Interior Truths Close into Ultimate Truths

From Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

All interior things are stored up in order, and are together in ultimates

When a man is being purified, then first of all are learned such truths as can be apprehended by the sensuous man, such as are the truths in the sense of the letter of the Word; afterward are learned more interior truths, such as are collected from the Word by those who are in enlightenment, for these collect its interior sense from various passages where the sense of the letter is unfolded. From these, when known, truths still more interior are afterward drawn forth by those who are enlightened, which truths together with the former serve the church for doctrine, the more interior truths for doctrine to those who are men of the internal church, the less interior for doctrine to those who are men of the external church. Both the former and the latter men, provided they have lived according to these truths, are taken up into heaven among the angels, and are there imbued with angelic wisdom, which is from truths still more interior, and finally is from inmost truths in the third heaven. These truths, together with the former in their order, close in the ultimate truths of the external sensuous, and are all together there. From this it is plain that all interior truths are together in the truths of the sense of the letter of the Word, for these truths, as above said, are the ultimate ones.

(Arcana Coelestia 10028:2)

The Lord Worshiped Through Uses

From Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

"to serve the Lord" denotes to perform uses, is because true worship consists in the performance of uses, thus in the exercises of charity. He who believes that serving the Lord consists solely in frequenting a place of worship, in hearing preaching there, and in praying, and that this is sufficient, is much mistaken. The very worship of the Lord consists in performing uses; and during man's life in the world uses consist in everyone's discharging aright his duty in his station, thus from the heart being of service to his country, to societies, and to the neighbor, in dealing sincerely with his fellow, and in performing kind offices with prudence in accordance with each person's character. These uses are chiefly the works of charity, and are those whereby the Lord is chiefly worshiped. Frequenting a place of worship, hearing sermons, and saying prayers, are also necessary; but without the above uses they avail nothing, because they are not of the life, but teach what the life must be. The angels in heaven have all happiness from uses, and according to uses, so that to them uses are heaven.

That happiness is from Divine order according to uses, can be seen from the things in man which correspond to those which are in the Grand Man; as those from the external senses, namely, from sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch, which as has been shown at the end of many chapters, are correspondent. These senses therefore have delights exactly in accordance with the uses which they perform; the most delightful is the sense of conjugial love, on account of its greatest use, because from this comes the propagation of the human race, and from the human race, heaven; the delight of taste follows next, because it serves for the nourishment and thereby for the health of the body, in accordance with which is the sound action of the mind; the delight of smell is less, because it merely serves for recreation: and thus also for health; the delight of hearing and that of sight are in the last place, because they merely take up those things which will be of service to uses, and wait upon the intellectual part, and not so much the will part.

From these and other like facts it becomes plain that it is uses according to which happiness is given in heaven by the Lord; and that it is uses through which the Lord is mainly worshiped. From this it is that John lay on the Lord's breast at table, and that the Lord loved him more than the rest; but this was not for his own sake, but because he represented the exercises of charity, that is, uses.

(Arcana Coelestia 7038)

Being in Truth Without Good

From Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

They who are in truth and not yet in good are in fallacies from lowest nature, may be seen from the fact that truth is not in any light unless good is with it, or in it; for good is like a flame which emits light from itself; and when good meets with any truth, it not only illuminates it, but also brings it to itself into its own light. They therefore who are in truth and not yet in good, are in shade and darkness; because truth has no light from itself, and the light which they have from good is faint, like a light which is going out; and therefore when these persons think and reason about truth, and from truth about good, they are like those who see phantasms in the dark, and believe them to be real bodies; or who see marks on a wall in a shady place, and in fancy make of them the image of some man or animal; and yet when the light comes, they are seen to be mere marks without any form;

Moreover all the heresies in the church have arisen from those who have been in some truth from the Word, but not in good; to them heresy has appeared exactly like truth; and in like manner the falsities in the church. That they who have promulgated these have not been in good, may be seen from the fact that they have rejected the good of charity far behind the truth of faith, and have in part devised such things as do not at all agree with the good of charity.

It is said that they who are in truth and not yet in good reason about good and truth from fallacies from lowest nature, and therefore it is necessary to say what fallacies are.

Take for example the life after death. They who are in fallacies from lowest nature, as are those who are in truth and not yet in good, do not believe that there is anything alive in man except his body, nor that when man dies he can rise again unless he again receives his body. If they are told that there is an interior man who lives in the body, and who is raised up by the Lord when the body dies, and that the man when raised has a body such as spirits or angels have, and that he sees, hears, speaks, is in company with others, and appears to himself exactly like a man, just as does a man in this world, they cannot apprehend it. Fallacies from lowest nature make them believe such things to be impossible, chiefly because they do not see them with the eyes of their body.

Moreover when such persons think about the spirit or soul, they have no idea whatever about it except such as they have of the invisible things in nature, whence they make it either a mere breath, or aerial, or ethereal, or like a flame; some a mere thinking power which has scarcely any vitality until it is again joined to the body. The reason why they think in this way is that to them all interior things are in shade and darkness, and only outward things are in light, which shows how easily they may fall into error; for if they think only of how the body is to be put together again; of the destruction of the world, and that this has been vainly awaited for so many ages; of brute animals having a life not unlike the life of man; and that none of the dead appear and make known the state of their life - when they think these and other such things, they easily recede from belief in the resurrection; and so in many other cases. The reason is that they are not in good, and through good in light. ...

(Arcana Coelestia 6400)