641、在该教会成员在被称为意愿的那个部分能得以改造之前，他必须先在被称为理解力的这个部分得以改造，故此处描述了意愿的事物如何与理解力的事物分离，以及意愿可以说如何被遮盖和保留，免得有东西触及它。因为如果属于意愿，也就是恶欲的事物被激起，他必要灭亡；蒙主的神性怜悯，这一点以后会变得清楚（660-661，751，760，927节）。对人来说，没有什么比这两个部分，就是意愿与理解力的区别更为显著的了。我也从以下事实确切得知这一点，即：灵人与天使的理解力的事物流入头或脑的左半部分，而意愿的事物则流入右半部分；脸也一样。天使灵流入时，像微风一样柔和；而恶灵流入时，则像一场洪水，以可怕的幻觉和说服流入脑的左半部分，以欲望流入右半部分；他们的流注就像一场幻觉和欲望的洪水。
New Century Edition
Cooper(2008,2013)
[NCE]641. The people of this church had to reform. The side of a person called the intellect had to reform first, before it was possible for the other side, referred to as the will, to do the same. So the present passage tells how the contents of the will were separated from those of the intellect and how they were concealed and stored away, so to speak, in order to block off any stimulus to the will. Had the appetites of the will been stirred up, it would have destroyed people, as will become clear from later explanations [660-661, 751, 760, 927], with the Lord's divine mercy.
These two sides, the intellect and will, are as clearly distinguished in us as they could possibly be. I was able to learn this unmistakably from the fact that intellectual information coming from spirits and angels enters the left side of the head or brain but impulses of the will enter the right side.{*1} They affect the face in a similar way. When angelic spirits exert an influence, they waft in like the gentlest possible breezes. When evil spirits arrive, they essentially flood the left side of the brain with dreadful hallucinations and delusions and the right side with cravings. Their influence is like a deluge of fantasies and appetites.
Footnotes:
{*1} Swedenborg was not the first thinker to localize mental functions in different parts of the brain. Attempts were made in this direction as early as the medieval era, when mental function was frequently said (for example) to be centered in the brain's ventricles (Gaukroger 1995, 278). Swedenborg himself, in The Soul's Domain, suggested that the cerebrum is the residence of the will, while the cerebellum is the residence of "nature," that is, involuntary or autonomic processes (Swedenborg [1744-1745] 1960, 394 note m). But Swedenborg does in this and similar passages (for example, Secrets of Heaven 3884, 4052) appear to have anticipated modern brain research by assigning different functions to the left and right hemispheres of the brain. See 644. For Swedenborg's manuscripts on the cerebrum, unpublished during his lifetime, see Swedenborg 1976d; other earlier discussions of brain form and function can be found in Dynamics of the Soul's Domain (Swedenborg [1740-1741] 1955) and Draft on the Fiber (Swedenborg 1976a). [RHK, RS, SS]
Potts(1905-1910) 641
641. As this man of the church must be reformed as to that part of man which is called the understanding, before he could be reformed as to the other part which is called the will, it is here described how the things of the will were separated from those of the understanding, and were as it were covered over and reserved, lest anything should touch the will. For if things of the will, that is of cupidity, had been excited, the man would have perished, as will appear, of the Lord's Divine mercy, hereafter. These two parts-the will and the understanding-are so distinct in man that nothing could be more distinct, as has been given me also to know with certainty from the fact that things of the understanding of spirits and angels flow into the left part of the head or brain, and things of the will into the right; and it is the same with respect to the face. When angelic spirits flow in, they do so gently like the softest breaths of air; but when evil spirits flow in, it is like an inundation into the left part of the brain with dreadful phantasies and persuasions, and into the right with cupidities, their influx being as it were an inundation of phantasies and cupidities.
Elliott(1983-1999) 641
641. Since this member of the Church needed to be reformed as to that part of the man which is called the understanding before he could be reformed as to the other part referred to as the will, it is described here how those things belonging to the will were separated from those belonging to the understanding, and how the will was so to speak protected and held back to prevent anything coming in contact with it. For if things belonging to the will, that is, to evil desires, had been aroused, he would have perished, as in the Lord's Divine mercy will be made clear later on. With man nothing could be more distinct and separate one from the other than those two parts, the will and the understanding. This I have been given to know plainly, especially from the fact that among spirits and angels things of the understanding flow into the left side of the head or brain, while things of the will flow into the right. The same applies to the face. When angelic spirits flow in they do so as softly as gentlest breezes. But when evil spirits do so it is like a deluge entering with dreadful delusions and persuasions into the left side of the brain, and with desires into the right. The influx of them is so to speak a deluge of delusions and desires.
Latin(1748-1756) 641
641. Quia hic homo Ecclesiae reformandus esset quoad illam partem hominis quae intellectus vocatur, prius quam reformari posset quoad alteram quae voluntas appellatur, hic describitur quomodo illa quae sunt voluntatis separata sint ab illis quae sunt intellectus, et quasi contecta et reservata, ne quicquam eam tangeret; nam si excitarentur ea quae voluntatis, hoc est, quae cupiditatis essent, periisset; ut, ex Divina Domini Misericordia, in sequentibus constabit. Binae illae partes, intellectus et voluntas, ita distinctae sunt apud hominem ut nihil distinctius, quod mihi manifeste scire datum, etiam per id quod intellectualia spirituum et angelorum influant in sinistram partem capitis seu cerebri, at voluntaria in dextram, similiter quoad faciem; cum angelici spiritus influunt, tunc molliter sicut lenissimae aurae influunt; at cum spiritus mali, tunc est quasi inundatio, in sinistram cerebri partem cum phantasiis et persuasionibus diris, in dextram cum cupiditatibus; influxus eorum est quasi inundatio phantasiarum et cupiditatum.