The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love: To Which is Added The Pleasures of Insanity Pertaining To Scortatory Love — John Shaqi
The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love: To Which is Added The Pleasures of Insanity Pertaining To Scortatory LoveSwedenborg, Emanuel
Religion
The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love: To Which is Added The Pleasures of Insanity Pertaining To Scortatory Love
Swedenborg, Emanuel
Marriage -- Religious aspects -- New Jerusalem Church; New Jerusalem Church -- Doctrines; Sexual ethics
8. After this the angel returned to the house of assembly, and called to
him those who had conceived the joys of heaven and eternal happiness to
consist in paradisiacal delights; to whom he said, "Follow me, and I
will introduce you into your paradisiacal heaven, that you may enter
upon the beatitudes of your eternal happiness." Immediately he
introduced them through a lofty portal, formed of the boughs and shoots
of the finest trees interwoven with each other. After their admission,
he led them through a variety of winding paths in different directions.
The place was a real paradise, on the confines of heaven, intended for
the reception of such as, during their abode on earth, had fancied the
whole heaven to be a single paradise, because it is so called, and had
been led to conceive that after death there would be a perfect rest from
all kinds of labor; which rest would consist in a continual feast of
pleasures, such as walking among roses, being exhilarated with the most
exquisite wines, and participating in continual mirth and festivity; and
that this kind of life could only be enjoyed in a heavenly paradise. As
they followed the angel, they saw a great number of old and young, of
both sexes, sitting by threes and tens in a company on banks of roses;
some of whom were wreathing garlands to adorn the heads of the seniors,
the arms of the young, and the bosoms of the children; others were
pressing the juice out of grapes, cherries, and mulberries, which they
collected in cups, and then drank with much festivity; some were
delighting themselves with the fragrant smells that exhaled far and wide
from the flowers, fruits, and odoriferous leaves of a variety of plants;
others were singing most melodious songs, to the great entertainment of
the hearers; some were sitting by the sides of fountains, and directing
the bubbling streams into various forms and channels; others were
walking, and amusing one another with cheerful and pleasant
conversation; others were retiring into shady arbors to repose on
couches; besides a variety of other paradisiacal entertainment. After
observing these things, the angel led his companions through various
winding paths, till he brought them at length to a most beautiful grove
of roses, surrounded by olive, orange, and citron trees. Here they found
many persons sitting in a disconsolate posture, with their heads
reclined on their hands, and exhibiting all the signs of sorrow and
discontent. The companions of the angel accosted them, and inquired into
the cause of their grief. They replied, "This is the seventh day since
we came into this paradise: on our first admission we seemed to
ourselves to be elevated into heaven, and introduced into a
participation of its inmost joys; but after three days our pleasures
began to pall on the appetite, and our relish was lost, till at length
we became insensible to their taste, and found that they had lost the
power of pleasing. Our imaginary joys being thus annihilated we were
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