Heaven and its Wonders and HellSwedenborg, Emanuel
Religion
Heaven and its Wonders and Hell
Swedenborg, Emanuel
Future life -- Christianity -- Early work to 1800; Heaven -- Christianity; Hell -- Christianity
102. Angels are amazed when they hear that there are men who
attribute all things to nature and nothing to the Divine, and who
also believe that their body, into which so many wonders of heaven
are gathered, is a product of nature. Still more are they amazed that
the rational part of man is believed to be from nature, when, if men
will but lift their minds a little, they can see that such effects
are not from nature but from the Divine; and that nature has been
created simply for clothing the spiritual and for presenting it in a
correspondent form in the outmost of order. Such men they liken to
owls, which see in darkness, but in light see nothing.
103. XIII. THERE IS A CORRESPONDENCE OF HEAVEN WITH ALL THINGS OF THE
EARTH.
What correspondence is has been told in the preceding chapter, and it
has there been shown that each thing and all things of the animal
body are correspondences. The next step is to show that all things of
the earth, and in general all things of the universe, are
correspondences.
104. All things of the earth are distinguished into three kinds,
called kingdoms, namely, the animal kingdom, the vegetable kingdom,
and the mineral kingdom. The things of the animal kingdom are
correspondences in the first degree, because they live; the things of
the vegetable kingdom are correspondences in the second degree,
because they merely grow; the things of the mineral kingdom are
correspondences in the third degree, because they neither live nor
grow. Correspondences in the animal kingdom are living creatures of
various kinds, both those that walk and creep on the ground and those
that fly in the air; these need not be specially named, as they are
well known. Correspondences in the vegetable kingdom are all things
that grow and abound in gardens, forests, fields, and meadows; these,
too, need not be named, because they are well known. Correspondences
in the mineral kingdom are metals more and less noble, stones
precious and not precious, earths of various kinds, and also the
waters. Besides these the things prepared from them by human activity
for use are correspondences, as foods of every kind, clothing,
dwellings and other buildings, with many other things.
105. Also the things above the earth, as the sun, moon, and stars,
and those in the atmosphere, as clouds, mists, rain, lightning and
thunder, are likewise correspondences. Things resulting from the
presence and absence of the sun, as light and shade, heat and cold,
are also correspondences, as well as those that follow in succession
therefrom, as the seasons of the year, spring, summer, autumn, and
winter; and the times of day, morning, noon, evening, and night.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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