Heaven and Hell - Swedenborg Foundation

HEAVEN AND HELL 57
which they have no idea except as something ethereal in which
there is some vitality. And as they thus ascribe to angels
nothing human except a thinking faculty, they believe that
having no eyes they do not see, having no ears they do not
hear, and having no mouth or tongue they do not speak.
[2] To this the angels replied that they are aware that such a
belief is held by many in the world, and is prevalent among the
learned, and to their surprise, even among the clergy. The
reason, they said, is that the learned, who were the leaders and
who first concocted such an idea of angels and spirits,
conceived of them from the sense conceptions of the external
man; and those who think from these, and not from interior
light and from the general idea implanted in everyone, must
needs fabricate such notions, since the sense conceptions of the
external man take in only what belongs to nature, and nothing
above nature, thus nothing whatever of the spiritual world. 69
From these leaders as guides this falsity of thought about angels
extended to others who did not think from themselves but
adopted the thoughts of their leaders; and those who first take
their thoughts from others and make that thought their belief,
and then view it with their own understanding, cannot easily
recede from it, and are therefore in most cases satisfied with
confirming it.
[3] The angels said, furthermore, that the simple in faith and
heart have no such idea about angels, but think of them as the
men of heaven, and for the reason that they have not
extinguished by learning what is implanted in them from
69. Unless man is raised above the sense conceptions of the external
man he has very little wisdom (n. 5089).
The wise man thinks above these sense conceptions (n. 5089, 5094).
When man is raised above these, he comes into clearer light, and finally
into heavenly light (n. 6183, 6313, 6315, 9407, 9730, 9922).
Elevation and withdrawal from these was known to the ancients (n.
6313).