Selection from Interaction of the Soul and Body ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
There are three degrees in the spiritual world, and three degrees in the natural world, hitherto unknown, according to which all influx takes place.It is discovered, by the investigation of causes from effects, that there are degrees of two kinds, one in which are things prior and posterior, and another in which are things greater and less. The degrees which distinguish things prior and posterior are to be called degrees of altitude, and also discrete degrees; but the degrees by which things greater and less are distinguished from each other are to be called, degrees of latitude, and also continuous degrees.
Degrees of altitude, or discrete degrees, are like the generations and compositions of one thing from another; as, for example, of any nerve from its fibers, and of any fiber from its fibrils; or of any piece of wood, stone, or metal from its parts, and of any part from its particles.
But degrees of latitude or continuous degrees are like the increments and decrements of the same degree of altitude as to breadth, length, height, and depth; as of greater and smaller volumes of water, or air, or ether; and as of large and small masses of wood, stone, or metal.
All and each of the things in both worlds, the spiritual and the natural, are, from creation, in degrees of both these kinds. The whole animal kingdom in this world is in those degrees both in general and in particular; and the whole vegetable kingdom and the whole mineral kingdom likewise; as also is the expanse of atmospheres from the sun even to the earth.
There are therefore three atmospheres discretely distinct according to the degrees of altitude, both in the spiritual world and in the natural world, because each world has its sun; but the atmospheres of the spiritual world, by virtue of their origin, are substantial, and the atmospheres of the natural world, by virtue of their origin, are material. And because the atmospheres descend from their origins according to those degrees, and are the containants, and, as it were, the carriers of light and heat, it follows that there are three degrees of light and heat.
And because light in the spiritual world in its essence is wisdom, and heat there in its essence is love, it follows also that there are three degrees of wisdom and three degrees of love, hence three degrees of life; for they are graded by those things through which they pass.
Hence it is that there are three angelic heavens: a highest, which is also called the third heaven, where are the angels of the highest degree; a middle, which is also called the second heaven, where are the angels of the middle degree; and a lowest, which is also called the first heaven, where are the angels of the lowest degree. Those heavens are also distinguished according to the degrees of wisdom and love.
• Those who are in the lowest heaven are in the love of knowing truths and goods
• Those who are in the middle heaven are in the love of understanding them
• Those who are in the highest heaven are in the love of being wise, that is, of living according to those things which they know and understand.
Since the angelic heavens are distinguished into three degrees, therefore the human mind is also distinguished into three degrees, because the human mind is an image of heaven, that is, it is a heaven in the least form. Hence it is that man can become an angel of one of those three heavens, and this is effected according to his reception of wisdom and love from the Lord:
• An angel of the lowest heaven if he receives only the love of knowing truths and goods
• An angel of the middle heaven if he receives the love of understanding them
• An angel of the highest heaven if he receives the love of being wise, that is, of living according to them.
That the human mind is distinguished into three regions, according to the three heavens, may be seen in the Relation inserted in the work on Conjugial Love (n. 270).—
One morning after sleep I was plunged deep in thought about some of the arcana of marital love, finally about this: in what region of the human mind true marital love resides and hence in what region marital cold resides. I knew that there are three regions of the human mind, one above another, and that natural love inhabits the lowest region, spiritual love the higher, and celestial love the highest, and that in each region there is a marriage of good and truth; and as good is of love and truth is of wisdom, that in each region there is a marriage of love and wisdom; and that this marriage is the same as the marriage of the will and the understanding, since the will is the receptacle of love and the understanding is the receptacle of wisdom.
While I was deep in the thought, I beheld two swans flying northward, and presently two birds of paradise flying southward, and also two turtledoves flying in the east. As my gaze followed their flight I saw that the two swans bent their way from the north to the east, likewise the two birds of paradise from the south; and that they joined the two turtledoves in the east and together they flew to a certain lofty palace there, surrounded by olive trees, palms and beeches. The palace had three rows of windows one above another; and as I watched I saw the swans fly into the palace through the opened windows of the lowest row, the birds of paradise through the opened windows of the middle row, and the turtledoves through the opened windows of the top row.
As I looked an angel presented himself, and said: "Do you understand what you have seen?" I replied, "In some small measure."
He said, "This palace represents the dwelling-places of marital love in the human mind. The highest part of the palace, into which the turtle-doves entered, represents the highest region of the mind, where marital love dwells in the love of good with its wisdom. The middle part to which the birds of paradise betook themselves represents the middle region, where marital love dwells in the love of truth with its intelligence. The lowest part to which the swans betook themselves represents the lowest region of the mind, where marital love dwells in the love of what is just and right with its knowledge.
The three pairs of birds have a similar significance - the pair of turtledoves signify the marital love of the highest region, the pair of birds of paradise marital love of the middle region, and the pair of swans marital love of the lowest region.
The three kinds of trees around the palace - the olives, palms and beeches have the same significance.
We, in heaven, call the highest region of the mind celestial, the middle spiritual, and the lowest natural. We also conceive of these regions as habitations in a house, one above another, with an ascent from one to the other by degrees as by stairs; and in each part are as it were two apartments, one for love, the other for wisdom; and in front is a bedchamber, as it were, where love with its wisdom, or good with its truth, or, what is the same, where the will with its understanding consociate in bed. All the arcana of marital love appear in that palace as in effigy."From these things it is evident that all spiritual influx to man and into man descends from the Lord through these three degrees, and that it is received by man according to the degree of wisdom and love in which he is.
Hearing these things, and kindled with a desire to see the palace, I asked whether one could enter and view it, inasmuch as it was a representation. He answered: "Only those in the third heaven can do so, for to them every representative of love and wisdom becomes real. I heard from them what I have related to you. Also this, that true marital love dwells in the highest region in the midst of mutual love in the marriage chamber or apartment of the will, and in the midst of perceptions of wisdom in the marriage chamber or apartment of the understanding; and that they are consociated in bed in the bedchamber which is toward the front and east."
I asked, "Why are there two marriage chambers?" He said, "The husband is in the marriage chamber of the understanding, and the wife in the marriage chamber of the will."
And I asked, "Since marital love dwells there, where then does marital cold dwell?"
He answered, "That also dwells in the highest region, but only in the marriage chamber of the understanding, when the marriage chamber of the will is closed. For the understanding can ascend at will with its truths by a spiral stairway into the highest region to its marriage chamber; but if the will does not ascend at the same time with the good of its love into the allied marriage chamber, the latter is shut and cold comes in the other, and this is marital cold. When there is such cold toward the wife, the understanding looks down from this highest region to the lowest, and, if not restrained by fear, also descends to be warmed by illicit fire."
Having said this, he would have recounted still more about marital love from its effigies in that palace, but said: "Enough for the present. First inquire whether these things are above the general understanding. If they are, why say more? But if they are not, more will be disclosed."
The knowledge of these degrees is of the greatest use at the present day; since many, because they do not know them, subsist and inhere in the lowest degree, in which are the senses of their body, and from ignorance, which is intellectual thick darkness, cannot be elevated into spiritual light, which is above them. Hence naturalism invades them, as it were spontaneously, as soon as they enter on any investigation and inquiry concerning the human soul and mind, and its rationality, and still more if they inquire concerning heaven and the life after death. Thus they become comparatively like those who stand in the marketplaces with telescopes in their hands, looking at the sky, and utter vain predictions; and also like those who chatter and also reason concerning every object they see, and everything they hear, without there being in it anything rational from the understanding. But such persons are like butchers, who believe themselves to be skilled in anatomy, because they have examined the viscera of oxen and sheep outwardly but not inwardly.
But it is a truth, that to think from the influx of natural light, not enlightened by the influx of spiritual light, is nothing else than dreaming, and to speak from such thought is to talk nonsense.
(from Interaction of the Soul and Body 16)