The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugial Love. Emanuel Swedenborg

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СКАЧАТЬ and wise, in the same proportion he becomes more internal and spiritual, and in the same proportion the form of his mind is more perfected; and this form receives conjugial love: for therein it perceives and is sensible of a spiritual delight, which is inwardly blessed, and a natural delight thence arising, which derives its soul, life, and essence from the spiritual delight.

      

      96. The reason why conjugial love is peculiar to man, is because he only can become spiritual, he being capable of elevating his intellect above his natural loves, and from that state of elevation of seeing them beneath him, and of judging of their quality, and also of amending, correcting, and removing them. No other animal can do this; for the loves of other animals are altogether united with their inborn knowledge; on which account this knowledge cannot be elevated into intelligence, and still less into wisdom; in consequence of which every other animal is led by the love implanted in his knowledge, as a blind person is led through the streets by a dog. This is the reason which conjugial love is peculiar to man; it may also be called native and near akin to him; because man has the faculty of growing wise, with which faculty this love is united.

      97. VIII. WITH MAN CONJUGIAL LOVE IS IN THE LOVE OF THE SEX AS A GEM IN ITS MATRIX. As this however is merely a comparison, we will explain it in the article which immediately follows: this comparison also illustrates what was shown just above, n. 94, 95—that the love of the sex belongs to the external or natural man, and conjugial love to the internal or spiritual man.

      

      98. IX. THE LOVE OF THE SEX WITH MAN IS NOT THE ORIGIN OF CONJUGIAL LOVE, BUT ITS FIRST RUDIMENT; THUS IT IS LIKE AN EXTERNAL NATURAL PRINCIPLE, IN WHICH AN INTERNAL SPIRITUAL PRINCIPLE IS IMPLANTED. The subject here treated of is love truly conjugial, and not ordinary love, which also is called conjugial, and which with some is merely the limited love of the sex. Love truly conjugial exists only with those who desire wisdom, and who consequently advance more and more into wisdom. These the Lord foresees, and provides for them conjugial love; which love indeed commences with them from the love of the sex, or rather by it; but still it does not originate in it; for it originates in proportion to the advancement in wisdom and the dawning of the light thereof in man; for wisdom and that love are inseparable companions. The reason why conjugial love commences by the love of the sex is, because before a suitable consort is found, the sex in general is loved and regarded with a fond eye, and is treated with civility from a moral ground: for a young man has to make his choice; and while this is determining, from an innate inclination to marriage with one, which lies concealed in the interiors of his mind, his external receives a gentle warmth. A further reason is, because determinations to marriage are delayed from various causes even to riper years, and in the mean time the beginning of that love is as lust; which with some actually goes astray into the love of the sex; yet with them it is indulged no further than may be conducive to health. This, however, is to be understood as spoken of the male sex, because it has enticements which actually inflame it; but not of the female sex. From these considerations it is evident that the love of the sex is not the origin of love truly conjugial; but that it is its first rudiment in respect to time, yet not in respect to end; for what is first in respect to end, is first in the mind and its intention, because it is regarded as primary; but to this first there is no approaching unless successively through mediums, and these are not first in themselves, but only conducive to what is first in itself.

      

      99. X. DURING THE IMPLANTATION OF CONJUGIAL LOVE, THE LOVE OF THE SEX INVERTS ITSELF AND BECOMES THE CHASTE LOVE OF THE SEX. It is said that in this case the love of the sex inverts itself; because while conjugial love is coming to its origin, which is in the interiors of the mind, it sees the love of the sex not before itself but behind, or not above itself but beneath, and thus as somewhat which it passes by and leaves. The case herein is similar to that of a person climbing from one office to another through a great variety, till he reaches one which exceeds the rest in dignity; when he looks back upon the offices through which he had passed, as behind or beneath him; or as when a person intends a journey to the palace of some king, after his arrival at his journey's end, he inverts his view in regard to the objects which he had seen in the way. That in this case the love of the sex remains and becomes chaste, and yet, to those who are principled in love truly conjugial, is sweeter than it was before, may be seen from the description given of it by those in the spiritual world, in the two MEMORABLE RELATIONS, n. 44 and 55.

      

      100. XI. THE MALE AND THE FEMALE WERE CREATED TO BE THE ESSENTIAL FORM OF THE MARRIAGE OF GOOD AND TRUTH. The reason for this is, because the male was created to be the understanding of truth, thus truth in form; and the female was created to be the will of good, thus good in form; and there is implanted in each, from their inmost principles, an inclination to conjunction into a one, as may be seen above, n. 88; thus the two make one form, which emulates the conjugial form of good and truth. It is said to emulate it, because it is not the same, but is like it; for the good which joins itself with the truth belonging to the man, is from the Lord immediately; whereas the good of the wife, which joins itself with the truth belonging to the man, is from the Lord mediately through the wife; therefore there are two goods, the one internal, the other external, which join themselves with the truth belonging to the husband, and cause him to be constantly in the understanding of truth, and thence in wisdom, by love truly conjugial: but on this subject more will be said in the following pages.

      

      101. XII. MARRIED PARTNERS ARE THAT FORM IN THEIR INMOST PRINCIPLES, AND THENCE IN WHAT IS DERIVED FROM THOSE PRINCIPLES, IN PROPORTION AS THE INTERIORS OF THEIR MINDS ARE OPENED. There are three things of which every man consists, and which follow in an orderly connection—the soul, the mind, and the body: his inmost is the soul, his middle is the mind, and his ultimate is the body. Every thing which flows from the Lord into a man, flows into his inmost principle, which is the soul, and descends thence into his middle principle, which is the mind, and through this into his ultimate principle, which is the body. Such is the nature of the influx of the marriage of good and truth from the Lord with man: it flows immediately into his soul, and thence proceeds to the principles next succeeding, and through these to the extreme or outermost: and thus conjointly all the principles constitute conjugial love. From an idea of this influx it is manifest, that two married partners are the form of conjugial love in their inmost principles, and thence in those derived from the inmost.

      

      102. But the reason why married partners become that form in proportion as the interiors of their minds are opened, is, because the mind is successively opened from infancy even to extreme old age: for a man is born corporeal: and in proportion as the mind is opened proximately above the body, he becomes rational; and in proportion as his rational principle is purified, and as it were drained of the fallacies which flow in from the bodily senses, and of the concupiscences which flow in from the allurements of the flesh, in the same proportion it is opened; and this is affected solely by wisdom: and when the interiors of the rational mind are open, the man becomes a form of wisdom; and this form is the receptacle of love truly conjugial. "The wisdom which constitutes this form, and receives this love, is rational, and at the same time moral, wisdom: rational wisdom regards the truths and goods which appear inwardly in man, not as its own, but as flowing in from the Lord; and moral wisdom shuns evils and falses as leprosies, especially the evils of lasciviousness, which contaminate its conjugial love."

      

      103. To the above I shall add two MEMORABLE RELATIONS: the FIRST is this. One morning before sun-rise I was looking towards the east in the spiritual СКАЧАТЬ