ACV8 S22 6307-6327

Click to Print Reading 6307. Continuation about influx, and about the interaction of the soul and the body. That there is an influx from the spiritual world through angels and spirits into the affections and thoughts, has been given me to know so manifestly by the experience of many years, that nothing can be more manifest. I have felt the influx, not only as to the thoughts, but also as to the affections and when evils and falsities were flowing in, I was given to know from what hells they came; and when goods and truths, from what angels. This experience has consequently become so familiar to me that at last I have been able to know whence came every one of my thoughts and affections; and nevertheless my thoughts have been just like those which I had before. 6308. This influx is effected by means of spirits and angels. The order of the influx is that evil spirits first flow in, and the angels disperse their action. That there is such an influx the man does not perceive, because his thought is kept in freedom by means of the equilibration between these two influxes, and because he does not attend to such things; nor could the evil know if they did attend, because with them there is no equilibrium between evil and good. But they who are in good can know it; and they also know from the Word that there is something within which fights against the evil and falsity with them, and that the spiritual man fights against the natural; thus the angels, who are in man's interiors and in his spiritual things, against the evil spirits who are in his exteriors and in his natural things; and it is also from this that the church is called militant. But the evil which flows into the thought from the evil spirits, does the man no harm if he does not receive it; but if he receives it and transfers it from the thought into the will, he makes it his own; and he then goes over to the side of the infernal spirits, and withdraws from the angels of heaven. This is what the Lord teaches when He says that the things which enter into a man do not make him unclean; but the things which go out of him, because these go forth from the heart, that is, from the will (Mark 7:14-23). 6309. I have spoken with good spirits about the internal and the external man, saying that it is wonderful that few within the church believe (although they know it from the Word) that there is an internal man, distinct from the external, when yet they might know this from a slight daily inspection of their own thought and will, namely, from the fact that they often think interiorly otherwise than they do exteriorly; and what they think exteriorly, they let out into speech, into their faces, and into act; but not so what they think interiorly, for this they deeply hide, as is customary with dissemblers, hypocrites, and the deceitful. They who are in good may know this from the fact that they think they ought not to do so and so, rebuking themselves; from which it can be seen that there is an interior man, separate from the exterior. But the reason why they do not attend to this, or if they do attend do not perceive it is that they make life consist in the body; and also that when they immerse the whole thought in bodily and worldly things, insight into such subjects perishes, and even belief that the fact is so. This also it has been given me to know from experience. When I was in any heavenly idea, and dropped into thought about worldly and earthly things, instantly heavenly things perished so absolutely as scarcely to be acknowledged. The reason is that the things of the light of heaven become darkness when they fall into those which belong to the light of this world; for in themselves these two lights are contrary to each other. In order however that they may not be contrary, man is regenerated, and is also elevated from sensuous toward interior things; and insofar as he is elevated from sensuous things, so far he abandons evils and falsities. But he cannot be elevated unless he is in the good of faith and of life. 6310. The interiors of man are distinct according to degrees by means of derivations, and according to these degrees are also the lights. The internal sensuous, which is nearest the sensuous things of the body, has the most gross light. This light it has been given me to discern by much experience, and I have noticed that whenever I sank into this light, falsities and evils of many kinds presented themselves, and even things scandalous against heavenly and Divine things, besides things filthy and foul. The reason is that this light rules in the hells, and by means of it chiefly do the hells flow into man. When a man is in this light, his thought is in nearly the same light as that in which is his external sight, and is then almost in the body. Men who are in this light are to be called the Sensuous, for they do not think beyond the sensuous things of the body. What is beyond these they neither perceive nor believe, believing only that which they see and touch. In this light are they who have not at all cultivated things interior, living in neglect and contempt of all things rational and spiritual; and in this light are especially the avaricious and adulterers, and they who have lived in mere pleasures and in disgraceful idleness, and who consequently think what is filthy, and often what is scandalous, about the holy things of the church. 6311. In the light just referred to are as before said the hells, and in it also are some who are not so evil, that is, who have not been avaricious, adulterous, or voluptuous, but who have come into this light because they have not cultivated their rational. It was given me early one morning to see these spirits in a kind of twilight; they appeared in a public place, in crowds, carrying bags in which were crude materials, weighing them, and carrying them away. Some sirens were at that time not far off, and I heard them saying that they desired to be there, because they saw men with their eyes. For as sirens have been more adulterous than others, and also in opposition to all heavenly and spiritual things, they cannot see other spirits, except such as are in sensuous light, because they themselves are of the same character. 6312. As the hells are in this sensuous light, therefore unless a man is elevated out of it, he must needs perish. He is elevated by means of the good of faith. There are also hells which are in a more subtle sphere, where are they who have been inwardly malignant, and have devised many arts for depriving others of their goods, and have contrived many treacherous plans in order to obtain dominion. But it was observed that this sphere flows into the external sensuous sphere, and this at the back where are the involuntary things of man. Hence the sensuous sphere is so strong. 6313. When a man is being elevated toward interior things, he comes out of the gross sensuous light into a milder light, and at the same time is withdrawn from the influx of scandalous and filthy things, and is brought nearer to the things that belong to what is just and fair, because nearer to the angels who are with him, thus nearer to the light of heaven. This elevation from sensuous things was known to the ancients, even to the Gentiles, and therefore when the lower mind is withdrawn from sensuous things, their wise men said that it comes into interior light, and at the same time into a tranquil state, and into a kind of heavenly bliss; and from this they also concluded that the mind is immortal. Man is capable of being elevated still more interiorly, and the more interiorly he is elevated, the clearer is the light into which he comes; and at last he comes into the light of heaven, which light is nothing else than wisdom and intelligence from the Lord. The three heavens are distinguished in no other way than according to elevations toward interior things, thus also according to degrees of light; the third heaven, being in inmost things, is in the greatest light, thus in a wisdom which far surpasses the wisdom of the lower heavens. 6314. As it is with light, so also it is with the heat which is man's vital heat. This vital heat does not in the slightest degree derive its origin from the heat which is from the sun of this world; but from spiritual heat, which is love, and which proceeds from the Lord: the angels have this heat. Hence so far as man is in love, so far he is in vital heat. The body, however, is in the heat of the world, and so is the interior sensuous; but the vital heat flows into this heat and vivifies it. The purities and the grossnesses of this heat are circumstanced in the same way as are the lights. It is this heat which is meant by the holy fires in the Word, and therefore by these fires are there signified heavenly loves. But in the opposite sense it is this heat which is meant by the fires of hell, and therefore by these fires in the Word are signified infernal loves and their cupidities. 6315. A man who in his earthly life has been elevated from sensuous things by means of the good of faith, is alternately in sensuous and in interior light; when he is in worldly cares, in company where external things flourish, and in pleasures, he is in sensuous life; in this state he shuns and is also averse to speaking and thinking about God, and about the things that belong to faith; and if he were then to speak and think on these subjects, he would make light of them, unless at the moment he were to be elevated by the Lord toward interior things. When the same man is not in worldly things, but in interior light, he thinks from what is just and fair; and if he is in a still more interior light, he thinks from spiritual truth and good. He who is in the good of life is elevated from one light into the other; and into the more interior light in an instant when he begins to think evilly; for angels are near him. This has been given to know by much experience,...