were to conceive of God as invisible, consequently without form and quality, they would not be able to think about God at all, inasmuch as such an invisible [being] does not fall into any idea of thought. On hearing this, it was given me to tell them that they do well to think of God under the Human Form, and that many on our Earth think in like manner, especially when they think of the Lord; and that the ancients thought in no other way. I then told them about Abraham, Lot, Gideon, Manoah and his wife, and what is related of them in our Word, namely, that they saw God under the Human Form, and acknowledged Him, thus seen, to be the Creator of the universe, and called Him Jehovah, and this also from an interior perception; but that at the present day that interior perception is lost in the Christian world, and only remains with the simple who are in faith. 159. Previous to this conversation, they had believed that our company also consisted of those who want to confuse them by the idea of three in relation to God; wherefore, on hearing what was said, they were affected with joy, and said that God, whom they then called the Lord, had also sent some to teach them concerning Him; and that they are unwilling to admit strangers who disturb them, especially with the idea of three persons in the Divinity, knowing as they do that God is One, consequently that the Divine is One, and does not consist of three in unanimity, unless they are disposed to think of God as of an angel, in whom there is an Inmost of life which is invisible, and from which he thinks and is wise; an External of life, which is visible under a human form, from which he sees and acts; and a Proceeding of life, which is the sphere of love and of faith from him; for from every spirit and angel there proceeds a sphere of life by which he is known at a distance[cc]; and as to the Lord, that that Proceeding of life from Him is the Divine itself which fills and constitutes the heavens, because it proceeds from the very Esse of the life of love and of faith. They said that in this and in no other manner can they perceive a trinity and unity together. On hearing this, it was given me to say that such an idea of a trinity and unity together agrees with the angelic idea concerning the Lord, and that it is from the Lord's own doctrine concerning Himself. For He teaches that the Father and Himself are One; that the Father is in Him and He in the Father; that he who seeth Him seeth the Father; and he who believeth in Him believeth in the Father and knoweth the Father; also that the Comforter, whom He calls the Spirit of Truth, and likewise the Holy Spirit, proceeds from Him, and does not speak from Himself but from Him, by which Comforter is meant the Divine proceeding. I was further permitted to tell them that their idea concerning a trinity and unity together agrees with the Esse and Existere of the Lord's life when He was in the world. The Esse of His life was the Divine Itself, for He