There are two things proper to nature - space and time. From these man
in the natural world forms the ideas of his thought, and thereby his
understanding. If he remains in these ideas, and does not raise his mind
above them, he is in no wise able to perceive things spiritual and Divine,
for these he involves in ideas drawn from space and time; and so far as
that is done the light [lumen] of his understanding becomes merely
natural. To think from this lumen in reasoning about spiritual and
Divine things, is like thinking from the thick darkness of night about
those things that appear only in the light of day. From this comes
naturalism. But he who knows how to raise his mind above ideas of thought
drawn from space and time, passes from thick darkness into light, and has
discernment in things spiritual and Divine, and finally sees the things
which are in and from what is spiritual and Divine; and then from that
light he dispels the thick darkness of the natural lumen, and banishes
its fallacies from the middle to the sides. Every man who has
understanding is able to transcend in thought these properties of nature,
and actually does so; and he then affirms and sees that the Divine,
because omnipresent, is not in space. He is also able to affirm and to
see the things that have been adduced above. But if he denies the Divine
Omnipresence, and ascribes all things to nature, then he has no wish to
be elevated, though he can be.
70. All who die and become angels put off the two above- mentioned
properties of nature, namely, space and time; for they then enter into
spiritual light, in which objects of thought are truths, and objects of
sight are like those in the natural world, but are correspondent to their
thoughts. The objects of their thought which, as just said, are truths,
derive nothing at all from space and time; and though the objects of
their sight appear as if in space and in time, still the angels do not
think from space and time. The reason is, that spaces and times there
are not fixed, as in the natural world, but are changeable according to
the states of their life. In the ideas of their thought, therefore,
instead of space and time there are states of life, instead of spaces
such things as have reference to states of love, and instead of times
such things as have reference to states of wisdom. From this it is that
spiritual thought, and spiritual speech therefrom, differ so much from
natural thought and natural speech therefrom, as to have nothing in
common except as regards the interiors of things, which are all spiritual.
Of this difference more will be said elsewhere. Now, because the thoughts
of angels derive nothing from space and time, but everything from states
of life, when it is said that the Divine fills spaces angels evidently
cannot comprehend it, for they do not know what spaces are; but when,
apart from any idea of space, it is said that the Divine fills all things,
they clearly comprehend it.
71. To make it clear that the merely natural man thinks of spiritual and
Divine things from space, and the spiritual man apart from space, let the
following serve for illustration. The merely natural man thinks by means
of ideas which he has acquired from objects of sight, in all of which
there is figure partaking of length, breadth, and height, and of shape
determined by these, either angular or circular. These [conceptions] are
manifestly present in the ideas of his thought concerning things visible
on earth; they are also in the ideas of his thought concerning those not
visible, such as civil and moral affairs. This he is unconscious of; but
they are nevertheless there, as continuations. With a spiritual man it
is different, especially with an angel of heaven, whose thought has
nothing in common with figure and form that derives anything from
spiritual length, breadth, and height, but only with figure and form
derived from the state of a thing resulting from the state of its life.
Consequently, instead of length of space he thinks of the good of a thing
from good of life; instead of breadth of space, of the truth of a thing
from truth of life; and instead of height, of the degrees of these. Thus
he thinks from the correspondence there is between things spiritual and
things natural. From this correspondence it is that in the Word "length"
signifies the good of a thing, "breadth" the truth of a thing, and
"height" the degrees of these. From this it is evident that an angel of
heaven, when he thinks of the Divine Omnipresence, can by no means think
otherwise than that the Divine, apart from space, fills all things. And
that which an angel thinks is truth, because the light which enlightens
his understanding is Divine Wisdom.
72. This is the basis of thought concerning God; for without it, what is
to be said of the creation of the universe by God-Man, of His Providence,
Omnipotence, Omnipresence and Omniscience, even if understood, cannot be
kept in mind; since the merely natural man, even while he has these
things in his understanding, sinks back into his life's love, which is
that of his will; and that love dissipates these truths, and immerses
his thought in space, where his lumen, which he calls rational, abides,
not knowing that so far as he denies these things, he is irrational.
That this is so, may be confirmed by the idea entertained of this truth,
that GOD is a MAN. Read with attention, I pray you, what has been said
above (n. 11-13) and what follows after, and your understanding will
accept it. But when you let your thought down into the natural lumen
which derives from space, will not these things be seen as paradoxes? and
if you let it down far, will you not reject them? This is why it is said
that the Divine fills all spaces of the universe, and why it is not said
that God-Man fills them. For if this were said, the merely natural lumen
would not assent. But to the proposition that the Divine fills all space,
it does assent, because this agrees with the mode of speech of the
theologians, that God is omnipresent, and hears and knows all things.
(On this subject, more may be seen above, n. 7-10.).