462# 第四则灵界见闻如下：
我望向灵界的海滨，看见一座宏伟的船坞。我走近观看，见其中有大小船只，船上载着各类货物；又有男孩女孩坐在横板上，把货物分给愿意接受的人。他们说：“我们等着观看我们美丽的龟，它们就要从海里上升到我们这里来了。”
随即，我看见大小不等的龟；在它们的甲壳和鳞甲上，坐着小龟，正望向四周的岛屿。那些父龟有两个头：一个很大，周围覆有类似其身体甲壳的壳，因此发出红光；另一个很小，像普通龟的头，它们把这个小头缩入身体前部，也以不易看见的方式嵌入那个大头中。
但我的目光注视着那个发红光的大头，看见它有一张如人的脸，并与坐在横板上的男孩女孩说话，还舔他们的手。于是男孩女孩抚摸它们，并给它们食物和精美之物，又给它们贵重之物，如作衣服用的全丝织物、作桌子用的香木、作装饰用的紫色织物，以及作染色用的朱红颜料。
【2】我见这些事，便渴望知道它们代表什么；因为我知道，凡在灵界显现的一切，都是对应，代表属于情感并由此属于思维的属灵事物。
于是有声音从天上对我说：“你自己知道船坞代表什么，也知道船只代表什么，又知道船上的男孩女孩代表什么；但你不知道龟代表什么。”
他们说：“龟代表那里那些神职人员，他们把信仰与仁义及仁义的善工完全分开。他们在心里确认说，二者之间全无任何结合；他们认为，圣灵因子之功劳、借对父上帝的信仰进入人里面，并洁净人的内在，直到人自己的意志；他们把人的意志看作一个椭圆形平面；又认为，当圣灵的运行接近这个平面时，就从它的左侧绕过去，完全不触及它。如此，人的才智中内在或较高的部分便归于上帝，而外在或较低的部分则归于人；因此，在上帝面前，人所行的任何事，无论善恶，都不显现出来。善不显现，因为善是求功的；恶也不显现，因为恶就是恶。因为若善或恶显现在上帝面前，人就会因二者而灭亡。
既然如此，他们便认为，人可以意愿、思想、言说、实行任何自己所喜好的事，只要为世俗缘故谨慎自保即可。”
【3】我问：他们是否也断言，人可以这样思想上帝，即认为上帝并非无所不在、无所不知？
天上回答说：这在他们那里也是许可的。因为他们认为，对于一个已获得信仰、并借信仰得洁净与称义的人，上帝并不察看他任何思想和意志；并且，这人仍在其心智或才智的内在胸怀或较高区域中，保有他在信仰行为中所接受的信仰；而那行为有时会在人不知不觉中重新返回。
“这些就是那个小头所代表的。它们把小头缩入身体前部；当与平信徒说话时，又把它嵌入大头中。因为它们并不以小头同平信徒说话，而是以大头说话；这大头从前面看，好像具有人的脸。他们便从圣言向平信徒谈论爱、仁义、善工、十诫的诫命、悔改，并且几乎把圣言中关于这些事的一切都取出来讲论；但这时他们把小头嵌入大头中，凭这小头在自己里面理解为：这一切并不是为上帝和救恩而实行，而只是为公共和私人的利益而实行。
【4】然而，由于他们从圣言讲论这些事，尤其讲论福音、圣灵的运行和救赎，并且讲得悦耳而优雅，所以在听众面前，他们显得如美丽的人，又显得比地球上其余众人更有智慧。因此你也看见，坐在船上横板上的男孩女孩，把精美和贵重之物给了他们。
所以，你所看见、由龟所代表的，就是这些人。在你的世界里，他们与别人很少能被辨识出来，只能从这一点辨认：他们自以为比所有人都智慧，并且嘲笑别人，甚至也嘲笑那些在信仰教义上与他们相似、却不在这些奥秘中的人。他们在衣服上带着某种标记，借此使自己在彼此之间被认出。”
【5】那与我说话者又说：“关于他们对其他信仰事项的看法，我不向你说明，如他们对拣选、自由意志、洗礼和圣餐的看法；这些都是他们不公开宣扬的事，但我们在天上知道。
然而，因为他们在世时就是这样，而死后不允许任何人说出与自己所想不同的话，所以他们那时不能不从自己思想的疯狂中说话，于是被视为疯癫之人，并被逐出各群体；最后被投入无底坑中——启示录九章二节所说的那坑——成为肉体化的灵，看起来如埃及人的木乃伊。因为他们心智的内在已生出硬皮，这是由于他们在世时也在其中设置了隔墙。
由他们组成的地狱群体，处于由马基雅维利主义者组成的地狱群体边界；他们常从一个群体进入另一个群体，并称彼此为同伴；但他们又会离开，因为二者有所不同：这些人尚有某种关于借信仰而称义之行为的宗教成分，而马基雅维利主义者那里则毫无宗教成分。”
【6】我看见他们被逐出各群体，并聚集起来，要被投下去。此后，我看见一艘船在空中飞行，有七张帆；船长与水手穿着紫色衣服，帽上戴着华美的月桂冠，高喊说：“看哪，我们在天上！我们是身披紫袍的博士，并且在众人之上戴着桂冠，因为我们是全欧洲神职人员中众智慧者的首领。”
我对此甚感惊异。有人告诉我，这些乃是先前那些如龟之人所发出的骄傲形像，以及称为幻相的观念性思维。他们如今已作为疯癫者被逐出各群体，并聚集在一处，站在同一个地方。
于是我渴望同他们谈话，便走到他们所站之处，向他们致意，并说：“你们就是那些把人的内在与外在分开，把圣灵在信仰中的运行同祂在信仰之外与人协作的运行分开，并由此把上帝与人分开的人吗？你们这样做，岂不是不仅像许多其他神职博士那样，把仁义及其作为从信仰中除去，而且还把信仰本身——就其在人面前向上帝显明而言——从人那里除去了吗？
【7】但请问，你们愿意我就此事凭理性与你们谈，还是凭圣经与你们谈？”
他们说：“先凭理性谈。”
于是我说：“人的内在与外在怎能分开？谁不从共同知觉看见，或至少能够看见：人的一切内在皆推进并延续到外在，直到其最外在之处，好产生其效果，并施行其作为？内在岂不是为着外在而存在，好终止于外在，立足于外在，并由此存在吗？这几乎如柱子立在柱座上一样。
你们可以看见，若无连续，因而无结合，最外在之物便会解体，并如空中的气泡般消散。谁能否认，上帝在人里面的内在运行有亿万之多，而人对此一无所知？人何须知道这些，只要他知道最外在之物即可；在最外在之物中，他以自己的思想和意志同上帝同在。
【8】这可用一个例子来说明。人知道自己言语的内在运行吗？比如肺如何吸入空气，并以空气充满肺泡、支气管和肺叶；它又如何把空气送入气管，并在那里把空气转为声音；声音又如何在声门中借喉而受调节；随后舌头如何把声音分节，嘴唇如何完成其分节，使之成为言语？
这一切内在运行，人毫无所知；然而它们岂不都是为了最外在之物，使人能够说话吗？你若从这些内在运行中移去或分离任何一环，使之不与最外在之物连续，人还能说话超过木桩吗？
【9】再举一例。双手是人的最外在部分。延续到双手的内在，岂不是从头经颈项，再经胸部、肩胛、上臂和前臂而来？其中有无数肌肉组织，无数运动纤维束，无数神经和血管丛，又有许多骨节，连同其韧带和膜。人对此知道什么呢？然而他的双手却由这一切及其中每一部分而运行。
假设这些内在于腕部附近向左或向右折转，而不通过连续进入双手，双手岂不会从前臂脱落，并像某种被扯下的无生命之物一样腐烂吗？甚至，若你们愿意相信，这情形就如身体被斩首一样。
人的心智及其两种生命——意志与理智——若也是如此：倘若属于信仰与仁义的神圣运行止于中途，而不借连续一直推进到人那里，那么人无疑不只是兽类，而且是腐朽的木桩。这些是凭理性所见。
【10】现在，若你们愿意听，同样的事也合乎圣经。主岂不是说：“你们要住在我里面，我也住在你们里面。……我是葡萄树，你们是枝子；住在我里面的，我也住在他里面，这人就多结果子。”（约15:4—5）
果子岂不就是善工，也就是主借人所行，而人从自己、却出于主所行的善工吗？
主又说：祂站在门外叩门；凡给祂开门的，祂就进去，与他一同坐席，他也与祂一同坐席（启3:20）。
主岂不是赐下银子和银锭，使人拿去经营并获利，并照所得之利赐永生吗？（太25:14—30；路19:13—26）
又，主岂不是说，祂要照人在祂葡萄园中的劳作赐给各人报偿吗？（太20:1—17）
然而这些只是少数例子；若要从圣言中列出人当像树一样结出果子、当照诫命行事、当爱上帝和邻舍等等，足可写满数卷。
【11】但我知道，你们自己的理智无法与圣言中的这些话形成它们本身所具有的共同意义；虽然你们也说这些话，你们的观念却把它们扭曲了。你们不能不如此，因为你们就交流以及由此而来的结合而言，把上帝的一切从人那里移除了；那么剩下的，岂不连敬拜的一切也都被移除了？”
此后，他们在天上的光中向我显现；这光揭露并显明每个人的真实状态。于是，他们不再像先前那样显现在空中的船上，仿佛在天上；也不再穿着紫袍，头戴桂冠；而是在一片沙地上，身着碎布衣，腰间缠着好像渔网的东西，透过那网可以看见他们的赤裸。随后，他们被投入那个处于马基雅维利主义者边界上的群体中。
462# 记事四：
我曾在灵界眺望海岸，看到一个宏伟的港口。我走近它，凑近一看，只见里面有大大小小的船只，满载着各种各样的货物；坐在那里的长凳上的男孩和女孩们正在将货物分发给那些想要的人。他们说：“我们正等着看我们美丽的海龟。它们很快就会从海里爬出来，来到我们身边。”看哪！我看到大大小小的海龟，龟壳和鳞甲上还驼着幼龟，面对着周围的岛屿。父海龟有两个头，一个头很大，上面覆盖着外壳，就像它们身体的外壳，它们因此泛着红光；另一个头很小，就是海龟所拥有的那种；它们把小头拉回身体前部，以某种看起不见的方式插入大头。不过，我一直盯着那大红头，发现这头有一张像人一样的脸，正在与坐在长凳上的男孩和女孩们说话，还舔他们的手。这些男孩和女孩们则抚摸它们，给它们食物和美味，以及贵重物品，如做衣服的丝绸，做建筑材料的柏木（译注：有英文版本为做药片的百里香木），装饰用的紫色料，上色或作胭脂用的朱红颜料。
看到这些事物，我很想知道它们代表什么，因为我知道，出现在灵界的一切事物都是对应，代表与情感和源于情感的思维有关的属灵事物。于是，他们从天上与我说话，说：“你自己知道港口和船只，以及船上的男孩和女孩们分别代表什么；但你不知道这些海龟代表什么。”他们继续说：“海龟代表那里的神职人员当中那些将信仰与仁爱及其善行完全分离的人。他们在自己的心智中肯定，它们之间显然没有结合；而是圣灵通过对父神的信仰，因圣子的功德而进入一个人，并洁净他的内层，甚至直到他自己的意愿；如他们所看到的，人类的意愿就像一种椭圆形的平面。他们声称，当圣灵的运作接近这个平面时，它会从左侧绕过它，根本不触碰它；因此，人本性的内在或更高部分是为了神，外在或更低部分是为了人；因此，凡人所行的，无论善恶，都不会出现在神面前：良善不会出现，因为它是寻求功德的；邪恶不会出现，因为它是邪恶的；如果这些出现在神面前，那么人就会因其中的任何一个而灭亡。既然如此，人可以自由地意愿，思考，说话，并做他想做的任何事，只要他在世人面前小心谨慎。”
我问他们是否也断言，可以认为神不是全在和全知的。他们从天上回答说：“这也是允许的，因为在一个已经获得信仰，已经洁净，并由此称义的人里面，神不理会与他的思维和意愿有关的任何东西；在他的内心深处，或在他心智或本性的更高区域，他仍保留着他在信仰的行为中所获得的信仰，这种行为有时可能会在人没有意识到它的情况下返回。这些就是小头所代表的事物，当与平信徒交谈时，他们会把小头拉进身体前部，也会插进大头，因为他们不用小头与平信徒说话，而是用大头，大头出现在前面，好像具有一张人脸。他们出于圣言与平信徒谈论爱、仁爱、善行、十诫、悔改，从圣言中选择那里关于这些主题所说的几乎所有经文。但在如此行时，他们将小头插进大头，由此在自己里面从内心明白，这些事没有一样是为了神和救赎而做的，只是为了公共和私人利益而做的。
“然而，由于他们以一种令人愉悦和优雅的方式出于圣言谈论这些事，尤其谈论福音、圣灵的运作和救赎，所以在听众看来，他们似乎是英俊潇洒的人，智慧胜过全世界其他所有人。这就是为何如你所看到的，坐在轮船长凳上的男孩和女孩们将美味和贵重物品送给他们；他们就是你所看到由海龟来代表的人。在你们的世界，他们与其他人几乎无法区分，除非通过这一点来区分：他们认为自己是最有智慧的人，并嘲笑他人，甚至嘲笑那些持有类似信仰教义，但不精通这些奥秘的人。他们的衣服上有一个标记或徽章，他们由此而与其他人区别开来。”
与我交谈的人说：“我不会告诉你他们在信仰的其它问题上所持的观点，如选民、自由意志、洗礼和圣餐。他们不会透露这些观点，但我们在天上知道它们。由于这就是他们在世界上的性质，而死后，任何人都不允许想一套，说一套，所以他们只能出于其疯狂的思维说话，被视为疯狂，并被赶出社群，最后被送入启示录（9:2）中提到的深渊之坑。他们在那里变成肉体灵，看上去就像埃及木乃伊。事实上，他们心智的内层已经生出一种硬茧，因为他们在世时设置了障碍，或说把这些内层关在了一道屏障后面。由他们形成的地狱社群与马基雅维利主义者的地狱社群接壤，他们随意地或经常从这个社群到另一个社群，并称彼此为同伴。但他们最终回去了，因为他们之间有这种区别：他们有关于通过信仰称义的行为的某种宗教，而马基雅维利主义者根本没有任何宗教信仰。”
我看到这些灵人被赶出社群，聚集在一起被扔下去后，又看见一艘七帆船在空中飞行，船上的官长和水手穿着紫衣，帽子上饰有华丽的月桂花冠，他们大声喊道：“看哪，我们在天堂；我们是身着紫袍的博士，尤其是戴着桂冠，因为我们是欧洲所有神职人员中的智者之首。”我想知道这是怎么回事，被告知，它们是骄傲和被称为幻想的理想思维的形像，源于那些之前看似海龟的人；但现在，他们因疯狂而被赶出了社群，并聚成一组，一起站在一个地方。于是，我想和他们谈谈，就走近他们所站的那个地方，向他们打招呼，然后说：“你们就是那些将人的内在和外在分离，将圣灵在信仰之内的运作和圣灵在信仰之外与人的合作分离，从而将神和人分离的人吗？这样你们不是像神职人员中的其他许多教师一样，不仅从信仰中除去仁爱本身及其作为，而且还在信仰在神面前显现方面，从人那里除去了信仰本身，或说还除去了信仰本身，因为没有仁爱和善行，人们就无法向神展示他们的信仰吗？
“不过，我问你们，你们是希望我从理性还是从圣经来与你们谈论这个问题？”他们说：“先从理性来谈谈吧。”于是我作了如下发言：“内在人与外在人怎能分离呢？凭普遍感知，谁看不出，或不能看出，人的一切内层都发出并延续到他的外层，甚至直到最外层，以便它们可以产生它们的结果，完成它们的作为？内在不是为外在而存在的吗？好叫内在可以终止于外在，并继续存在于它们里面，从而拥有存在，就像一根柱子立于其基座上一样。你们可以看到，若没有一个延续，因而没有一个结合，最外层就会像空气中的肥皂泡一样溶解和破裂。谁能否认，神在人身上的内在运作是无数的，而人对此一无所知？事实上，知道它们对他来说有什么好处呢？他只需知道最外层，知道他以自己的思维和意愿与神一起在最外层中。
“这一点可举例来说明：人知道他说话时的内在运作吗？如肺如何吸入空气，然后充满小泡、支气管和肺叶；它们如何将这空气排入气管，在那里将它转化为声音；声音如何在喉咙的帮助下在声门中被调整；舌头如何将它清晰表达出来，嘴唇如何完成发音，从而使它变成言语。人对这一切内在运作一无所知，它们难道不是为了最外层，好叫人可以拥有说话的能力而存在的吗？将这些内在中的一个从它与最外层的连续联系中除去，人不就像一块木头一样，还能说话吗？
“再举一例：两只手是人的终端。延伸到那里的内层难道不是通过颈部，也通过胸部、肩膀、手臂和前臂而来自头部吗？还有无数肌肉组织，无数运动纤维，无数神经和血管，以及许多骨关节及其膜和韧带。人对这些东西了解多少呢？然而，手的行动力量却取决于它们中的每一个和全部。假如这些内层在手腕处向右或向左偏转，而不是延续到手上，那么这手岂不会从前臂脱落，就像从身体上撕下来、失去生命的东西一样烂掉吗？事实上，若你们愿意相信，这手就像人被斩首后的身体。如果神性运作，即信仰和仁爱的运作，中途停止，没有通过一个连续过程直达人自己，那么人类心智及其两种生命，即意愿和理解力，也会如此。显然，这时人不仅是牲畜，还是朽木。这些事是合乎理性的。
“你们若愿意听，这些事也与圣经相符。主不是说，你们要住在我里面，我也住在你们里面。我是葡萄树，你们是枝子。住在我里面的，我也住在他里面，这人就多结果子（约翰福音15:4，5）吗？果子不是主通过人所做，并且人貌似凭自己从主那里所做的善行吗？主不也说，祂站在门外叩门，要进到那开门的人那里去，祂与他，他与祂一同坐席（启示录3:20）吗？主不是赐下英镑和才干，叫人用来做买卖赚钱，祂按人所赚的赐他永生（马太福音25:14-30；路加福音19:13-26）吗？还有：
祂按照各人在祂葡萄园里的劳动赏赐各人。（马太福音20:1-16）
这些只是少数经文。关于这个主题，即：人应当像树一样结出果实；应当遵行诫命，爱神、爱邻，等等，来自圣言的引文可以填满几页纸。
“但我知道，你们的自我聪明无法想象任何在真正意义上与来自圣言的这些经文和谐一致的东西；虽然你们引用它们，但你们的观念仍扭曲它们。你们不能不这样做，因为在交流和随之而来的结合方面，你们从人身上除去了神的一切。那么除了移除敬拜的一切外，还剩下什么呢？”后来，我在天堂之光中看到这些灵人，这光揭示并显明每个人的真实性质。这时，他们不再像之前那样出现在空中的船中，仿佛在天堂，也不再身穿紫袍、头戴月桂花冠，而是在沙地上，衣衫褴褛，腰束像渔网那样的网，透过这网可以看到他们赤裸的身体。然后，他们被送到了与马基雅维利主义者的社群接壤的社群。
462. The fourth memorable occurrence. I looked over to a seacoast in the spiritual world. There I saw a magnificent harbor. I went to it and examined it more closely. There were large and small vessels there carrying merchandise of every different kind. Boys and girls were sitting on them distributing the wealth to anyone who wanted it. They said, "We are waiting to see our beautiful sea turtles. They will soon be coming up out of the sea to us. "
Then I saw the sea turtles, large and small. They had little baby sea turtles riding on their shells, looking around at the surrounding islands. The parent turtles had two heads. One head was large and was covered in a shell like the shell on their body, which made them look reddish. The other head was small like a normal turtles head. They would retract this smaller head into the front part of their body. By an unseen method, they would also put this smaller head inside their larger head.
I kept my focus, however, on their large, reddish heads. I noticed that these heads had faces like those of human beings. They were talking with the boys and girls on the seats in the boats and licking the children's hands. Then the boys and girls began stroking the sea turtles and giving them things: rich, wonderful food, and also expensive gifts such as silk for clothing, cypress wood for building material, purple cloth for beautification, and scarlet dye for dying cloth.
[2] When I saw these things, I was eager to know what they meant, because I knew that everything visible in the spiritual world is a correspondence and represents something spiritual having to do with feelings and thoughts.
Then people began talking to me from heaven, saying, "You know what the harbor represents, and also the boats, and the boys and girls on them. You don't know what the sea turtles represent. "
They continued, "The sea turtles represent members of the clergy in the spiritual world who keep their faith completely separate from goodwill and its good works. Inwardly in themselves they assert that there is obviously no connection between faith and goodwill; instead the Holy Spirit enters into us through our faith in God the Father on account of the Son's merit and purifies our inner levels, including our will. As they see it, the human will is like an oval plane. When the action of the Holy Spirit comes near that plane, it veers around it to the left without touching it at all. The inner or higher part of the human character, then, belongs to God, while the outer or lower part is all our own. Nothing that we do appears before God - either good or evil. The good things we do don't appear, because we do them to earn merit; and the evil things we do don't appear, because they are evil. If our doings did appear before God, we would perish on both counts. Therefore we are allowed to intend, think, speak, and do whatever we want as long as we are careful before the world. "
[3] I asked, "Is it acceptable to them to think about God as not being omnipresent or omniscient?"
The people from heaven said, "This is also acceptable as far as they are concerned, because if people have developed faith and have been purified and justified as a result, God doesn't see through to anything they think or intend. Such people keep in the inner core or higher region of their mind or character the faith that they originally accepted when they experienced the purifying operation of faith. Those spirits believe that sometimes the purifying operation of faith can come to us again without our knowing it.
"These beliefs are represented by the small head they pull into the front of their body or else insert into the large head when they are talking to lay people. They don't use their small head to talk to lay people. They use the large one that looks like it has something of a human face on the front of it. They base their conversation with lay people on the Word, discussing love, goodwill, good works, the Ten Commandments, and repentance. From the Word they quote practically everything it has to say on these subjects. Then they insert the small head into the large one. In their small head, they privately believe that all the things just mentioned don't have to be done for God's sake or for the sake of salvation, but just for the sake of public and private benefit.
[4] "Because they say smooth and elegant things based on the Word about these subjects, especially about the good news of the gospel, the actions of the Holy Spirit, and salvation, they appear to the people who hear them to be people of beauty and of greater wisdom than anyone else in the world. That is also why you saw that they were given luxuries and expensive items by the boys and girls sitting on the seats in the boats.
"These then are the people you saw represented as sea turtles. In your world, they are hard to differentiate from others except for the fact that they think they are wiser than everyone else and laugh at others - even people who have a similar view of faith as their own but don't share in their mysteries. They wear a particular insignia on their clothing that they use to identify themselves as set apart from others. "
[5] The person speaking with me said, "I am not going to tell you what they feel on the other topics related to faith: predestination, free choice, baptism, and the Holy Supper. They don't make their views on these topics public, but we in heaven know what they are.
"This is what they are like in the world. After death no one can speak anything except what he or she really thinks. Therefore because they then cannot help speaking the insane things they think, they are considered insane and are thrown out of the communities they are in. Eventually they are sent down into the pit of the abyss mentioned in Revelation 9:2. They become mindlessly earthly spirits. They look like Egyptian mummies. A callus develops over the interiors of their mind, because even in the world they put a boundary around them.
"There is a hellish community of these people right next to the hellish community of Machiavellians. They often go from the one community to the other - they call each other colleagues - but they leave because there is a difference between the two communities: they themselves have some religious spirit based on the act of justification by faith, but there is no religious spirit among the Machiavellians. "
[6] After seeing them being thrown out of the communities they had been in and being gathered together to be sent down, I saw a boat with seven sails flying through the air. In it there were captains and sailors wearing purple robes. They had magnificent laurel wreaths on their caps. They were shouting, "Look at us in heaven! We are doctors decorated with purple and more laureled than all the rest! We are the wisest of all the clergy in Europe!"
I wondered what this could possibly be. I was told that these were the arrogant pictures and mental images called fantasies on the part of the people I had seen before as sea turtles and more recently as insane people being thrown out of their former communities and gathered together in one place.
At that point I felt an urge to talk to those people. I went to the place where they were staying, greeted them, and said, "Are you the people who see our inner and our outer levels as being disconnected; who see the Holy Spirit's operation on us within the realm of faith as being disconnected from the Holy Spirit's cooperation with us outside the realm of faith; and who therefore see God as being disconnected from us? In that case you have not only taken goodwill and its works away from faith, as many other professors among the clergy have done, but you have also done away with faith itself in the sense that [without goodwill and good works] people have no way to demonstrate their faith to God.
[7] "Let me ask: would you like me to address this issue with you on the basis of reason or on the basis of Sacred Scripture?"
"Start with reason," they said.
So I said, "How can the inner and outer selves in people be disconnected? Surely everyone sees based on general awareness (or is at least able to see) that all the things inside us extend and are continued to the outer parts of us, even into the outermost parts, in order to have their effect and do their work. What is on the outside of us exists for the sake of what is on the inside of us, to give it a place of termination and something to rest on in order to have continued existence, much the way a base supports a column.
"If there were no continuity and connection, the outermost things would fall apart and burst like bubbles in the air. God carries out millions of processes in us that we know nothing about. How would it help us to know about them? All we need is to pay attention to the outermost areas where we and our thinking and willing are together with God.
[8] "I will illustrate this with an example: Do we know the inner functions involved in our speaking? Do we know, for example, how the lungs pull in air and fill the air sacs, bronchial tubes, and lobes with air? Do we know how the lungs expel that air into the trachea and there turn it into sound? Do we know how that sound is modified in our glottis with the help of our larynx? Do we know how the tongue then articulates the sound and the lips complete the articulation so that speaking occurs? All those inner functions, about which we know nothing, exist for the sake of one outer function: enabling us to speak. Break the continuity between any one of those inner functions and the outer functions - could we speak any more than a piece of wood can?
[9] "Take another example: Our hands are two of our extremities. There are inner parts that extend into our hands from our head through our neck, and then through our chest, shoulder blades, upper arms, and lower arms. There are countless muscle tissues, countless arrays of motor fibers, countless troops of nerves and blood vessels, and a number of bone joints with ligaments and membranes involved. Do we know anything about them? And yet every one of them is involved in making our hands work. Suppose that as those inner parts reached our wrist they were sent off in another direction to the left or right and did not run all the way into our hands. Our hands would just dangle from our forearms like disconnected things, bereft of spirit, and rot. In fact, believe it or not, our hands would then be just like a body with its head cut off.
"It would be exactly the same with our mind and its two lives, the will and the intellect, if the divine functions related to faith and goodwill were to stop midway and not extend all the way into us. Truly, if that were the case we would be less than brutes; we would be mere pieces of dead wood shot through with rottenness.
"The points just made follow the lines of reason.
[10] "Now - if you are still willing to listen to me - the same points also accord with Sacred Scripture. The Lord says, 'Live in me and I [shall live] in you. I am the vine and you are the branches. Those who live in me and I in them bear much fruit' (John 15:4-5). Surely those fruits are the good works that the Lord does through us and that we do on our own from the Lord. The Lord also says that he is standing at our door and knocking, and that if we open it, he will come in and will dine with us and we with him (Revelation 3:20). The Lord gives us money and talents so that we will trade with them and make a profit, and if we make a profit he gives us eternal life (Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:12-26). The Lord gives us all a reward according to our labor in his vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16). But these passages are just a few. Whole volumes could be filled with quotations from the Word that say we are to produce fruit like a tree, to work on following the commandments, to love God and our neighbor, and more.
[11] "I am aware, however, that your own intelligence as it truly is cannot have anything in common with these quotations from the Word. Although you yourselves quote them, your ideas nonetheless pervert them. You cannot help it, because you deny that anything having to do with God could be shared with or joined to humankind. What then is left but all the rituals of worship?"
Later on I saw them in the light of heaven, which uncovers and manifests what people are really like. Then they did not seem as they had before. They were not flying through the air in a ship, as though through heaven itself. They did not look like they had fine purple robes or laurel wreaths on their heads. They were instead in a sandy place in clothes made out of rags, with something like fishnets wrapped around their waists that still showed their nakedness. Then they were sent down to the community near the Machiavellians.
462. The fourth experience 1
In the spiritual world I looked towards the sea-coast and saw a splendid port. On approaching I looked inside and there lay boats both great and small, containing cargoes of every kind; and on their thwarts sat boys and girls who distributed the goods to any that wished. 'We are waiting,' they said, 'for our lovely turtles to appear. They will come out of the sea to us at any moment.'
Then I saw turtles, both small and great, on whose shells and scales sat baby turtles, all looking towards the surrounding islands. The father turtles had two heads, a large one covered with shell like that of their bodies, which gave them a ruddy look; the other a small one of the sort turtles have, which they could draw back into the forepart of their bodies, and could make invisible by inserting it into the larger head. But I kept my gaze on the large, ruddy head, and made out that it had a face like a human being, and was talking with the boys and girls on the thwarts and was licking their hands. The boys and girls fondled them and gave them tit-bits and delicacies, as well as valuable goods such as silk for clothes, citron-wood for tables, purple for ornament and scarlet for dyeing.
[2] On seeing these I wanted to know what they represented, because I know that all sights seen in the spiritual world are correspondences, representing the spiritual effects of affection and the thought it produces. Then I was spoken to from heaven and told: 'You know yourself what the port and the ships represent, as well as the boys and girls on the thwarts; but you do not know what the turtles are. They represent,' they said, 'those of the clergy there who totally separate faith from charity and its good deeds, insisting to themselves that there is obviously no possibility of linking them, but the Holy Spirit by means of faith in God the Father for the sake of the Son's merit enters into a person and purifies him inwardly even as far as his own will, which they imagine as a sort of oval plane. When the working of the Holy Spirit approaches this plane, it twists aside around its left edge without touching it at all, so that the interior or upper part of the person's character is for God, and the exterior or lower part is for man. Thus nothing the person does appears in God's sight, neither good nor bad; the good does not, because this would be to acquire merit, and the bad does not because it is bad. Either of these, if it were presented to God's sight, would destroy the person, Since this is so, a person may will, think, speak and do whatever he pleases, so long as he takes precautions from a worldly point of view,'
[3] I asked whether they also held that one might think of God as not being omnipresent and omniscient. I was told from heaven that this too is allowed them, because in the case of one who has acquired faith and been purified and justified by it, God pays no attention to any thought or will on his part, but he still retains in the inward recess or higher region of his mind or character the faith which he had received by its activity, and that this activity may from time to time recur without the person's knowledge. 'These facts are represented by the small head which they draw back into the forepart of their bodies and also insert into the larger head when talking to laymen. For in speaking to them they do not use the small head, but the large one, the front of which has a kind of human face. Their talk with them is based on the Word, about love, charity, good deeds, the Ten Commandments, repentance; and they quote from the Word almost everything which is said there on these subjects. But then they insert the small head into the large one, which allows them inwardly to understand that these things are not to be done for God's sake or for salvation, but only for the sake of public or private advantage.
[4] 'But because they base their remarks on these subjects on the Word, especially in speaking with great charm and elegance of the Gospel, the working of the Holy Spirit and salvation, they seem to their hearers like handsome men endowed with wisdom beyond all others on the globe. This was why you saw them being given delicacies and valuable goods by the boys and girls sitting on the thwarts in the boats. So these are the people you saw represented as turtles. In your world they are hard to tell apart from others, except for the fact that they think they excel all others in wisdom, laughing at others, including those who hold similar views on faith, but are not privy to their secrets. They carry a seal with them in their clothing, by which they can make themselves known to others of their sort.'
[5] The person talking with me said: 'I shall not tell you their opinions on other matters to do with faith, such as the elect, free will, baptism and the Holy Supper. These are opinions that they do not divulge, though we in heaven know them. However, since this is the sort of people they are in the world, and after death no one is allowed to speak otherwise than he thinks, they are considered insane, because they are then unable to speak except for the mad ideas that fill their thoughts. So they are ejected from their communities, eventually being cast down into the pit of the abyss (mentioned in Revelation 9:2), becoming bodily spirits and looking like Egyptian mummies. A hard skin is drawn over the interiors of their minds, because in the world too they had set up a barrier there. The community they form in hell is adjacent to the one there composed of Machiavellians; they constantly visit one another and call themselves companions. But they leave them on account of their difference, in that they have some religious feeling about the act of justification by faith, while the Machiavellians have none.'
[6] After seeing them expelled from their communities and brought together ready to be cast down, I saw in the air a ship sailing under seven sails, and in it ships' officers and seamen dressed in purple with magnificent laurels on their hats. 'Here we are in heaven,' they shouted, 'we are purple-clad doctors, adorned with finer laurels than anyone else, because we are the leading wise men of all the clergy in Europe.' I wondered what this was, and I was told that they were pictures of pride and imaginary thoughts, known as fantasies, arising from those who previously appeared as turtles; now being cast out of their communities as insane, they were gathered into one group and were now standing in one place.
Then wishing to talk with them I approached the place where they were standing and greeted them. 'Are you,' I said, 'the people who separated people's internals from their externals, and the working of the Holy Spirit as in faith from the Spirit's co-operation with man outside of faith, thus separating God from man? Did you not by this take away not only charity itself and its deeds from faith, as many other doctors of the clergy do, but also faith itself in so far as it is displayed by man in the sight of God?
[7] But would you prefer me to talk to you on this subject by the light of reason, or by drawing upon Holy Scripture?' 'Speak first,' they said, 'by the light of reason.'
So I spoke and said: 'How can a person's internal and external be separated? Can anyone endowed with normal powers of perception fail to see, or fail to be capable of seeing, that all of a person's interiors extend into and are continued into his exteriors, reaching even to his outermost level so as to bring about their effects and perform what they want to do? Surely the internals exist for the sake of the externals, so that these may be where they end, and they may rest on them, so coming into being, very much as a column stands on its base. You can see that, if they were discontinuous and so not joined, the outermost layers would collapse and burst like a bubble in the air. Can anyone deny that the inward workings of God in a person number billions, all unknown to the person concerned; and what profit is it to know about them, so long as the outermost layers are known, the point at which he is in his thought and will together with God?
[8] 'Let us take an example to illustrate this. Surely no one is aware of the inward workings of his speech: how the lungs draw in air, which fills the vesicles, bronchi and lobes; how he expels the air into the trachea and there turns it into sound; how the sound is modified in the glottis by the help of the larynx, and how the tongue then articulates it, the lips completing the articulation, so that speech is produced. All those inward workings, of which the person is totally unaware, are for the sake of the end product, the person's ability to speak. Take away or separate one of those internal processes so that it is no longer continuous with the end product, and a person could no more talk than a block of wood.
[9] 'Let us take another example. The two hands form the extremities of the human body. But the internal parts which form a continuous link with them run from the head through the neck, then the chest, shoulder-blades, arms and elbows; and there are countless muscular tissues, countless rows of motor fibres, countless bundles of nerves and blood-vessels, and many joints of bones with their ligaments and membranes - is anyone aware of any of this? Yet it takes every single one of them to make the hands function. Suppose the internal parts twisted back to the left or the right around the wrist-joint and did not continue into the hands; would not the hand then fall away from the elbow and rot away like any lifeless part torn off? Or if you prefer the idea, it would be like what happens to the body when a person is beheaded. This is exactly what would happen to the human mind, together with its two kinds of life, the will and the understanding, if the Divine workings which have to do with faith and charity stopped mid-way, and did not extend without a break to man. To be sure, man then would be not merely an animal, but a rotten block of wood. Such conclusions are the product of reason.
[10] 'Now if you are willing to listen, the same things are in accordance with Holy Scripture. Does not the Lord say:
Remain in me and I in you. I am the vine and you are the branches. If someone remains in me and I in him, he bears much fruit, John 15:4-5.
Surely the fruits are the good deeds which the Lord does by means of man, and man does of himself under the Lord's guidance. The Lord also says that He stands at the door and knocks, and He goes in to anyone who opens the door, and dines with him and he with the Lord (Revelation 3:20). Does not the Lord give minas and talents for man to trade with and make a profit, and does He not give everlasting life in accordance with his profit (Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:13-26)? Or again, does He not give each man his pay in proportion to the work he does in the Lord's vineyard (Matthew 20:1-17)? These are but a few examples; pages could be filled with quotations from the Word showing that man should produce fruit like a tree, should act according to the commandments, love God and the neighbour, and much more besides.
[11] 'But I know that your own intelligence cannot have anything in common, regarded as it is essentially, with these teachings from the Word. Although you talk about them, your ideas pervert them. Nor can you help yourselves, because you take away from man everything that is God's as regards communication and the linking it produces. What is then left, but merely everything that has to do with public worship?'
Later on these people appeared to me in the light of heaven, which uncovers and makes visible what sort of person each one is. Then they did not appear as before in a ship sailing through the air as if in heaven, nor did the people in it have purple clothing and laurels around their heads. But they were in a sandy place, clothed in rags, with nets like fishermen's round their lower parts, through which their nakedness was visible. Then they were sent down to join a community which was adjacent to that of the Machiavellians.
Footnotes:
1. Repeated from Apocalypse Revealed 463.
462. Fourth Memorable Relation:
Looking toward the seashore in the spiritual world, I saw a splendid dockyard. I went near and looked into it, and behold, there were large and small vessels, and in them merchandise of every kind, and on benches there were sitting boys and girls distributing the merchandise to all who wanted it.
And they said, "We are waiting to see our beautiful tortoises, which will soon rise up out of the sea to us."
And behold, I saw both large and small tortoises, on the shells and scales of which sat young tortoises looking toward the surrounding islands. The paternal tortoises had two heads, a large one covered over with a shell like the shells on their bodies, which gave them a reddish hue, and a small one, such as tortoises have; this they drew back into the forepart of the body, and also, in some unseen way, inserted into the larger head.
But I kept my eyes on the large red head; and I saw that it had a face like the face of a man, and it talked with the boys and girls on the seats and licked their hands. Then the boys and girls patted them, and gave them food and dainties, and also costly things, such as silk for clothing, thyine-wood for tables, purple for decorations, and scarlet for coloring.
[2] Seeing these things, I wished to know what they represented, as I knew that all things that appear in the spiritual world are correspondences, and represent the spiritual things pertaining to affection and to thought therefrom.
They then spoke to me from heaven and said, "You yourself know what the dockyard represents, and the ships, and the boys and girls that are on them; but you do not know what the tortoises signify." And they said, "The tortoises represent such of the clergy there as altogether separate faith from charity and its good works, affirming in themselves, that there is clearly no conjunction of these, but that the Holy Spirit, through man's faith in God the Father on account of the merit of the Son, enters into man, and purifies his interiors even to his own will; out of which they make a sort of oval plane; and they claim that when the operation of the Holy Spirit comes near this plane, it bends itself around it towards the left and does not touch it at all; so that the inner or higher part of man's nature is for God, and the outer or lower part for man; consequently nothing that man does, whether good or evil, is apparent to God - not the good, because this is a matter of merit, nor the evil, because it is evil, for if either of these were to appear to God, man would perish because of it. And this being so, man is at liberty to will and think and say and do whatever he pleases, provided he is discreet before the world."
[3] I asked whether they also asserted that man is permitted to think of God as not omnipresent and omniscient.
They answered from heaven that this is permitted, for the reason that in a man who has acquired faith, and has been purified and justified thereby, God does not look at anything pertaining to his thought and will, and that he still retains in his inner bosom, or in the higher region of his mind or nature, the faith that he had received in the act of faith, it being sometimes possible for that act to return without man's being conscious of it. "These are the things represented by the small head, which they draw into the forepart of the body, and insert into the larger head when they are talking with the laity, for with them they do not talk from the small head, but from the large one, which in appearance is provided in front with a human face; and with them they talk from the Word about love, charity, good works, the commandments of the Decalogue, and repentance, selecting from the Word almost everything that is there said on these subjects. But in so doing they insert the small head into the large one, and from this they understand inwardly in themselves that none of these things are to be done for the sake of God and salvation, but only for the sake of public and private good.
[4] And inasmuch as they talk about these subjects from the Word, especially about the Gospel, the operation of the Holy Spirit, and salvation, in a pleasing and elegant manner, they seem to their hearers to be handsome men and the wisest in all the world. This is why, as you saw, costly and precious things were given them by the boys and girls who sat upon the benches in the vessels; also why you saw them represented as tortoises. In your world they are but little distinguished from others, except by this, that they imagine themselves the wisest of men, and laugh at others, even at those who entertain a like doctrine of faith but are not in these mysteries. They carry with them on their clothing a certain mark by which they make themselves distinguishable from others."
[5] He who was talking to me said, "I will not tell you what their sentiments are respecting other matters of faith, such as election, freedom of choice, baptism, and the holy supper, which are of such a nature that they do not divulge them; but we in heaven know what they are. But because they are such in the world, and because no one is allowed after death to think one thing and say another, and therefore they can then do no otherwise than speak from the insanities of their thoughts, they are regarded as insane and are expelled from societies, and finally sent down to the bottomless pit spoken of in Revelation (9:2). There they become corporeal spirits, and look like the mummies of the Egyptians. For a callousness has been induced upon the interiors of their minds, owing to the barrier they had interposed when they were in the world. The infernal society composed of them borders upon the infernal society from the Machiavelians, and they pass indiscriminately from one to the other, and call each other fellow-members. But they go back because there is a difference between them, arising from the fact that there has been with them some religious principle respecting the act of justification by faith, while the Machiavelians have no religious principle at all."
[6] After I had seen them expelled from societies and collected together to be cast down, I saw a vessel flying in the air with seven sails, and therein officers and sailors dressed in purple clothing and having splendid laurels on their caps, and shouting, "Lo, we are in heaven; we are purple-robed doctors of the highest degree, since of all the wise men among the clergy in Europe we are the heads."
I wondered what this meant, and was told that they were images of pride and of the visionary thoughts called fantasies, which spring from those who before appeared as tortoises, but these had now been cast out of the societies as insane and gathered into one body and now stood together in one place.
I then wished to speak with them, and therefore went to the place where they were standing and saluted them, and said, "Are you those who have separated the internals of men from their externals, and who have separated the operation of the Holy Spirit, as being in faith, from its cooperation with man outside of faith, and thus you have separated God from man? Have you not thus not only removed charity itself and the works of charity from faith, as many others of the learned clergy have done, but also faith itself from man as to its manifestation before God?
[7] But I pray you, which do you prefer, that I should speak to you on this matter from reason, or from Holy Scripture?"
They said, "Speak first from reason."
And I spoke as follows, "How can the internal man and external man be separated? Who does not see or cannot see from common perception, that all of man's interiors go forth and are continued into his exteriors, and even into his outermosts, in order to work out their effects and produce their works? Are not internals for the sake of externals, that they may terminate in them and find permanence in them, and so come forth, nearly the same as a column rests upon its base? You can see that unless there were a continuation and thus a conjunction, outermosts would dissolve and pass away like bubbles in the air. Who can deny that the interior operations of God in man are myriads of myriads and of these man knows nothing? And what need is there of his knowing about them, provided he knows about the outermosts, in which, with his thought and will, he is together with God?
[8] But this shall be illustrated by an example. Does man understand the interior operations of his speech, as how the lungs draw in the air, and fill the little vessels with it, and the bronchial tubes, and the lobes; how they send out the air into the trachea, and there turn it into sound; how that sound is modified in the glottis with the aid of the larynx; and how the tongue then articulates it, and the lips complete the articulation that it may become speech? Do not all these interior operations, of which man knows nothing, exist for the sake of the outermost, which is that man may have power to speak? Remove or separate one of these internals from its continuity with the outermosts, and could man speak any more than a stock?
[9] Take another example. The two hands are the outermosts of man. Do not the interiors, which are continued thither, come from the head through the neck, also through the chest, the shoulders, the arms, and the forearms? And there are the innumerable muscular textures, innumerable battalions of motor fibers, innumerable combinations of nerves and blood-vessels, and the many bony articulations with their ligaments and membranes. What does a man know about these things? And yet the working of his hands is from each and all of them. Suppose that these interior parts were to turn back to the right or left near the elbow, instead of continuing onward, would not the hand drop down from the forearm and rot like something torn away from the body and deprived of life? If you will believe it, it would be with the hand as it would be with the body if the man were beheaded. It would be precisely the same with the human mind and its two lives, the will and the understanding, if the Divine operations, which are those of faith and charity, were to cease half way and not pass by a continuous course even to the man himself. Clearly man would then be not merely a brute, but a rotten stick. All this is in accordance with reason.
[10] Furthermore, if you will listen, it is also in accordance with the Sacred Scripture. Does not the Lord say,
Abide in Me, and I in you. I am the Vine and ye are the branches. He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit (John 15:4, 6).
Is not the fruit the good works which the Lord does through man, and man does of himself from the Lord? The Lord also says,
That He stands at the door and knocks, and that He comes in to him that opens, and sups with him, and he with Him (Revelation 3:20).
Does not the Lord give pounds and talents to man to trade with and profit by, and as man profits by them, does He not give him eternal life? (Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:13-26).
And again:
That He gives wages to every man according to the labor done in His vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16).
These are but a few passages. Pages might be filled from the Word on this subject, that man ought to bear fruit like a tree, to do according to the commandments, to love God and the neighbor, and so forth.
[11] But I am aware that your self-intelligence is unable to hold to anything such as it is in itself, that is in common with these things from the Word, for although you give utterance to it, your ideas pervert it. And you cannot do otherwise, because you remove from man everything belonging to God as to communication and conjunction. What then remains but to remove all that pertains to worship also?"
Afterward these spirits appeared to me in the light of heaven, which discloses and manifests the character of everyone. And they did not then appear as they did before, in a ship in the air, as if in heaven; neither were they clad in purple robes and crowned with laurel, but in a sandy place, in garments of rags, and girt about the loins with network like fishers' nets, through which their nakedness was visible. And then they were sent down to the society bordering on that of the Machiavellians.
462. The fourth experience. I once looked towards the sea-coast in the spiritual world and saw a magnificent harbor. I approached it, and on a nearer view I saw vessels in it both large and small, laden with merchandise of all kinds, which boys and girls, seated on the rowers' benches, were distributing to those who desired. They said: "We are waiting to see our beautiful turtles 1 which will soon rise out of the sea and come to us." And lo! I saw small and large turtles upon whose scaly shells young turtles were sitting, facing the islands which lay around. The male parent turtles had two heads, a large one covered with a shell like that covering their bodies, from which they emitted a reddish glow, and a smaller one, such as turtles have, which they drew back into the from part of their body and inserted in some unseen way into the larger head. I paid particular attention to the large reddish head and saw that it had a face like a man, and that it talked with the boys and girls who were seated on the benches, and licked their hands. The boys and girls then stroked them, and gave them rich food and also costly articles, as silk for clothes, cedar wood for tables, purple cloth for decorations and scarlet dye for coloring.
[2] On seeing these things I was desirous to learn what they represented, as I knew that all the things that appear in the spiritual world are correspondences, and represent spiritual things relating to affection and thought derived from it. Thereupon some spoke to me from heaven and said: "You know already what is represented by the harbor, the ships and the boys and girls on board, but you do not know what is represented by the turtles;" so they continued: "Turtles represent those of the clergy who entirely separate faith from charity and its good works. They affirm in their own mind that plainly there is no conjunction between them; but that the Holy Spirit, through faith in God the Father for the sake of the Son's merit, enters into and dwells with a man, and purifies his interiors even to his own will. Of this they form a sort of oval plane, and when the operation of the Holy Spirit approaches it, it is turned away round it on the left side and makes no contact with it. In this way the interior or higher part of man's nature is for God, and the exterior or lower for man; so that nothing which a man does, whether good or evil, appears in God's sight, nothing good because it is merit-seeking, and nothing evil because it is evil; for if these were to appear before God man would perish on account of either. This being so, man is at liberty to will, think, speak and act as he pleases, provided he is careful before the world."
[3] I then asked whether they also assert that it is allowable to think of God as not being omnipresent and omniscient. The reply came from heaven: "Even this is allowed them, for God takes no cognizance of anything thought or willed by him who has obtained faith, and is thereby purified and justified; and he still retains in the interior recesses or higher region of his mind or nature the faith which he had received in act, which act may recur at any time, even without his knowledge. These things are represented by the little head which they draw into the from part of their body, and also insert into the large head when they talk with the laity. For they do not speak with these from the small head but from the large one, which appears in front with a face resembling that of a man. Quoting from the Word they converse with them about love, charity, good works, the commandments of the Decalogue and repentance, selecting from the Word almost everything that is there said on these subjects. As at these times they insert the small head into the large one, they inwardly think that all those things are not to be done for the sake of God and salvation, but only with a view to the public and private good.
[4] "Since, however, they speak concerning these things from the Word, especially concerning the Gospel, the operation of the Holy Spirit and the nature of salvation in pleasing and graceful language, they appear to their hearers as handsome men, superior in wisdom to the rest of mankind. For this reason also you saw that sumptuous food and costly articles were given to them by the boys and girls sitting on the benches in the ships. These are they whom you saw represented as turtles. In your world they are scarcely distinguished from others, except in this respect that they fancy themselves superior to all in wisdom; and they laugh at others, even at those who hold a similar doctrine respecting faith, but who are not versed in those mysteries. They carry with them on their clothing a mark by which others recognize them."
[5] He who spoke with me continued: "I will not relate to you what they think concerning the other matters that pertain to faith, such as election, free will, baptism and the Holy Supper. These they do not divulge, but they are known to us in heaven. As this is their nature in the world, and after death no one is allowed to think one thing and say another, therefore, because they cannot do otherwise than utter their insane conceptions, they are regarded as insane and cast out of the societies. They are at length sent down to the pit of the abyss mentioned in the Revelation 9:2, where they become corporeal spirits and appear like Egyptian mummies. For the interiors of their mind contract a certain hardness, because while in the world they had shut these in behind a barrier. The infernal society formed by them borders on that of the Machiavellians, 2 and they frequently pass from one to the other, calling themselves companions; but they ultimately withdraw because of this difference, that they have some religious conviction concerning the act of justification through faith, whereas the Machiavellians have none."
[6] After I had seen those spirits cast out from the societies and gathered together to be sent down to the pit, I observed a ship with seven sails flying in the air. The officers and sailors in it were clothed in purple with splendid wreaths of laurel upon their caps, and they called out, "Lo, we are in heaven; we are doctors robed in purple and above all others crowned with laurel, because we are the chief of the wise from all the clergy of Europe." As I wondered what this meant I was told that they were representations of the pride and ideal thoughts, called delusions, of those whom I had before seen as turtles. They were now cast out from the societies as insane, and, gathered into one band, they were standing together in one place. Then, desiring to speak with them, I approached the place where they stood; and having greeted them, I said: "Are you those who have separated the internals of men from their externals, and the operation of the Holy Spirit, as it works in faith, from its co-operation with man, as having nothing to do with faith, and who have thus separated God from man? Have you not in this way removed not only charity itself and its works from faith, like many other teachers among the clergy, but also faith itself from man as to its manifestation in the sight of God?
[7] "I ask you, however, whether you wish me to speak on these matters from reason or from the Sacred Scripture?" They said, "Speak first from reason;" so I spoke as follows: "How is it possible for the internal and the external with man to be separated? Who does not see from common perception, or is unable to see, that all a man's interiors proceed and are continued to his exteriors and even to what is outermost, in order to produce their effects and accomplish their works? Do not internal things exist for the sake of the external, in order that they may terminate in them and subsist in them, and thus exist, like a column on its base? You can see that unless there was continuation and conjunction in this way, what is outermost would be dissolved and dissipated like bubbles in the air. Who can deny that the interior operations of God with man are countless in number, of which man knows nothing? Indeed, what advantage is it for him to know them? He need only know the most external of them, in which with his thought and will he is together with God.
[8] This may be illustrated by an example. A man is not aware of the interior operations involved in speech. The lungs draw in the air and with it fill the vesicles, the bronchia and the lobes; they emit it into the trachea, and there turn it into sound; that sound is modified in the glottis by the aid of the larynx; the tongue then articulates it, and the lips complete the articulation, in order that it may become speech. All these interior operations, of which a man is not conscious, exist for the sake of the most external, that a man may be able to speak. Remove or separate one of these internal operations from its connection with what is outermost and a man would be no more able to speak than a stock.
[9] "Take another example. The two hands are the ultimate parts of man. The interior things which are continued to them descend from the head through the neck, and then through the breast, the shoulders, the arms and the elbows. There are innumerable muscular tissues, innumerable groups of moving fibres, innumerable bundles of nerves and blood vessels, many articulations (ginglymi) of bones 3 with their ligaments and membranes. Of these, the man is utterly unconscious, and yet the hands depend upon them all collectively and singly, for their power to act. If these interior things were deflected to the left or right at the elbow and were not continued into the hand, the hand would fall off from the joint and putrefy, dismembered and lifeless. Indeed, as you may well suppose, it would be with the hand as with the body when a man is beheaded. It would be so also with the human mind and with its two principles of life (lives), the will and the understanding, if the Divine operations relating to faith and charity should cease midway in their course and not continue till they reached man. Man would then of a surety be not only a brute but a rotten tree-trunk. These things are according to reason.
[10] "Now, if you will hear, the same are also according to the Sacred Scripture. The Lord says:
"Abide in me, and I in you... I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit" John 15:4-5.
Fruits are the good works which the Lord performs through man, and which man does of himself from the Lord. Again the Lord says,
that He stands at the door and knocks, and that He enters to him that opens, and sups with him, and he with Him, Revelation 3:20.
The Lord gives pounds and talents, that men may trade with them and make profit; and, in proportion to such profit, that He may give him eternal life, Matthew 25:14-30; Luke 19:13-26.
And again,
He gives wages to every one according to the work which he does in His vineyard, Matthew 20:1-17.
These are only a few passages; for pages might be filled with quotations from the Word insisting that a man ought to bear fruit like a tree, that he ought to act according to the commandments, love God and the neighbor, and more to the same effect.
[11] I know, however, that your own intelligence cannot conceive of anything which in its real meaning is in harmony with those passages from the Word; and although you quote them, still your ideas pervert them. You cannot do otherwise, because you remove from man all things of God that regard communion and consequent conjunction with Him. What then remains, but to remove also all things of worship?"
I now saw the assembled spirits with the light of heaven shining upon them. This clearly reveals the true nature of every one; and they appeared no longer as if in heaven in a ship sailing in the air, robed in purple and crowned with laurel. They were now seen to be in a sandy desert, clad in rags, and girt about their loins with nets like those used by fishermen, through which their nakedness appeared. They were then sent down to the society that borders upon the Machiavellians.
Footnotes:
1. exspectamus videre pulchras nostras Testudines (Skillepadde). Swedenborg uses Skillepadde, probably a colloquial form of Swedish skoldpadda, tortoise, turtle, from skold, shield, armor, and padda, toad. Cf. Scot, puddock.
2. Machiavellian, one who adopts the principles of Machiavelli, an Italian statesman and writer, A.D. 1469-1527. His best-known works are THE PRINCE and THE ART OF WAR. His views on statecraft were such that his name has become a byword for those who are astute and perfidious, with no sense of honor in political matters.
3. plures ginglymi ossium. Ginglymus (from Greek), hinge-like joint with motion only in two directions.
462. Quartum Memorabile. Prospexi ad Oram maritimam in Mundo spirituali; et vidi magnificum Navale; accessi, et introspexi, et ecce ibi Navigia magna et parva, et in illis merces omnis generis, et super transtris sedentes Pueri et Puellae distribuentes volentibus: et dixerunt, exspectamus videre pulchras nostras Testudines (Skillepadda), 1 quae jamjam e mari ad nos exsurgent: et ecce vidi Testudines parvas et magnas, super quarum conchis et squamis sedebant Testudines infantes, quae spectabant ad Insulas circum. Testudines patres habebant bina Capita, unum magnum, circumductum concha simili conchae corporis illarum, unde rutilabant, et alterum parvum, quale est testudinibus, quod retrahebant in anteriora corporis, et quoque insertabant modo inconspicuo Capiti majori: sed tenebam oculos in Magno Capite rutilo, et vidi quod hoc haberet faciem sicut homo, et loqueretur cum pueris et puellis super transtris, et lamberet manus eorum, et tunc pueri et puellae palpabant illos, et dabant illis edulia et opipara, et quoque pretiosa, ut holosericum ad vestes, lignum thyinum ad tabulas, purpuram ad decorationes, et Coccinum ad infucationes. 2
[2] His visis, desiderabam scire, quid illa repraesentabant, quia novi quod omnia quae in Mundo spirituali apparent, sint Correspondentiae, et repraesentent spiritualia quae affectionis et inde cogitationis sunt; et tunc loquebantur mecum e Coelo, et dicebant, nosti ipse quid repraesentat Navale, tum quid Navigia, ut et quid Pueri et Puellae super illis, sed non scis quid Testudines; et dixerunt; Testudines repraesentant illos e Clero ibi, qui prorsus separant Fidem a Charitate et ejus bonis operibus, affirmantes apud se, quod plane non sit aliqua conjunctio, sed quod Spiritus sanctus per Fidem in Deum Patrem propter meritum Filii, intret apud hominem, ac purificet interiora ejus usque ad propriam Voluntatem ejus, ex qua faciunt sicut Planum ovale, et quod cum operatio Spiritus sancti ad illud Planum appropinquat, a parte ejus sinistra 3 circum id deflectat se et prorsus illud non tangat, et quod ita Pars interior seu superior ingenii hominis sit pro Deo, et quod Pars exterior seu inferior sit pro homine, et sic quod non appareat coram 4 Deo aliquid, quod homo facit, neque bonum neque malum; non bonum, quia hoc est meritorium, et non malum, quia hoc est malum; quoniam si illa apparerent coram Deo, homo ex utroque periret: et quia ita est, quod liceat homini velle, cogitare, loqui et facere, quicquid lubet, modo caveat sibi pro Mundo;
[3] quaesivi, num etiam asserant, quod liceat cogitare de Deo, quod non Omnipraesens et Omniscius sit; dixerunt e Coelo, quod hoc quoque illis liceat, quia Deus apud illum, qui Fidem adeptus est, et per illam purificatus et justificatus, non videt ad aliquod cogitationis et voluntatis ejus, et quod usque retineat in sinu interiori aut regione superiori mentis suae seu ingenii Fidem, quam in actu ejus receperat, et quod ille actus quandoque possit redire, homine nesciente. Haec sunt, quae repraesentat CAPUT PARVUM, quod in anteriora corporis intrahunt, et quoque insertant CAPITI MAGNO, dum loquuntur cum Laicis; nam ex Parvo Capite non loquuntur cum illis, sed ex Magno, quod antrorsum apparet sicut facie humana praeditum, et loquuntur cum illis ex Verbo de Amore, de Charitate, de Bonis operibus, de Praeceptis Decalogi, de Poenitentia, et ex Verbo desumunt paene omnia quae ibi sunt de illis; sed tunc insertant Caput parvum in Magnum, ex quo intus apud se intelligunt, quod omnia illa non facienda sint propter Deum et salutem, sed modo propter Bonum publicum et privatum.
[4] Verum quia loquuntur 5 de illis ex Verbo, imprimis de Evangelio, Operatione spiritus sancti, et Salvatione, suaviter et eleganter, ideo apparent auditoribus sicut homines pulchri, et prae reliquis in terrarum Orbe sapientes; quare etiam vidisti, quod data illis essent a pueris et puellis sedentibus super transtris navigiorum opipara et pretiosa: Hi itaque sunt, quos repraesentatos vidisti ut Testudines. In Mundo tuo parum dignoscuntur ab aliis, solum per id, quod credant se omnibus sapientiores esse, ac rideant alios, et quoque illos qui in simili doctrina quoad Fidem sunt, sed non in illis arcanis: sigillum quoddam secum in veste ferunt, ex quo se faciunt ab aliis internosci.
[5] Dixit loquens cum me, non dicam tibi quid sentiunt de caeteris rebus Fidei, ut quid de Electione, de Libero arbitrio, de Baptismo, et de Sacra Coena, quae sunt talia, quae non evulgant, sed nos in Coelo scimus. Verum, quia tales sunt in Mundo, et post mortem non licet alicui loqui aliter, quam cogitat, ideo quia tunc non possunt aliter quam loqui ex insaniis cogitationum suarum, reputantur ut insani, ac ejiciuntur e Societatibus, et tandem demittuntur in Puteum abyssi, de quo in Apocalypsi 9:2, et fiunt Spiritus corporei, et apparent sicut Aegyptiorum Mumia; callus enim inductus est interioribus Mentis eorum, quia in Mundo etiam interposuerunt sepem. Societas infernalis ex illis est in confinio ad Societatem infernalem ex Machiavelistis, ac intrant passim ab una in alteram, et vocant se Sodales, sed exeunt, quia diversitas est, ex eo, quod aliquod Religiosum de actu justificationis per fidem apud illos fuerit, sed non aliquod apud Machiavelistas.
[6] Postquam vidi illos ejectos ex Societatibus, et collectos ut dejicerentur, vidi Navigium in aere cum septem velis volans, et inibi naucleros et nautas indutos veste purpurea, habentes super pileis magnificas laurus, clamantes, en nos in Coelo; sumus Doctores 6 purpurati, et prae omnibus laureati, quia sumus Capita sapientum ex omni Clero in Europa. Miratus sum quid hoc, et dictum est mihi quod essent imagines fastus, ac cogitationes ideales, quae vocantur phantasiae, ex illis, qui prius visi sunt ut Testudines, et nunc ut insani ejecti e Societatibus, et in unum collecti, ac starent simul in uno loco: et tunc desiderabam loqui cum illis, et accessi ad locum ubi stabant, et salutabam illos, et dicebam, estis vos qui separavistis Interna hominum ab Externis illorum, ac Operationem Spiritus sancti sicut in Fide a cooperatione Ejus cum homine extra Fidem, et sic separavistis Deum ab homine; annon vos ita non modo removistis ipsam Charitatem et ejus Opera a fide, sicut multi alii Doctores e Clero, sed etiam ipsam Fidem quoad manifestationem ejus coram Deo ab homine;
[7] sed quaeso, Numeri velitis, ut de illa re loquar vobiscum ex Ratione, vel num ex Scriptura Sacra; dixerunt, loquere primum ex Ratione; et loquutus sum, dicens; quomodo potest Internum et Externum apud hominem separari; quis non ex communi perceptione videt, aut videre potest, quod omnia Interiora hominis pergant et continuentur in Exteriora, et usque in extrema ejus ut efficiant effectus suos, et operentur opera sua; suntne Externa propter Interna, 7 ut desinant in illa, et subsistant in illis, et sic existant, vix aliter quam sicut columna super stylobata sua; potestis videre, quod nisi continuatio foret, et sic conjunctio, extrema dissolverentur, ac diffluerent sicut bullae in aere: quis negare potest, quin interiores operationes Dei apud hominem sint myriades myriadum, de quibus homo nihil scit, et quid juvat illa scire, modo sciat extrema, in quibus cum sua cogitatione et voluntate cum Deo simul est.
[8] Sed hoc illustrabitur per Exemplum: num scit homo interiores operationes loquelae suae, ut quomodo Pulmo attrahit aerem, et illo implet vesiculas, bronchias, et lobos; quomodo illum aerem emittit in Trachiam, et ibi vertit illum in sonum, quomodo sonus ille in glottide ope laryngis modificatur, et quomodo lingua dein articulat illum, et labia articulationem complent, ut fiat loquela; nonne omnes illae interiores operationes, de quibus homo nihil scit, sunt propter extremum, ut homo possit loqui; remove aut separa unum ex internis illis a suo continuo cum extremis, num homo potuisset loqui plus quam stipes.
[9] Sit adhuc exemplum; binae Manus sunt ultima hominis; nonne Interiora, quae illuc continuantur, sunt a Capite per Cervicem, tum per Pectus, Scapulas, Brachia et Ulnas, suntque innumeri musculares textus, innumerae phalanges fibrarum motricium, innumeri manipuli nervorum et vasorum sanguineorum, ac plures ginglymi ossium cum suis ligamentis et membranis; num homo aliquid de illis scit, et tamen operantur Manus ejus ex omnibus et singulis illis: suppone, quod interiora illa circa poplitem manus se sinistrorsum aut dextrorsum reflecterent, et non per continuum intrarent; annon manus ab ulna decideret, ac sicut aliquod avulsum inanimatum putresceret; imo si vultis credere, foret sicut cum corpore, si homo decollaretur. Prorsus simile foret cum Mente humana, ac cum binis ejus Vitis, Voluntate et Intellectu, si Divinae Operationes, quae Fidei et Charitatis sunt, desinerent in media via, et non usque ad hominem per continuum tenderent; sane foret tunc homo non modo brutum, sed putris stipes: 8 haec sunt secundum rationem.
[10] Nunc si vultis audire, eadem etiam sunt secundum Scripturam Sacram; annon Dominus dicit, Manete in Me, et Ego in vobis; Ego sum Vitis et vos palmites; qui manet in Me, et Ego in illo, hic fert fructum multum, Johannes 15:4-5; 9 numne fructus sunt bona Opera, quae Dominus facit per hominem, et homo ex se a Domino. Dominus etiam dicit, Quod stet ad ostium et pulset, et quod ad illum qui aperit, ingrediatur, ac coenet cum illo et ille cum Ipso, Apocalypsis 3:20. Annon Dominus dat minas et talenta, ut homo negotietur cum illis, et lucretur, et quod sicut lucratur, det vitam aeternam, Matthaeus 25:14-30, 10 Luca 19:12-26. 11 Tum, Quod mercedem det cuivis secundum laborem in Vinea Ipsius, Matthaeus 20:1-16: 12 sed haec pauca sunt; possunt Membranae impleri ex Verbo, de eo, quod homo facturus sit fructus sicut arbor, operaturus sit secundum praecepta, amaturus Deum et proximum, et plura.
[11] Sed scio, quod propria Intelligentia vestra cum illis quae ex Verbo sunt, non possit tale commune habere, quale est in se, quae tametsi loquimini, usque ideae vestrae pervertunt illa: et vos non potestis aliter, quia removetis omnia Dei ab homine quoad communicationem et inde conjunctionem; quid tunc superest, nisi etiam omnia Cultus. Postea illi mihi visi sunt in luce Coeli, quae detegit et manifestat, qualis quisque est; et tunc non visi sicut 13 prius in Navigio in aere quasi in Coelo, nec inibi purpurati quoad vestes, ac laureati quoad caput, sed in loco arenoso, 14 in vestibus ex frustis, ac cincti retibus quasi piscatoriis circum lumbos, trans quae nuditates illorum apparebant; et tunc demissi sunt in Societatem, quae in confinio ad Machiavelistas erat.
Footnotes:
1. In lingua Suecana hodierna, sk�ldpadda.
2. Coccinum ad infucationes ubi in prima editione COCCINUM AD INFUCATIONES.
3. Prima editio: finistra.
4. Prima editio: eorum.
5. Prima editio: loguuntur.
6. Prima editio: Doctorcs.
7. Externa propter Interna ubi in prima editione Interna propter Externa.
8. Prima editio: stapes.
9. Prima editio: 16.
10. Prima editio: 34.
11. Prima editio: 13.
12. Prima editio: 17.
13. Prima editio: ficut.
14. Prima editio: arinoso.