Those Who Make Themselves Atheists

Selection from Conjugial Love ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

A Memorable Relation

One morning when I awoke out of sleep, meditating in the early and serene light before I was fully awake, I saw through the window as it were a flash of lightning, and presently heard as it were rolling thunder. And as I was wondering whence it was I heard these words from heaven:

"There are some not far from you who are reasoning sharply about God and about nature. The vibration of light like lightning and the rumbling of the air like thunder are the correspondences and thence the appearances of the contest and collision of arguments on one side in favor of God and on the other in favor of nature."

The cause of this spiritual contest was this. There were certain satans in hell who said among themselves,

"Would that we might be permitted to speak with the angels of heaven, and we would show conclusively and fully that nature is that which they call God, from whom all things are, and thus that God is only a word unless nature is meant."

And as the satans with their whole heart and soul believed this, and also longed to speak with the angels of heaven, it was given them to ascend out of the mire and darkness of hell, and to speak with two angels then come down from heaven. They were in the world of spirits, which is intermediate between heaven and hell.

The satans seeing the angels there, quickly ran up to them, and in a furious voice exclaimed,

"Are you the angels of heaven with whom it is permitted us to engage in reasoning about God and about nature? You are called wise because you acknowledge God; but O how simple you are! Who sees God? Who understands what God is? Who comprehends that God governs, and can govern, the universe and all and each thing of it? Who, but the common people and the rabble, (a large, noisy, uncontrolled group of people; people of a low social position), acknowledges what he does not see and understand? What is more obvious than that nature is all-in-all? Who sees anything but nature with the eye? Who hears anything but nature with the ear? Who perceives anything but nature by the smell? Who tastes anything but nature with the tongue? Who feels anything but nature by the touch of the hand and of the body? Are not the senses of our body the only witnesses of truth? Who cannot from then swear that a thing is so? Are not your heads in nature? Whence the influx into the thoughts of the head but from her? Take her away can you think anything?"

Besides much other like matter.

Hearing this the angels responded,

"You speak in this way because you are merely sensual. All in the hells have the ideas of their thought immersed in the senses of the body, and cannot elevate the minds above them. We therefore excuse you. A life of evil, and thence the belief in what is false, have so closed the interiors of your minds that elevation above things sensual is with you impossible, except in a state removed from the evils of life and the falsities of faith. For a satan equally with an angel can understand truth when he hears it, but he does not retain it, because evil obliterates the truth and brings in falsity. But we perceive that you are now in a state thus removed, and that thus it is possible for you to understand the truth which we speak. Give attention then to what we say."

And they said,

"You were in the natural world, died there, and now you are in the spiritual world. Did you before now know anything about a life after death? Did you not before deny it, and make yourselves equal with beasts? Did you before now know anything about heaven and hell? Or anything about the light and heat of this world? Or about the fact that you are no longer within nature, but above it? For this world and all things pertaining to it are spiritual; and spiritual things are above natural, so that not even the least of nature can flow into this world. But you, because you have believed nature to be a god or a goddess believe also the light and heat of this world to be the light and heat of the natural world; when in fact it is not so at all, for here natural light is thick darkness and natural heat here is cold. Did you know anything about the sun of this world from which our light and heat proceed? Did you know that this sun is pure love, and the sun of the natural world is pure fire? And that the sun of the world, which is pure fire, is that from which nature exists and subsists? And that the sun of heaven, which is pure love, is that whence life itself, which is love with wisdom, exists and subsists? And thus that nature, which you make a god or goddess, is manifestly dead? You can, if a guard is granted you, ascend with us into heaven; and we, if a guard is granted us can descend with you into hell. And in heaven you will see things magnificent and splendid; but in hell things squalid and unclean. The differences arise from the fact that all in heaven worship God, and all in hell worship nature; and those magnificent and splendid things in the heavens are the correspondences of the affections of good and of truth; and the squalid and unclean things in the hells are correspondences of the lusts of the evil and false. Judge now from these things and those whether God or nature is all-in-all."

To this the satans replied,

"In the state in which we now are we are able to conclude from what we have heard that it is God; but when the delight of evil takes possession of our minds we see nothing but nature."

The two angels and the two satans were standing not far from me on the right, so that I saw and heard them.

And lo! I saw many spirits around them, who in the natural world had been celebrated for learning, and I was surprised that these learned men stood now beside the angels, now beside the satans, and that they favored those beside whom they stood. And I was told that their changes of place were changes of their state of mind, favoring now one side now the other;

"For they are Vertumni.* And we will tell you a mystery. We have looked down upon earth, to those celebrated for learning who have thought according to their own judgment about God and about nature, and we find 600 out of a 1000 in favor of nature, and the rest in favor of God; but they were in favor of God because they had frequently said that nature is from God, not from any understanding, but only from what they had heard; and frequent speech from memory and recollection, though not at the same time from thought and intelligence, induces a sort of faith."

After this a guard was given the satans and with the two angels they ascended into heaven, and saw magnificent and splendid things. And being then in illustration from the light of heaven there, they acknowledged that there is a God, and that nature is created to subserve the life which is in God and from God; and that nature in itself is dead, and so does nothing of itself, but is actuated by life.

Having seen and perceived these things they descended; and as they descended the love of evil returned, and closed their understanding above and opened it beneath. And then there appeared as it were a veil above it, flashing from infernal fire; and the instant their feet touched the earth the ground opened beneath them, and they sank down to their own.

After this the two angels, seeing me near, said of me to those standing by,

"We know that this man has written about God and about nature; let us hear him."

And they came and asked that what had been written respecting God and nature might be read to them; and I read therefrom the following:

"They who believe in Divine operation in the single things of nature can confirm themselves in favor of the Divine by very many things that they see in nature, equally with, yea, better than those who confirm themselves in favor of nature. For those who confirm themselves in favor of the Divine consider the wonders that are visible in the production both of vegetables and animals. In the Productions of Vegetables, how that from a small seed cast into the earth there comes forth a root, by means of the root a stem, and successively branches, leaves, flowers, and fruit, even to new seeds, just as if the seed knew the order of succession or procession by which it is to renew itself. Can any rational man think that the sun which is pure fire knows this? Or that it can put it into its heat and light to effect such things? And that it can form the wonderful things within them and purpose use? A man whose rational is elevated when he sees and contemplates these things cannot but think that they are from Him who has infinite wisdom, that is from God. They also who acknowledge the Divine see and think this. But those that do not acknowledge do not see and think this, because they will not, and thus let their rational so far down into the sensual that it derives all its ideas from the light in which the senses of the body are and confirms their fallacies, saying, "Do you not see the sun operating these things by its heat and light? What is that which you do not see? Is it anything?

"They that confirm themselves in favor of the Divine consider also the wonders that are observable in The Production of Animals. To mention here only with respect to eggs, that within them lies hidden a chicken in its seed or inception, with every requisite until it is hatched from the shell, and also for its progression after it leaves the shell until it becomes a bird or flying thing in the form of its parent. And if one takes notice of the form, it is such that it cannot but excite amazement if he thinks profoundly; for that in the least as well as in the greatest of them, yea, in the invisible as in the visible, that is, in the minutest insects as in the large birds and beasts, there are organs of the senses, of sight, smell, taste, and touch; and organs of motion which are muscles, for they fly and walk; and viscera also around the heart and lungs which are actuated by brains. That even poor insects rejoice in such organs is known from their anatomy described by some, especially by Swammerdam in his Biblia Naturoe. They who ascribe all things to nature indeed see such things but think only that they exist, and say that nature produces them, and they say this because they have turned their mind away from thinking of the Divine, and those who have turned away from thought of the Divine, when they behold the wonderful things in nature cannot think rationally, much less spiritually, but think sensually and materially, and then think in nature from nature and not above it, in like manner as do those who are in hell, with only this difference from beasts, that they have the power of rationality, that is, that they can understand and so can think otherwise if they will.

"They who have turned themselves away from the thought of the Divine when they behold the wonderful things in nature, and thereby become sensual, do not reflect that the sight of the eye is so gross that it sees many minute insects as one obscure object, and yet that each one of these is organized to feel and to move itself, and so is provided with fibers, and vessels, and a little heart, and pulmonary tubes, and minute viscera, and brains, and that these are woven together out of the purest things in nature, and that these contextures correspond to some life by which the minutest of them are distinctly actuated. Since the sight of the eye is so gross that many such creatures, with the innumerable things in each, appear to it as one little obscure thing, and yet they who are sensual think and judge from that sight, it is manifest how their mind has become gross, and hence in what thick darkness they are as to spiritual things.

"Everyone can confirm himself in favor of the Divine from the visible things of nature if he will, and he in fact does confirm himself who thinks of God from life; as when he beholds the fowls of heaven, how every species of them knows its own food and where it is; knows its kind by sound and sight; and which among others are their friends and which their enemies; that they mate together, know how to copulate, skilfully build nests, lay eggs therein, sit upon them, know the period of incubation, which accomplished they hatch out the young, tenderly love them, cherish them under their wings, offer them their food and feed them, and this until they become mature and able to do the like and to procreate families to perpetuate their kind. Everyone who will think of the Divine influx through the spiritual world into the natural can see it in these things, and can also, if he will, say from his heart: Such knowledge cannot flow into these creatures from the sun through the rays of its light, for the sun from which nature takes its origin and its essence is pure fire, and the rays of its light are therefore altogether dead; and thus he can conclude that such things come from the influx of Divine wisdom into the ultimates of nature.

"Anyone can confirm himself in favor of the Divine from the visible things of nature, when he considers the caterpillars (vermes), which, from the delight of a certain longing, affect and aspire to a change of their terrestrial state for one having some analogy to the heavenly state; and to that end creep into hiding-places and commit themselves as it were to a womb that they may be born again; and there become chrysalids, aurelias, nymphs, and at length butterflies. And when this metamorphosis is passed, and according to their species they are invested with beautiful wings, they fly away into the air as into their heaven, and there disport genially, pair together, lay eggs, and provide for themselves a posterity, and nourish themselves the while with pleasant and sweet food from the flowers. Who that confirms himself in favor of the Divine from the visible things of nature does not see some image of the earthly state of man in these creatures as caterpillars? And an image of his heavenly state in them as butterflies? But those who confirm themselves in favor of nature see them indeed; but as they have rejected out of their mind the heavenly state of man, they call them mere instincts of nature.

"Everyone can confirm himself in favor of the Divine from the visible things of nature, if he considers what is known about bees; that they know how to gather wax and suck honey out of herbs and flowers; and to build cells like little houses, and dispose them in the form of a city, with streets through which they go in and by which they pass out; that from a long way off they scent the flowers and the herbs from which they gather wax for their house and honey for their food, and laden with these fly back, according to the quarter of the heavens, directly to their hive, and thus provide for themselves food and habitation for the coming winter just as if they knew and foresaw it. They also appoint over them a mistress like a queen, from whom a posterity is propagated, and build for her as it were a palace above them, with guards round about; and when the time of bringing forth is at hand she goes with her attendants from cell to cell and lays eggs, which the following crowd anoint that they may not be injured by the air. Thence comes to them a new progeny. Afterwards, when these are advanced to the age at which they can do the like they are expelled from the hive; and the excluded host gather themselves together in a swarm, in order that the band may not be scattered; they then fly thence to seek for them a home. Also about autumn they bring out the useless drones and deprive them of their wings, so that they may not return and consume the food whereon they bestowed no labor. Besides many other things, from which it is evident, that for the sake of the use that they perform for the human race, they have, by virtue of the influx from the spiritual world, a form of government such as there is with men on earth, yea, with the angels in heaven. What man with reason unimpaired does not see that such things with them are not from the natural world? What has the sun from which nature is in common with a government emulating and analogous to heavenly government? From these and things like these among brute animals, the confessor and worshiper of nature confirms himself in favor of nature; while from the same evidence the confessor and worshiper of God confirms himself in favor of the Divine, for the spiritual man sees spiritual things in them, and the natural man sees in them natural things. Thus everyone sees as he is.

For myself, such things have been to me testimonies of the influx of the spiritual into the natural, or of the spiritual world into the natural world, thus from the Divine wisdom of the Lord. Consider, also, whether you can think analytically of any form of government, or of any civil law, or of any moral virtue, or of any spiritual truth, unless the Divine out of His wisdom flows in through the spiritual world. As for me, I could not and cannot. Indeed I have perceptibly and sensibly observed the influx now continually for five and twenty years.** I therefore affirm this from having witnessed it.

"Can nature have use as an end? And dispose uses into orders and forms? This none but one who is wise can do. And none but God, who has infinite wisdom, can thus ordinate and form a universe. Who else could foresee and provide all things that men require for food and for raiment, food from the fruits of the earth and from animals, and raiment from the same? It is among the marvels that the vile caterpillars called silk-worms, clothe with silk and magnificently adorn both women and men, from queens and kings down to maidservants and menservants; and that creatures so lowly as bees furnish wax for the lights from which temples and palaces have their brightness. These facts, and many more, are conspicuous proofs that the Lord, for Himself through the spiritual world operates all things that are in nature.

"To this should be added, that there have been seen in the spiritual world those who have so confirmed themselves in favor of nature, from the visible things of the world, that they have become atheists; and that in spiritual light their understanding appeared open beneath but closed above, because in thought they look downwards to the earth, and not upwards towards heaven; above their sensual, which is the lowest of the understanding, appeared a veil as it were, with some flashing from infernal fire, with some black as from soot, and with some livid as a corpse. 

Let everyone then be on his guard against confirmations in favor of nature; let him confirm himself in favor of the Divine. There is no lack of material."

(from Divine Love and Wisdom 351-357)

* Vertumnus was a god among the Romans who could assume various shapes; Vertumni is the plural of Vertumnus.
** In the work from which this was being read (D. L. W.), which was published in 1763, and written probably in 1762, the number of years is given as nineteen, and the statement here has in some editions been changed to make it conform to that. This not only appears unwarrantable, but a substantial error. The author, in making new use of this material, simply brings the time of this remarkable experience down to the then present, which was about 1768, the date of this work. A year later, in using yet again some of the same material, and referring to the same experience (in The True Christian Religion 12) he extends the period another year and makes it twenty-six years. [TR.]

Some indeed are to be pardoned for having ascribed certain visible things to nature, for the reason that they have not known anything about the sun of the spiritual world where the Lord is and of influx therefrom; nor anything about that world and the state of it, no, nor of its presence with men; and that therefore they could not but think of the spiritual as a purer natural, and so that angels either were in the ether or in the stars; and of the devil, that either he is the evil of man, or, if he actually exists, that he is in the air or in the deep; and that the souls of men after death are either in the inmost of the earth, or in a somewhere or other (in aliquo ubi seu pu), until the day of judgment; and other like notions that fancy has induced from want of knowledge of the spiritual world and of its sun. This is the reason why they are to be pardoned who have believed that nature produces the things that they see from something inherent from creation. But still they cannot be pardoned who by confirmations in favor of nature have made themselves atheists; because they could have confirmed themselves in favor of the Divine. Ignorance indeed excuses but does not take away the confirmed falsity; for this falsity coheres with evil and evil with hell. 

(Conjugial Love 415-422)

Eternal Rest

Selection from Conjugial Love ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them. Revelation 14:13

Eternal rest is not inactivity. From inactivity come only languor, torpidity, stupor, and drowsiness of the mind and thence of the whole body. These are death, not life, still less the eternal life in which the angels of heaven are.

Eternal rest is of a kind to dispel languor and drowsiness, and quicken men; it must be something which uplifts the mind. It is in some study or work that the mind is aroused, enlivened and delighted; and this takes place according to the use from, in, and toward which it is working. Hence all heaven in the Lord's sight is a theater of uses; every angel is an angel according to his use. His pleasure in his use bears an angel along as a favoring current does a ship. It causes him to be in eternal peace, and in the rest of peace. This is what is meant by eternal rest from labor.

That an angel is alive according to the zeal of his mind in a use, is attested by the fact that every angel has marital love, with its vigor, potency and delights, according to the zeal with which he pursues the genuine use in which he is.

(from Conjugial Love 207)

Children in the After-Life

Selection from Conjugial Love ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Love of children remains after death, especially with women.

On first being raised up, which takes place immediately on death, little ones are taken up into heaven and entrusted to angels of the female sex who in the life of the body in the world had loved children and at the same time had feared God. Having loved all children with maternal tenderness, these women receive the children as their own, and in turn the children, from an implanted instinct, love them as their own mothers. Such mothers are entrusted with as many children as they desire from spiritual storge. The heaven where infants are, appears in front in the region of the forehead, in the line or radius along which angels look directly to the Lord. Their heaven is so situated because all infants are reared under the Lord's immediate auspices. There also flows in with them the heaven of innocence, which is the third heaven. When this first period comes to an end, the children are transferred to another heaven, where they receive instruction.

Under the Lord's auspices children are educated by these women,
and grow in stature and intelligence as in the world.

Children are educated in heaven as follows:

From their teacher they learn to speak. Their first speech is only an utterance of affection, in which however there is an initial something of thought, by which the human in utterance is distinguished from animal sounds. The speech gradually becomes more articulate as ideas enter the thought from affection. All their affections - these also grow - proceed from innocence. First such things are insinuated in them as appear before the eyes and delight them, into which, too, because they have a spiritual origin, there flow things of heaven by which the interiors of the minds are opened. Then, as the children are perfected in intelligence, they also increase in stature, and in this respect also, look more like adults. This is because intelligence and wisdom are spiritual nutriment itself; hence what nourishes their minds also nourishes their bodies there. But children do not grow up in heaven beyond early youth, stopping there and remaining at that age to eternity. On reaching that age they are given in marriage by the Lord's provision; the marriage is celebrated in the heaven where the young man is, who presently follows his wife into her heaven, or into her home if they are in the same society. That I might know for certain that children grow in stature as well as in intelligence, and become adult, I was permitted to speak with some while they were children and later when they had become adult; and as adults they seemed to be of a like stature with grown youths in the world.

Children are instructed especially by means of representatives adapted and suited to their natures, of such beauty and at the same time so replete with interior wisdom that the world can hardly credit it. I may cite two representations here from which others can be imagined. Teachers once represented the Lord's rising from the tomb, and at the same time the union of His human with the Divine. First they presented an idea of a tomb, but no idea at the same time of the Lord except a remote one, so that it was scarcely perceived that it was the Lord except as it were at a distance, for the reason that there is in the idea of a tomb something funereal which they thus removed. Afterwards they discreetly let into the tomb a certain atmospheric something, yet: appearing like a fine watery something, by which they signified, again in seemly remoteness, the spiritual life in baptism. Afterwards I saw them represent the Lord's descent to those who were bound, and His ascent with them into heaven. And what was childlike, they lowered slender cords, almost invisible and very delicate and soft, as if to aid the Lord in His ascent, always devoutly fearful lest anything in the representative might border on what had nothing heavenly in it. There are other representations besides by which children are borne into knowledges of truth and affections of good, as by games agreeable to their infant minds. Children are predisposed by the Lord to these and like representatives through the innocence which comes to them from the third heaven. Spiritual things are thus insinuated into their affections and hence into their tender thoughts in such a way that the children know no otherwise than that they make up and think up such things themselves, and as a result their understanding grows.

The Lord provides in heaven
that the INNOCENCE of INFANCY in children
shall become the INNOCENCE of WISDOM.

Many may fancy that children remain children and become angels immediately on death. But intelligence and wisdom make an angel. While children have none, therefore, they are indeed among angels, but are not angels. They first become angels when they become intelligent and wise. Children are led therefore out of the innocence of infancy into the innocence of wisdom, that is, out of external into internal innocence. This innocence is the goal of all their instruction and development.

When therefore they come into the innocence of wisdom, their childhood's innocence, which had served them meanwhile as a plane, is adjoined.

I saw the nature of childhood's innocence represented by something woody, almost devoid of life, which was vivified as they were imbued with knowledges of truth and affections of good. Afterwards the nature of the innocence of wisdom was represented by a living and naked child. The angels of the third heaven, who more than others are in a state of innocence from the Lord, appear to the eyes of spirits below the heavens as naked children, and being wiser than all others, they are also more alive. The reason is that innocence corresponds to infancy and also to nakedness. Adam and his wife in their state of innocence were therefore said to be naked and not ashamed; but after they lost that state of innocence it is said they were ashamed of their nakedness and hid themselves (Genesis 2:25; 3:7, 10, 11).

In a word, the wiser an angel is, the more innocent he is. The nature of the innocence of wisdom may be seen in a measure from the innocence of childhood ... provided that in the place of the parents the Lord is put as Father, by whom they are led and to whom they ascribe all they receive.

I have spoken with angels at different times about innocence. They have said that innocence is the esse of every good, and that good is good as far as it has innocence in it; also that as wisdom is of the life and hence of good, wisdom is wisdom as far as it partakes of innocence. The same is true, they said, of love, and charity, and faith. Hence it is, too, that no one can enter heaven unless he has innocence, which is the meaning of the Lord's words:

And they brought young children to him, that he should touch them: and his disciples rebuked those that brought them. But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein. And he took them up in his arms, put his hands upon them, and blessed them. (Mark 10:13-16; Luke 18:15-17).

In this, as in other passages in the Word, infants signify those who are in innocence. Good is good as far as it has innocence in it because all good is from the Lord, and innocence consists in being led by Him.

(Conjugial Love 410-414)

The Life of The Soul or Spirit

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

With regard to the general subject of the life of souls, that is, of novitiate spirits, after death, I may state that much experience has shown that when a man comes into the other life he is not aware that he is in that life, but supposes that he is still in this world, and even that he is still in the body. So much is this the case that when told he is a spirit, wonder and amazement possess him, both because he finds himself exactly like a man, in his senses, desires, and thoughts, and because during his life in this world he had not believed in the existence of the spirit, or, as is the case with some, that the spirit could be what he now finds it to be.

A second general fact is that a spirit enjoys much more excellent sensitive faculties, and far superior powers of thinking and speaking, than when living in the body, so that the two states scarcely admit of comparison, although spirits are not aware of this until gifted with reflection by the Lord.

Beware of the false notion that spirits do not possess far more exquisite sensations than during the life of the body. I know the contrary by experience repeated thousands of times. Should any be unwilling to believe this, in consequence of their preconceived ideas concerning the nature of spirit, let them learn it by their own experience when they come into the other life, where it will compel them to believe.

In the first place spirits have sight, for they live in the light, and good spirits, angelic spirits, and angels, in a light so great that the noonday light of this world can hardly be compared to it. The light in which they dwell, and by which they see.... Spirits also have hearing, hearing so exquisite that the hearing of the body cannot be compared to it. For years they have spoken to me almost continually.... They have also the sense of smell.... They have a most exquisite sense of touch, whence come the pains and torments endured in hell; for all sensations have relation to the touch, of which they are merely diversities and varieties. They have desires and affections to which those they had in the body cannot be compared.... Spirits think with much more clearness and distinctness than they had thought during their life in the body.

There are more things contained within a single idea of their thought than in a thousand of the ideas they had possessed in this world. They speak together with so much acuteness, subtlety, sagacity, and distinctness, that if a man could perceive anything of it, it would excite his astonishment. In short, they possess everything that men possess, but in a more perfect manner, except the flesh and bones and the attendant imperfections. They acknowledge and perceive that even while they lived in the body it was the spirit that sensated, and that although the faculty of sensation manifested itself in the body, still it was not of the body; and therefore that when the body is cast aside, the sensations are far more exquisite and perfect. Life consists in the exercise of sensation, for without it there is no life, and such as is the faculty of sensation, such is the life, a fact that anyone may observe.

(Arcana Coelestia 320-322)

Man's Entrance Into Eternal Life (Pt 2)

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
Man's Entrance Into Eternal Life

After the use of light has been given to the resuscitated person, or soul, so that he can look about him, the spiritual angels previously spoken of render him all the kindly services he can in that state desire, and give him information about the things of the other life, but only so far as he is able to receive it. If he has been in faith, and desires it, they show him the wonderful and magnificent things of heaven.

But if the resuscitated person or soul is not of such a character as to be willing to be instructed, he then desires to be rid of the company of the angels, which they exquisitely perceive, for in the other life there is a communication of all the ideas of thought. Still, they do not leave him even then, but he dissociates himself from them. The angels love everyone, and desire nothing more than to render him kindly services, to instruct him, and to convey him to heaven. In this consists their highest delight.

When the soul thus dissociates himself, he is received by good spirits, who likewise render him all kind offices while he is in their company. If however his life in the world has been such that he cannot remain in the company of the good, he desires to be rid of these also, and this process is repeated again and again, until he associates himself with those who are in full agreement with his former life in the world, among whom he finds as it were his own life. And then, wonderful to say, he leads with them a life like that which he had lived when in the body. But after sinking back into such a life, he makes a new beginning of life; and some after a longer time, some after a shorter, are from this borne on toward hell; but such as have been in faith toward the Lord, are from that new beginning of life led step by step toward heaven.

Some however advance more slowly toward heaven, and others more quickly. I have seen some who were elevated to heaven immediately after death, of which I am permitted to mention only two instances.

A certain spirit came and discoursed with me, who, as was evident from certain signs, had only lately died. At first he knew not where he was, supposing himself still to be in the world; but when he became conscious that he was in the other life, and that he no longer possessed anything, such as house, wealth, and the like, being in another kingdom, where he was deprived of all he had possessed in the world, he was seized with anxiety, and knew not where to betake himself, or whither to go for a place of abode. He was then informed that the Lord alone provides for him and for all; and was left to himself, that his thoughts might take their wonted direction, as in the world. He now considered (for in the other life the thoughts of all may be plainly perceived) what he must do, being deprived of all means of subsistence; and while in this state of anxiety he was brought into association with some celestial spirits who belonged to the province of the heart, and who showed him every attention that he could desire. This being done, he was again left to himself, and began to think, from charity, how he might repay kindness so great, from which it was evident that while he had lived in the body he had been in the charity of faith, and he was therefore at once taken up into heaven.

I saw another also who was immediately translated into heaven by the angels, and was accepted by the Lord and shown the glory of heaven; not to mention much other experience respecting others who were conveyed to heaven after some lapse of time.

(Arcana Coelestia 314-319)

Man's Entrance Into Eternal Life (Pt 1)

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
The Entrance into Eternal Life of Those Who are Raised from The Dead

When the celestial angels are with a resuscitated person, they do not leave him, for they love everyone; but when the soul is of such a character that he can no longer be in the company of the celestial angels, he is eager to depart from them; and when this takes place the spiritual angels arrive, and give him the use of light, for previously he had seen nothing, but had only thought.

I was shown how these angels work. They seemed to as it were roll off the coat of the left eye toward the septum of the nose, in order that the eye might be opened and the use of light be granted. To the man it appears as if this were really done, but it is only an appearance.

After this little membrane has been thus in appearance rolled off, some light is visible, but dim, such as a man sees through his eyelids when he first awakes out of sleep; and he who is being resuscitated is in a tranquil state, being still guarded by the celestial angels. There then appears a kind of shadow of an azure color, with a little star, but I perceived that this takes place with variety.

Afterwards there seems to be something gently unrolled from the face, and perception is communicated to him, the angels being especially cautious to prevent any idea coming from him but such as is of a soft and tender nature, as of love; and it is now given him to know that he is a spirit.

He then commences his life. This at first is happy and glad, for he seems to himself to have come into eternal life, which is represented by a bright white light that becomes of a beautiful golden tinge, by which is signified his first life, to wit, that it is celestial as well as spiritual.

His being next taken into the society of good spirits is represented by a young man sitting on a horse and directing it toward hell, but the horse cannot move a step. He is represented as a youth because when he first enters upon eternal life he is among angels, and therefore appears to himself to be in the flower of youth.

His subsequent life is represented by his dismounting from the horse and walking on foot, because he cannot make the horse move from the place; and it is insinuated to him that he must be instructed in the knowledges of what is true and good.

Afterwards pathways were seen sloping gently upward, which signify that by the knowledges of what is true and good, and by self-acknowledgment, he should be led by degrees toward heaven; for no one can be conducted thither without such self-acknowledgment, and the knowledges of what is true and good.

(Arcana Coelestia 182-189)

Transition from the Natural World to the Spiritual World

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
The Resuscitation of Man from the Dead, and His Entrance into Eternal Life

Being permitted to describe in connected order how man passes from the life of the body into the life of eternity, in order that the way in which he is resuscitated might be known, this has been shown me, not by hearing, but by actual experience.

I was reduced into a state of insensibility as to the bodily senses, thus almost into the state of dying persons, retaining however my interior life unimpaired, attended with the power of thinking, and with sufficient breathing for life, and finally with a tacit breathing, that I might perceive and remember what happens to those who have died and are being resuscitated.

Celestial angels were present who occupied the region of the heart, so that as to the heart I seemed united with them, and so that at length scarcely anything was left to me except thought, and the consequent perception, and this for some hours.

I was thus removed from communication with spirits in the world of spirits, who supposed that I had departed from the life of the body. Besides the celestial angels, who occupied the region of the heart, there were also two angels sitting at my head, and it was given me to perceive that it is so with everyone.

The angels who sat at my head were perfectly silent, merely communicating their thoughts by the face, so that I could perceive that another face was as it were induced upon me; indeed two, because there were two angels. When the angels perceive that their faces are received, they know that the man is dead.

After recognizing their faces, they induced certain changes about the region of the mouth, and thus communicated their thoughts, for it is customary with the celestial angels to speak by the province of the mouth, and it was permitted me to perceive their cogitative speech.

An aromatic odor was perceived, like that of an embalmed corpse, for when the celestial angels are present, the cadaverous odor is perceived as if it were aromatic, which when perceived by evil spirits prevents their approach.

Meanwhile I perceived that the region of the heart was kept very closely united with the celestial angels, as was also evident from the pulsation.

It was insinuated to me that man is kept engaged by the angels in the pious and holy thoughts which he entertained at the point of death; and it was also insinuated that those who are dying usually think about eternal life, and seldom of salvation and happiness, and therefore the angels keep them in the thought of eternal life.

In this thought they are kept for a considerable time by the celestial angels before these angels depart, and those who are being resuscitated are then left to the spiritual angels, with whom they are next associated. Meanwhile they have a dim idea that they are living in the body.

As soon as the internal parts of the body grow cold, the vital substances are separated from the man, wherever they may be, even if inclosed in a thousand labyrinthine interlacings, for such is the efficacy of the Lord's mercy (which I had previously perceived as a living and mighty attraction), that nothing vital can remain behind.

The celestial angels who sat at the head remained with me for some time after I was as it were resuscitated, but they conversed only tacitly. It was perceived from their cogitative speech that they made light of all fallacies and falsities, smiling at them not indeed as matters for derision, but as if they cared nothing about them. Their speech is cogitative, devoid of sound, and in this kind of language they begin to speak with the souls with whom they are at first present.

As yet the man, thus resuscitated by the celestial angels, possesses only an obscure life; but when the time comes for him to be delivered to the spiritual angels, then after a little delay, when the spiritual angels have approached, the celestial depart; and it has been shown me how the spiritual angels operate in order that the man may receive the benefit of light.

(Arcana Coelestia 168-181)

(continuation of this subject to follow)