Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine WisdomSwedenborg, Emanuel
Religion
Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom
Swedenborg, Emanuel
God (Christianity) -- Love; God (Christianity) -- Wisdom
understanding that hears through the ear; consequently hearing is
predicated also of attention and giving heed, which pertain to the
understanding. The appearance is that the nose smells, and the tongue
tastes but it is the understanding that smells and also tastes by virtue
of its perception; therefore smelling and tasting are predicated also of
perception. So in other cases. The sources of all these are love and
wisdom; from which it can be seen that these two make the life of man.
364. Everyone sees that the understanding is the receptacle of wisdom,
but few see that the will is the receptacle of love. This is because the
will does not act at all by itself, but only through the understanding;
also because the love of the will, in passing over into the wisdom of the
understanding, is first changed into affection, and thus passes over; and
affection is not perceived except by something pleasant in thinking,
speaking, and acting, which is not noticed. Still it is evident that love
is from the will, for the reason that everyone wills what he loves, and
does not will what he does not love.
365. (2) The life of man in its first principles is in the brains, and in
its derivatives in the body. In first principles means in its firsts, and
in derivatives means in what is brought forth and formed from its firsts.
By life in first principles is meant will and understanding. These two are
what are in their first principles in the brains, and in their derivatives
in the body. It is evident that the first principles or firsts of life are
in the brains:
(1) From the feeling itself; since man perceives, when he exerts his mind
and thinks, that he thinks in the brain. He draws in as it were the sight
of the eye, contracts the forehead, and perceives the mental process to be
within, especially inside the forehead and somewhat above it.
(2) From man's formation in the womb; in that the brain or head is first
developed, and continues for some time larger than the body.
(3) In that the head is above and the body below; and it is according to
order for the higher to act upon the lower, and not the reverse.
(4) In that, when the brain is injured in the womb or by a wound or by
disease, or by excessive application, thought is weakened and sometimes
the mind becomes deranged.
(5) In that all the external senses of the body sight, hearing, smell, and
taste, with touch (the universal sense) as also speech, are in the front
part of the head, which is called the face, and communicate immediately
through fibers with the brains, and derive therefrom their sensitive and
active life.
(6) It is from this that affections, which are of love, appear imaged
forth in the face, and that thoughts, which are of wisdom, are revealed
in a kind of sparkle of the eyes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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