also in these words of the Lord: No man can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or cleave to the one and not heed the other (Mt 6:24). 19. ( viii) _That which is in good and at the same time in truth is something; that which is in evil and at the same time in falsity is not anything._ See above (n. 11) that what is in good and at the same time in truth is something. It follows that what is at once evil and false is not anything. By not being anything is meant that it is without power and without spiritual life. Those at once in evil and in falsity (all of whom are in hell) have power indeed among themselves, for an evil man can do evil and does so in a thousand ways. Yet he can do evil to the evil only by reason of their evil; he cannot harm the good at all; if, as sometimes happens, he does, it is by conjunction with their evil. [2] In this way temptations arise; they are infestations by evil spirits who are with a man; so combats ensue by which the good are freed from their evils. Since the wicked have no power, all hell in the Lord's sight is not only nothing, but nothing at all in point of power, as I have seen proved by much experience. But it is remarkable that the evil all deem themselves powerful, and the good all think themselves powerless. This is because the evil ascribe everything to their own power or shrewdness and malice, and nothing to the Lord; whereas the good ascribe nothing to their own prudence, but all to the Lord who is almighty. Evil and falsity together are not anything for the further reason that they have no spiritual life. The life of the infernals is therefore called death, not life. Since life holds everything, death has nothing. 20. Men in evil and at the same time in truths may be likened to eagles flying aloft which, deprived of their wings, fall. For after death, on becoming spirits, men do the like who have understood and spoken and taught truths and yet have not looked to God in their lives. By means of things of the understanding they raise themselves aloft and even enter heaven at times and feign themselves angels of light. But when they are deprived of truths and are cast out, they fall down to hell. Eagles also signify rapacious men with intellectual acumen, and wings signify spiritual truths. Such, we said, are those who have not looked to God in their lives. To look to God in life means simply to think that a given evil is a sin against God, and for that reason not to commit it.