Table of Contents

i. [Introduction] §§1-2

I. There are two worlds: the spiritual world, inhabited by spirits and angels, and the natural world, inhabited by men. §3

II. The spiritual world first existed and continually subsists from its own sun; and the natural world from its own sun. §4

III. The sun of the spiritual world is pure love from Jehovah God, who is in the midst of it. §5

IV. From that sun proceed heat and light; the heat proceeding from it is in its essence love, and the light from it is in its essence wisdom. §6

V. Both that heat and that light flow into man: the heat into his will, where it produces the good of love; and the light into his understanding, where it produces the truth of wisdom. §7

VI. Those two, heat and light, or love and wisdom, flow conjointly from God into the soul of man; and through this into his mind, its affections and thoughts; and from these into the senses, speech, and actions of the body. §8

VII. VII. The sun of the natural world is pure fire; and the world of nature first existed and continually subsists by means of this sun. §9

VIII. Therefore everything which proceeds from this sun, regarded in itself, is dead. §10

IX. That which is spiritual clothes itself with that which is natural, as a man clothes himself with a garment. §11

X. Spiritual things, thus clothed in a man, enable him to live as a rational and moral man, thus as a spiritually natural man. §12

XI. The reception of that influx is according to the state of love and wisdom with man. §13

XII. The understanding in a man can be raised into the light, that is, into the wisdom in which are the angels of heaven, according to the cultivation of his reason; and his will can be raised in like manner into the heat of heaven, that is, into love, according to the deeds of his life; but the love of the will is not raised, except so far as the man wills and does those things which the wisdom of the understanding teaches. §14

XIII. It is altogether otherwise with beasts. §15

XIV. There are three degrees in the spiritual world, and three degrees in the natural world, hitherto unknown, according to which all influx takes place. §16

XV. Ends are in the first degree, causes in the second, and effects in the third. §17

XVI. Hence it is evident what is the nature of spiritual influx from its origin to its effects. §§18-20

10. VIII. Therefore everything which proceeds from this sun, regarded in itself, is dead.

Who does not see from the rational faculty belonging to his understanding, if this be a little elevated above the things of the bodily senses, that love, regarded in itself, is alive, and that the appearance of its fire is life; and, on the contrary, that elementary fire, regarded in itself, is respectively dead; consequently, that the sun of the spiritual world, being pure love, is alive, and that the sun of the natural world, being pure fire, is dead; and that the case is the same with all the products which proceed and exist from them?

[2] There are two things which produce all the effects in the universe, LIFE and NATURE; and they produce them according to order, when life, from within, actuates nature. The case is otherwise when nature, from within, causes life to act, which occurs with those who place nature, which in itself is dead, above and within life, and thence wholly devote themselves to the pleasures of the senses and the lusts of the flesh, esteeming the spiritual things of the soul, and the truly rational things of the mind, as nothing. These persons, on account of this inversion, are those who are called THE DEAD: such are all atheistic materialists in the world, and all the satans in hell.

[3] They are also called the dead in the Word; as in David: “They joined themselves also unto Baal-Peor, and ate the sacrifices of the dead' (Psalm 106:28). The enemy persecutes my soul; he makes me to sit in darkness, as the dead of the world' (Psalm 143:3). “To hear the groaning of the prisoner, and to set at liberty the sons of death” (Psalm 102:20). And in Revelation: “I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and are dead. Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die” (3:1-2).

[4] They are called THE DEAD, because spiritual death is condemnation; and condemnation is the lot of those who believe life to be from nature, and thus believe the light of nature to be the light of life, and thereby conceal, suffocate, and extinguish every idea of God, of heaven, and of eternal life. In consequence of so doing, such persons are like owls, which see light in darkness, and darkness in light, that is, they see falsities as truths, and evils as goods, and, as the delights of evil are the delights of their hearts, they are not unlike those birds and beasts which devour dead bodies as choice delicacies, and scent the stenches arising from graves as balsamic odours. They also see no influx but such as is physical or natural; if, notwithstanding, they affirm influx to be spiritual, it is not from any idea of it, but from the mouth of their instructor.

4. -II-. The spiritual world first existed and continually subsists from its own sun; and the natural world from its own sun.

That there is one sun of the spiritual world and another of the natural world is because those worlds are altogether distinct from each other, and a world derives its origin from a sun. For a world in which all things are spiritual cannot originate from a sun, all the products of which are natural, since thus there would be physical influx, which, however, is contrary to order. That the world came into existence from the sun, and not the sun from the world, is evident from the consequence of the fact that the world, as to all things belonging to it, in general and in particular, subsists by means of the sun; and subsistence proves existence, hence it is said that subsistence is perpetual existence: thus it is evident that if the sun were removed its world would fall into chaos, and this chaos into nothing.

[2] That in the spiritual world there is a sun different from that in the natural world I am able to testify, for I have seen it: in appearance it is fiery, like our sun, of nearly the same magnitude, and at a distance from the angels as our sun is from men. It does not rise or set, however, but stands immovable in a middle altitude between the zenith and the horizon, whence the angels enjoy perpetual light and perpetual spring.

[3] A man given to reasoning, who knows nothing concerning the sun of the spiritual world, easily becomes insane in his idea of the creation of the universe. When he deeply considers it, he perceives no otherwise than that it is from nature; and because the origin of nature is the sun, that it is from its sun as a creator. Moreover, no one can have a perception of spiritual influx, unless he also knows its origin: for all influx proceeds from a sun; spiritual influx from its sun, and natural influx from its sun. The internal sight of a man, which is the sight of his mind, receives influx from the spiritual sun; but the external sight, which is that of the body, receives influx from the natural sun, and in operation they unite, just as the soul does with the body.

[4] Hence it is evident into what blindness, darkness, and stupidity those may fall who know nothing of the spiritual world and its sun; into blindness, because the mind, depending solely upon the sight of the eye, becomes in its reasonings like a bat, which flies by night in a wandering course, and sometimes into linen clothes which may be hanging up; into darkness, because the sight of the mind, when the sight of the eye is flowing into it from within, is deprived of all spiritual light [lumen], and becomes like that of an owl; into stupidity, because the man still thinks, but from natural things about spiritual, and not the other way round; consequently, idiotically, foolishly, and insanely.