Afterlife: A Guided Tour of Heaven and Its Wonders - Swedenborg ...

AFTERLIFE
First, some from the animal kingdom. In this field,
many people realize what kind of knowledge is virtually
instinctive in any creature you choose. Bees know how to
collect honey from flowers, build cells from wax in which
they store their honey, and so provide food for themselves
and their families for the coming winter. Their queen lays
eggs, while the others cover them over and lead her
around so that a new generation may be born. They live
under a kind of government that all their members know
instinctively, protecting their useful members and expel -
ling the useless ones and clipping off their wings. There
are even more marvels that are given them from heaven
for their use. In fact, their wax serves the human race
throughout the world for candles, and their honey for
flavoring foods.
Then what about caterpillars, the lowest creatures in
the animal kingdom! They know how to nourish them -
selves with the sap of their leaves and in due time how to
make a covering around themselves and virtually put
them selves in a womb and so to hatch offspring of their
own species. Some first turn into nymphs and chrysalides
and make threads, and after exhausting labor grace them -
selves with new bodies and adorn themselves with wings.
Then they fly in the air as though it were their heaven,
celebrate their “weddings,” lay their eggs, and so provide
themselves with a posterity.
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