The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love. Emanuel Swedenborg

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СКАЧАТЬ world: for he has a similar body, countenance, speech, and senses; for he has a similar affection and thought, or will and understanding. He is indeed actually not similar, because he is a spiritual, and consequently an interior man; but the difference does not appear to him, because he cannot compare his spiritual state with his former natural state, having put off the latter, and being in the former; therefore I have often heard such persons say, that they know not but that they are in the former world, with this difference, however, that they no longer see those whom they had left in that world; but that they see those who had departed out of it, or were deceased. The reason why they now see the latter and not the former, is, because they are no longer natural men, but spiritual or substantial; and a spiritual or substantial man sees a spiritual or substantial man, as a natural or material man sees a natural or material man, but not vice versa, on account of the difference between what is substantial and what is material, which is like the difference between what is prior and what is posterior; and what is prior, being in itself purer, cannot appear to what is posterior, which in itself is grosser; nor can what is posterior, being grosser, appear to what is prior, which in itself is purer; consequently an angel cannot appear to a man of this world, nor a man of this world to an angel. The reason why a man after death is a spiritual or substantial man, is, because this spiritual or substantial man lay inwardly concealed in the natural or material man; which natural or material man was to it as a covering, or as a skin about to be cast off; and when the covering or skin is cast off, the spiritual or substantial man comes forth, a purer, interior, and more perfect man. That the spiritual man is still a perfect man, notwithstanding his being invisible to the natural man, is evident from the Lord's being seen by the apostles after his resurrection, when he appeared, and presently he did not appear; and yet he was a man like to himself both when seen and when not seen: it is also said, that when they saw him, their eyes were opened.

      32. II. IN THIS CASE A MALE IS A MALE, AND A FEMALE A FEMALE. Since a man (homo) lives a man after death, and man is male and female, and there is such a distinction between the male principle and the female principle, that the one cannot be changed into the other, it follows, that after death the male lives a male, and the female a female, each being a spiritual man. It is said that the male principle cannot be changed into the female principle, nor the female into the male, and that therefore after death the male is a male, and the female a female; but as it is not known in what the masculine principle essentially consists, and in what the feminine, it may be expedient briefly to explain it. The essential distinction between the two is this: in the masculine principle, love is inmost, and its covering is wisdom; or, what is the same, the masculine principle is love covered (or veiled) by wisdom; whereas in the feminine principle, the wisdom of the male is inmost, and its covering is love thence derived; but this latter love is feminine, and is given by the Lord to the wife through the wisdom of the husband; whereas the former love is masculine, which is the love of growing wise, and is given by the Lord to the husband according to the reception of wisdom. It is from this circumstance, that the male is the wisdom of love, and the female is the love of that wisdom; therefore from creation there is implanted in each a love of conjunction so as to become a one; but on this subject more will be said in the following pages. That the female principle is derived from the male, or that the woman was taken out of the man, is evident from these words in Genesis: Jehovah God took out one of the man's ribs, and closed up the flesh in the place thereof; and he builded the rib, which he had taken out of the man, into a woman; and he brought her to the man; and the man said, This is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; hence she shall be called Eve, because she was taken out of man, chap. ii. 21–23: the signification of a rib and of flesh will be shewn elsewhere.

      33. From this primitive formation it follows, that by birth the character of the male is intellectual, and that the female character partakes more of the will principle; or, what amounts to the same, that the male is born into the affection of knowing, understanding, and growing wise, and the female into the love of conjoining herself with that affection in the male. And as the interiors form the exteriors to their own likeness, and the masculine form is the form of intellect, and the feminine is the form of the love of that intellect, therefore the male and the female differ as to the features of the face, the tone of the voice, and the form of the body; the male having harder features, a harsher tone of voice, a stronger body, and also a bearded chin, and in general a form less beautiful than that of the female; they differ also in their gestures and manners; in a word, they are not exactly similar in a single respect; but still, in every particular of each, there is a tendency to conjunction; yea, the male principle in the male, is male in every part of his body, even the most minute, and also in every idea of his thought, and every spark of his affection; the same is true of the female principle in the female; and since of consequence the one cannot be changed into the other, it follows, that after death a male is a male, and a female a female.

      34. III. EVERY ONE'S PECULIAR LOVE REMAINS WITH HIM AFTER DEATH. Man knows that there is such a thing as love; but he does not know what love is. He knows that there is such a thing from common discourse; as when it is said, that such a one loves me, that a king loves his subjects, and subjects love their king; that a husband loves his wife, and a mother her children, and vice versa; also when it is said, that any one loves his country, his fellow citizens, and his neighbour; in like manner of things abstracted from persons; as when it is said that a man loves this or that. But although the term love is thus universally applied in conversation, still there is scarcely any one that knows what love is: even while meditating on the subject, as he is not then able to form any distinct idea concerning it, and thus not to fix it as present in the light of the understanding, because of its having relation not to light but to heat, he either denies its reality, or he calls it merely an influent effect arising from the sight, the hearing, and the conversation, and thus accounts for the motions to which it gives birth; not being at all aware, that love is his very life, not only the common life of his whole body and of all his thoughts, but also the life of all their particulars. A wise man may perceive this from the consideration, that if the affection of love be removed, he is incapable both of thinking and acting; for in proportion as that affection grows cold, do not thought, speech, and action grow cold also? and in proportion as that affection grows warm, do not they also grow warm in the same degree? Love therefore is the heat of the life of man (hominis), or his vital heat. The heat of the blood, and also its redness, are from this source alone. The fire of the angelic sun, which is pure love, produces this effect.

      

      35. That every one has his own peculiar love, or a love distinct from that of another; that is, that no two men have exactly the same love, may appear from the infinite variety of human countenances, the countenance being a type of the love; for it is well known that the countenance is changed and varied according to the affection of love; a man's desires also, which are of love, and likewise his joys and sorrows, are manifested in the countenance. From this consideration it is evident, that every man is his own peculiar love; yea, that he is the form of his love. It is however to be observed, that the interior man, which is the same with his spirit which lives after death, is the form of his love, and not so the exterior man which lives in this world, because the latter has learnt from infancy to conceal the desires of his love; yea, to make a pretence and show of desires which are different from his own.

      

      36. The reason why every one's peculiar love remains with him after death, is, because, as was said just above, n. 34, love is a man's (hominis) life; and hence it is the man himself. A man also is his own peculiar thought, thus his own peculiar intelligence and wisdom; but these make a one with his love; for a man thinks from this love and according to it; yea, if he be in freedom, he speaks and acts in like manner; from which it may appear, that love is the esse or essence of a man's life, and that thought is the existere or existence of his life thence derived; therefore speech and action, which are said to flow from the thought, do not flow from the thought, but from the love through the thought. From СКАЧАТЬ