355. Any one may confirm himself in favor of the Divine from things seen in nature by giving attention to what is known about bees: that they know how to collect wax and suck honey from herbs and flowers, and to build cells like little houses, and set them in the form of a city, with streets through which to come in and go out; that they scent at long distances the flowers and herbs from which they collect wax for their houses and honey for food, and laden with these fly back in a direct line to their hive; thus providing themselves with food and habitation for the coming winter, as if they had foresight and knowledge of it. They also set over them a mistress as queen, out of whom a posterity may be propagated; and for her they build a sort of a palace over themselves with guards around it; and when her time of bringing forth is at hand, she goes attended by her guards from cell to cell, and lays her eggs, which the crowd of followers smear over to protect them from the air, from which a new progeny springs forth for them. When this progeny becomes mature enough to do the same, it is driven from the hive. The expelled swarm first collects, and then in a close body, to preserve its integrity, flies away in quest of a home for itself. Moreover, in the autumn the useless drones are led out and are deprived of their wings to prevent their returning and consuming the food for which they have not labored; not to mention other particulars. From all this it can be seen that bees, because of their use to the human race, have from influx from the spiritual world, a form of government similar to that among men on earth, and even like that of angels in heaven. Can any man of unimpaired reason fail to see that these doings of the bees are not from the natural world? What has that sun, from which nature springs, in common with a government that vies with and resembles the government of heaven? From these things and others very similar to them in the brute creation, the confessor and worshiper of nature confirms himself in favor of nature, while the confessor and worshiper of God confirms himself from the same things in favor of the Divine; for the spiritual man sees in them spiritual things and the natural man natural things, thus each according to his character. As for myself, such things have been proofs to me of an influx of the spiritual into the natural, that is, of the spiritual world into the natural world, thus of an influx from the Lord's Divine Wisdom. Consider, moreover, whether you can think analytically concerning any form of government, or any civil law, or moral virtue, or spiritual truth, unless the Divine out of His wisdom flows in through the spiritual world ? For myself, I could not and cannot. For having now observed that influx perceptibly and sensibly for about nineteen years continually, I speak as an eye-witness.