169、当来自该星球的天使灵映入眼帘时，他们和我们搭讪，问我们是谁，想要什么。我们说，我们是被带到他们这里的旅行者，我们没什么好怕的。因为他们担心我们和那些干扰他们对神、信和类似事物观念的人是一伙的。为了尽可能地躲避这些人，他们已经朝他们星球的那个方向撤退，寻找能逃避他们的某个地方。我们问这些来访者利用什么观念来干扰他们，他们回答说，是对三个（位格）和神里面没有人性的神性的观念；然而，他们一直就知道并发觉，神是一，是一个人。于是，我们意识到，那些干扰他们、令他们唯恐避之不及的人来自我们地球，这一点也可从以下事实明显看出来：在来世，因喜欢并热衷于旅行而四处游逛的，正是来自我们地球的人，他们在世时就有这种爱好。因为在其它星球，人们都没有这样旅行的习惯。后来，我们得知，他们是修道士，曾出于让外邦人皈依的热情而在我们地球旅行。于是，我们告诉他们说，他们避开这些来访者是对的，因为他们的动机不是教导人，而是获得利益和统治权。我们说，一开始，他们研究各种艺术，以迷惑人们的心智，但后来却使他们沦为奴隶，听从他们的命令。此外，我们说，他们不让这种人搅乱他们对神的概念也是对的。
他们继续说，他们的来访者还混淆他们，声称他们要有信仰，要相信他们所说的话。对此，他们却回答说，他们不知道什么是信仰，也不知道相信是什么意思，因为他们能在自己里面觉察到事情是不是真的。他们来自主的属天国度，那里的所有人出于内在觉知都知道我们称之为信之真理的真理。他们被主启示；在这一点上不同于那些在属灵国度的人。该星球的天使灵来自属天国度，我蒙恩从火焰般的光芒看出这一点，他们的观念就从这光流出。因为，在属天国度，光就像火焰；但在属灵国度，光则是亮白。来自属天国度的人在谈论真理时，只说“是，就是”，或“不，不是”；他们从不推理一件事是否如此。他们正是主所说的那些人：
你们的话，是，就说是；不是，就说不是；若再多说，就是从恶出来的。（马太福音5:37）
正因如此，那些灵人说，他们不知道有信仰或相信是什么意思。他们认为这就像是有人对亲眼看见房子或树木的同伴说，他要信仰或相信它们是房子或树木；而事实上，他能清楚看到它们就是房子或树木。这就是那些来自主的属天国度之人，和这些天使灵的性质。
我们告诉他们说，我们地球上很少有人具有内在觉知，因为他们年轻的时候虽学习真理，却没有付诸实践。人有两种官能，一种被称为理解力，一种被称为意愿。那些只允许真理进入他们的记忆，由此在某种很小程度上进入理解力，却没有进入生活，也就是进入意愿，以致不能拥有来自主的任何启示或内在视觉之人会说，必须相信这些真理，或人必须拥有信仰。他们还推理真理，求问它们是不是真的。事实上，他们不愿让这些真理被任何内在视觉，或理解力中的任何启示所觉察。他们之所以这样说，是因为对他们来说，真理缺乏天堂之光；那些脱离天堂之光观看的人就会视虚假为真理，视真理为虚假。因此，地球上的许多人具有很大盲目性，一个人即便没有将真理付诸实践，或照它们生活，仍声称，他能凭唯信得救；仿佛一个人的人性不是出自并取决于他的生活方式，而是取决于知道并相信这类事，而无需照它们生活。
后来，我们与他们谈论主，对祂和邻人的爱，以及重生。我们说，爱主意味着爱祂所赋予的诫命，就是出于爱照这些诫命生活。对邻人的爱就是向同胞、自己的祖国、教会和主的国度意愿、因而行善，但不是为了让自己显眼，或赚取功德，而是出于对良善的情感。关于重生，我们说，那些被主重生，并将真理立即应用于生活的人便进入关于它们的内在觉知。而那些首先在记忆领受真理，然后意愿并行出它们的人是拥有信仰的人；因为他们出于信仰行事，此时，这信仰便被称为良知。这些灵人说，他们发觉这些事的确如此，因此能明白什么是信仰。我通过属灵观念与他们交谈，属灵观念使这类事能在光中被呈现出来并得到理解。天堂分为两个国度，其中一个被称为属天国度，另一个被称为属灵国度(AC 3887, 4138)。属天国度的天使比属灵国度的天使拥有无数更多知识和无尽的更多智慧(AC 2718)。因此，属天天使不像属灵天使那样出于信，而是出于事情就是如此的一种内在觉知进行思考和谈论(AC 202, 597, 607, 784, 1121, 1387, 1398, 1442, 1919, 7680, 7877, 8780)。对于信之真理，属天天使只说：“是，就是”，或“不，不是”；而属灵天使则争论事情是否如此(AC 202, 337, 2715, 3246, 4448, 9166 [原文9196])。爱主就是照祂的诫命生活(AC 10143, 10153, 10310, 10578, 10645 [原文10648])。爱邻就是在一切工作和职业中出于对良善、公义和公平的情感行出良善、公义和公平(AC 8120-2, 10310, 10336)。对邻之爱的生活就是遵行主诫命的生活(AC 3249)。
169. When some angelic spirits from that planet came into view they addressed us, asking who we were and what we wanted. We told them that we were travelers and had been brought there, and that they had nothing to fear from us. They were in fact afraid, though, that we might be more of the kind of people who disturb them about God, faith, and the like. It was because of people like this that they had retreated to the region of their planet that they were now in, to avoid such people in any way that they could.
When we asked what it was that had disturbed them, they said it was the idea that there are three [gods] and the notion that there is divinity but not humanity in God, when in fact they know and perceive that God is one and is human.
We could tell from this that the people who were disturbing them, the people they were avoiding, were from our planet. Another sign was that the only people in the other life who take journeys because they developed a passion for and delight in travel during their time in the world are the people of our planet. The people on other planets do not engage in travel.
We learned later that the visitors were monks who had traveled throughout our globe to make converts of non-Christians. 1We therefore told the spirits that they did well to avoid them because the monks’ intention was not to teach but to amass wealth and gain power. 2Their first goal was to captivate the others’ minds by various means; their second was to turn the others into their slaves.
We also said the angelic spirits did well not to let their own concept of God be disrupted by such people.
[2] They added that these visitors also disturbed them by saying that they should have faith and believe what they were being told; but they had replied to them that they did not know what faith was or why they would need to believe something when they could perceive in themselves whether it was true. These angelic spirits were part of the Lord’s heavenly kingdom; all the people there have an inner perception that helps them recognize the truths that to us are matters of faith. Unlike people in the Lord’s spiritual kingdom, they are bathed in enlightenment from the Lord. 3
We were also shown that the angelic spirits of that planet were from the heavenly kingdom by the flamelike light in which their mental images were presented. The light in the heavenly kingdom is flamelike; the light in the spiritual kingdom is a shining white.
When there is a conversation about matters of truth, people from the heavenly kingdom say no more than “Yes, yes,” or “No, no”; they never resort to reasoning to determine whether something is true or not. They are the type of people the Lord is referring to when he says, “Let your communication be ‘Yes, yes; no, no.’ Whatever is more than these comes from evil.” 4That is why they said that they do not know what it means to have faith or believe. In their eyes, this is like saying to friends who can see houses and trees with their own eyes that they should have faith or believe that there are houses and trees, when they can see them perfectly well. This is what people from the Lord’s heavenly kingdom are like, and this is what these angelic spirits were like. 5
[3] We told them that on our planet not many people have inner perception, because in our youth we learn about truths but we do not live by them. People have two basic abilities, called understanding and will. Some people accept truths only into their memory and then to some extent into their understanding, but not into their lives-that is, into their will. Since people like this can have no enlightenment or inner vision from the Lord, they say that things must be believed or that we must have faith, and they also employ reasoning to determine whether things are true or not. They have no desire to perceive something by inner vision or by enlightenment of any kind flowing into their understanding. They say things like this because for them truths have no light from heaven, and to people with no light from heaven, things that are false can appear to be true and things that are true can appear to be false. As a result, a great blindness has afflicted many on Earth. Even though people do not practice what is true or live by it, they still say that we can be saved solely by our faith. It is as if we were human not because of and in accord with the way we live, but because of our knowledge of a type of faith that says it does not matter how we live. 6
[4] Later we talked with them about the Lord-about love for him, love for our neighbor, and regeneration 7-saying that loving the Lord is loving the commandments that come from him, which means loving to live by them. 8
We said that love for our neighbor is wishing well to and therefore doing what is good for our fellow citizens, our country, the church, and the Lord’s kingdom, doing so not for show or for credit for our own sakes, but because we care about what is good. 9
On regeneration, we said that people who are being regenerated by the Lord and are putting truths straight into their lives develop an inner perceptiveness about truths, while people who accept truths into their memory first and only later will them and do them are people who are focused instead on faith. 10This is because they act on the basis of their faith, which they then call “conscience.”
The angelic spirits said that they perceived that this was true and therefore also perceived what “faith” was. I expressed these things to them by means of spiritual images, which make it possible for things like this to be presented and grasped in the light.
Footnotes:
1. Swedenborg may be thinking of the large number of Catholic monks who in previous centuries had traveled to Asia, Africa, and the Americas in search of converts. One notable example is the Jesuit Francis Xavier (1506-1552), who traveled to India, China, and Japan on missionary journeys; the most complete account of his career is perhaps Brodrick 1952. On Jesuits, see note 2 in Last Judgment 58; on European attitudes toward this missionary work, see note 2 in Other Planets 169. [RS]
2. This view of missionaries was common in Europe during the mid-1700s among both Catholics and Protestants, who directed their chief ire at the most active evangelizers, the Jesuits (see note 2 in Last Judgment 58). The Jesuits were indeed widely distributed; by 1749, some 1,180 colleges, missions, and other institutions around the world were home to 22,589 members of the order; fifteen percent of the total were missionaries (Kors 2003, 293). One typical focus of the criticism of their efforts was the system of South American mission settlements called “reductions.” Over the course of a century and a half beginning in 1609, some 200,000 Guaraní Indians were relocated to thirty reductions in Paraguay and neighboring parts of Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil. Some historians have seen these exercises in social engineering as republican or utopian, and others as exploitive and even genocidal; to this day they remain controversial. Swedenborg’s accusation of ulterior motives was also common among critics of the policy: the reductions were economically self-sufficient and engaged in trade among themselves, a success that gave rise to a belief that their Jesuit governors were secretly amassing great wealth. Perhaps the most ferocious critics of the Jesuit missionary effort were the French philosophes; Voltaire (1694-1778), for example, mocks the reductions of Paraguay in his satirical novel Candide, saying among other things that under Jesuit rule “Los Padres [the Jesuit priests] have everything and the people nothing” (Voltaire [1759] 1961, 44). It should be noted by contrast, however, that Montesquieu (1689-1755), the French political philosopher contemporaneous with Swedenborg, mentions the Paraguayan reductions approvingly (though even he writes in a defensive tone) in his Spirit of the Laws book 4, chapter 6 (= Montesquieu [1748] 1952, 16). Swedenborg’s comment here has a particularly current reference: Other Planets appeared in print only two years after a major revolt by the Guaraní Indians against the Spanish Crown. In this “War of the Seven Reductions,” which claimed thousands of lives and drew widespread European attention, the Guaraní rose up in protest against the 1750 Treaty of Madrid, a territorial swap that placed seven of the Jesuit reductions under the spiritual and temporal sovereignty of Portugal rather than Spain (Ganson 2003, 88-116). Many in Europe believed that the Jesuits had deliberately incited the Indians to war in order to protect their “state within a state.” The abuse imputed to the Jesuits ultimately led to the expulsion of the Society of Jesus from Paraguay and contributed to the temporary disbanding of their order in Europe (Kors 2003, 293, 299-300). [SS, DNG]
3. On the two realms, or kingdoms, of heaven mentioned in this passage, see note 5 in New Jerusalem 4. [Editors]
4. The verse quoted is Matthew 5:37. Swedenborg often associates this verse with heavenly angels. See, for example, Secrets of Heaven 202, 2715:6, 3246:2; Heaven and Hell 271; Divine Love and Wisdom 427; Divine Providence 219:3. See also 2 Corinthians 1:17-20; James 5:12. [SS, LHC, LSW]
5. [Swedenborg note] Heaven contains two different kingdoms, one called the heavenly kingdom and the other the spiritual kingdom: 3887, 4138. Angels in the heavenly kingdom are immensely knowledgeable and are far wiser than angels in the spiritual kingdom: 2718. Heavenly angels do not think and talk the same way spiritual angels do, on the basis of faith, but on the basis of an inner perception that something is true: 202, 597, 607, 784, 1121, 1387, 1398, 1442, 1898, 1919, 7680, 7877, 8780. On the topic of the truths that belong to religious faith, heavenly angels say only “Yes, yes” or “No, no,” while spiritual angels employ a method of reasoning to determine whether something is true or not: 202, 337, 2715, 3246, 4448, 9166.
6. On being saved solely by faith, see the discussion of the concept of justification by faith alone in note 1 in New Jerusalem 4. [Editors]
7. For more on Swedenborg’s concept of regeneration, see note 1 in New Jerusalem 22. [Editors]
8. [Swedenborg note] Loving the Lord means living by his commandments: 10143, 10153, 10310, 10578, 10645.
9. [Swedenborg note] Loving our neighbor is doing what is good, fair, and right in every task and in every function because we care about what is good, fair, and right: 8120, 8121, 8122, 10310, 10336. A life of love for our neighbor is a life in accord with the Lord’s commandments: 3249.
10. This distinction between those who put truths straight into their lives and those who accept truths into their memory first and only later will them and do them is one of the characteristic differences Swedenborg sees between people or angels who are of a “heavenly” character and those who are of a “spiritual” character. Those who are of a heavenly character are motivated primarily by love for the Lord. They act from love seamlessly through their wisdom and intelligence. These are the ones who put truths straight into their lives. Those who are of a spiritual character are motivated primarily by love for their neighbor. They act from intelligence or faith first, before it becomes a matter of love. These are the ones who accept truths into their memory first and only later will and do them. For more on this distinction, see Secrets of Heaven 10124; Heaven and Hell 20-28, 271, 348; Divine Love and Wisdom 427; Revelation Explained (= Swedenborg 1994-1997a) 710:29-30, 831:3. [LSW]
169. When the angelic spirits from that world came into view, they hailed us asking who we were and what we wanted. We said we were travellers who had been brought to their abode, and they had nothing to fear from us. For they were afraid that we were some of those who disturb their ideas of God, faith and suchlike; it was to avoid them they had retreated in that direction towards their world, seeking somewhere they could escape them. Asked what ideas these visitors used to disturb them, they replied the idea of three [Persons], and of a Divinity in God with no human feature, when all the time they know and perceive that God is one and is a man. Then we grasped that those who upset them and whom they avoided, were from our world. This was also evident from the fact that it is those from our world who in the next life travel around as the result of the fondness and pleasure they take in travel, which they acquired in the world. For in other worlds people do not travel like this. Later we learned that they were monks, who had travelled our globe with the purpose of converting the heathen. We therefore told them that they were right to avoid them, since their motive is not teaching, but gaining advantage and taking control. At first, we said, they aim to ensnare people's minds by various means, but they end up by making them into slaves under their orders. Moreover, we said, they were right not to let such people upset their concept of God.
[2] They went on to say that their visitors also confused them by saying that the spirits of that world ought to have faith and believe what their visitors said. Their reply to this was that they did not know the meaning of faith or believing, since they could perceive in themselves that a thing was so. They came from the Lord's celestial kingdom, where interior perception allows everyone to know truths which we call matters of faith. They are enlightened by the Lord, and in this differ from those in the spiritual kingdom. A further sign that the angelic spirits of that world came from the celestial kingdom was the sight of a flame, which is the source of their ideas. For the light in the celestial kingdom is like a flame, but in the spiritual kingdom brilliant white.
Those from the celestial kingdom when speaking about truths never say more than 'yes, yes' or 'no, no'; they never reason about whether a matter is so or not. It is these of whom the Lord says:
Your speech is to be 'yes, yes, no, no'. Anything further is from evil. [Matthew 5:37]
This is why those spirits said they did not know what it was to have faith or believe. They regard this as being as if someone told his companion, who could see houses or trees with his own eyes, that he ought to have faith or believe they were houses or trees, when he can clearly see that they are. That is the nature of those from the Lord's celestial kingdom, and of these angelic spirits. 1
[3] We told them that there are few in our world endowed with interior perception, because when they are young they learn truths which they do not put into practice. A person has two faculties, called the intellect and the will. Those who only allow truths into their memory and so a little way into the intellect, and not into their life, that is, into the will, being unable to have any enlightenment or inward sight from the Lord, say that things must be believed or one must have faith. They also reason about truths, asking whether they are true or not; in fact, they are unwilling to have them perceived by any inward sight or any kind of enlightenment through the intellect. They say this because truths for them are devoid of light from heaven, and those who see without light from heaven can see falsities as truths and truths as falsities. As a result many people in this world have become so blinded, that, even though a person does not put truths into practice, or live by them, they still say he can be saved by faith alone; as if a person's humanity did not come from and depend on the way he lives, but on knowing such things and believing them without living by them.
[4] Afterwards we talked with them about the Lord, about love directed to Him and towards the neighbour, and about regeneration. We said that loving the Lord means loving the commandments He gives, which is living according to them out of love. 2Love towards the neighbour is wishing and consequently doing good to one's fellow citizen, one's country, one's church and the Lord's kingdom, not selfishly so as to be noticed or to earn merit, but from an affection for good. 3On regeneration we said that those who are regenerated and put truths at once into practice in their lives, come to be able to perceive them inwardly. But those who first take truths into their memory, and then wish for and do what they demand are those who have faith; for they act from faith, which is then called conscience. The spirits said that they perceived this was so, and hence could see what faith was. I spoke with them by means of spiritual ideas, which allow such matters to be presented and grasped lucidly.
Footnotes:
1. Heaven is divided into two kingdoms, one of which is called the celestial, the other the spiritual kingdom (Arcana Caelestia 3887, 4138). The angels in the celestial kingdom have countless more pieces of knowledge and immeasurably more wisdom than those in the spiritual kingdom (Arcana Caelestia 2718). Celestial angels do not base their thought and speech on faith as do spiritual angels, but on inner perception that this is how things are (Arcana Caelestia 202, 597, 607, 784, 1121, 1387, 1398, 1442, 1919, 7680, 7877, 8780). Celestial angels only say about the truths of faith 'Yes, yes' or 'No, no'; but spiritual angels argue whether it is so or not (Arcana Caelestia 202, 337, 2715, 3246, 4448, 9166 [9196 in original]).
2. Loving the Lord is living according to His commandments (Arcana Caelestia 10143, 10153, 10310, 10578, 10645 [10648 in original]).
3. Loving the neighbour is doing good and acting justly and correctly in every task and office through affection for good, justice and right (Arcana Caelestia 8120-8122, 10310, 10336). Living in love toward the neighbour is living in accordance with the Lord's commandments (Arcana Caelestia 3249).
169. When the angelic spirits who were from that earth came into view, they accosted us, asking who we were, and what we wanted. We said that we came for the sake of journeying, that we were directed thither, and that they had nothing to fear from us; for they were afraid we were of those who disturb them in regard to God, to faith, and things of a like nature, on account of whom they had betaken themselves to that quarter of their earth, shunning them as much as possible. We asked them by what they were disturbed. They replied, by an idea of three, and by an idea of the Divine without the Human, in God, when yet they know and perceive that God is one, and that He is Man. It was then perceived that they who disturbed them, and whom they shunned, were from our earth. This was manifest also from this, that there are from our earth those who thus wander about in the other life in consequence of their fondness for and delight in travelling, which they have contracted in the world; for on other earths there is no such custom of travelling as on ours. It was then discovered that they were monks, who had traveled on our globe from the zeal of converting the Gentiles; wherefore we told them they did well to shun them, because their intention was not to teach, but to secure gain and dominion; and that they study by various arts first to captivate men's minds, but afterwards to subject them to themselves as slaves. Moreover, that they did well in not suffering their ideas concerning God to be disturbed by such. They said further, that the above spirits confuse them by asserting that they ought to have faith and to believe the things they say; but they replied to them, that they know not what faith is nor what is meant by believing, since they perceive in themselves whether a thing be true or not. They were of the Lord's celestial kingdom, where all know from an interior perception the truths which with us are called the truths of faith, for they are in enlightenment from the Lord; but it is otherwise with those who are in the spiritual kingdom. That the angelic spirits of that earth were of the Lord's celestial kingdom, it was granted me to see from the flaming light whence their ideas flowed; for the light in the celestial kingdom is flaming, and in the spiritual kingdom it is white. They who are of the celestial kingdom, when the discourse is about truths, say no more than yea, yea, or nay, nay, and never reason about truths whether they be so or not so. These are they of whom the Lord speaks:
Let your discourse be yea, yea, and nay, nay, for whatsoever is more than this is from evil.
Hence it was that those spirits said that they did not know what is meant by having faith or believing. They consider this, like a person's saying to his companion who sees houses or trees with his own eyes, that he ought to have faith or to believe that they are houses and trees, when he sees clearly that they are so. Such are they who are of the Lord's celestial kingdom, and such were these angelic spirits. 1We told them that there are few on our earth who have interior perception, because in their youth they learn truths and do not do them. For man has two faculties, which are called the understanding and the will; they who admit truths no further than into the memory, and thence in some small degree into the understanding, and not into the life, that is, into the will, these, inasmuch as they are not capable of any enlightenment or interior sight from the Lord, say that those truths are to be believed, or that they are objects of faith, and also reason concerning them whether they be truths or not; yea, they are not willing that they should be perceived by any interior sight, or by any enlightenment in the understanding. They say this, because truths with them are without light from heaven, and to those who see without light from heaven, falsities may appear like truths, and truths like falsities; hence so great blindness has seized many there, that although they do not do truths or live according to them, still they say that they can be saved by faith alone, as if it were the knowledge of the things of faith which constitutes man, and not the life according to that knowledge. We afterwards discoursed with them concerning the Lord, concerning love to Him, concerning love toward the neighbor, and concerning regeneration; saying that to love the Lord is to love the commandments which are from Him, which is to live according to them from love. 2That love toward the neighbor is to will good and thence do good to a fellow-citizen, to one's country, to the church, and to the Lord's kingdom, not for the sake of self, to be seen, or to merit, but from the affection of good. 3Concerning regeneration, we observed that they who are regenerated by the Lord, and commit truths immediately to life, come into an interior perception concerning them; but that they who receive truths first in the memory, and afterwards will them and do them, are they who are in faith; for they act from faith, which is then called conscience. They said that they perceived these things to be so, and thus perceived also what faith is. I discoursed with them by spiritual ideas, whereby such things may be exhibited and comprehended in light.
Footnotes:
1. Heaven is distinguished into two kingdoms, one of which is called the celestial kingdom, the other the spiritual kingdom (Arcana Coelestia 3887, 4138). The angels in the celestial kingdom know innumerable things and are immensely more wise than the angels in the spiritual kingdom (Arcana Coelestia 2718). The celestial angels do not think and speak from faith, like the spiritual angels, but from an internal perception that a thing is so (Arcana Coelestia 202, 597, 607, 784, 1121, 1387, 1398, 1442, 1919, 7680, 7877, 8780). The celestial angels say only concerning the truths of faith, yea, yea, or nay, nay, but the spiritual angels reason whether it be so or not so (Arcana Coelestia 202, 337, 2715, 3246, 4448, 9196).
2. To love the Lord is to live according to His commandments (Arcana Coelestia 10143, 10153, 10310, 10578, 10648).
3. To love the neighbor is to do what is good, just, and right, in every work and in every function, from the affection of what is good, just, and right (Arcana Coelestia 8120-8122, 10310, 10336). A life of love towards the neighbor is a life according to the Lord's commandments (Arcana Coelestia 3249).
169. Cum Spiritus angelici, qui ab illa Tellure, venerunt in conspectum, alloquebantur nos, quaerentes quinam essemus, et quid vellemus; dicebamus quod peregrinationis causa, et quod illuc delati, et ne timeant a nobis: timebant enim quod essemus ex illis qui perturbant eos de Deo, de Fide, et de similibus, propter quos in illam plagam ad Tellurem suam se contulerunt, fugientes eos quocunque possent. Interrogati per quae perturbant, respondebant per ideam Trium, et per ideam Divini absque Humano in Deo, cum tamen sciunt et percipiunt quod Deus sit unus, et quod sit Homo. Perceptum tunc quod illi qui perturbarunt eos, et quod fugerunt, fuerint ex nostra Tellure; tum ex eo quod ex nostra Tellure sint qui ita circumvagantur in altera vita ex studio et jucundo peregrinationis quod contraxerunt in mundo; in aliis enim Telluribus non tales peregrinationes sunt: compertum dein est, quod essent Monachi, qui ex studio convertendi gentes in nostro Orbe peregrinati sunt: quapropter dicebamus eis, quod bene faciant quod fugiant illos, quia intentio illorum non est docere, sed lucrari et dominari; et quod per varia primum captare animos studeant, sed dein subjicere illos sibi ut servos. Praeterea, quod bene faciant, quod non patiantur ideam suam de Deo a talibus perturbari. Porro dicebant, quod etiam confundant illos per id, quod dicant se oportere fidem habere ac credere quae dicunt: at quod responderint illis, quod non sciant quid Fides seu quid sit credere, quum in se percipiunt quod ita sit; erant e Regno coelesti Domini, ubi omnes ex interiore perceptione sciunt vera, quae apud nos vocantur fidei; sunt enim in illustratione a Domino; secus ac illi qui in Regno spirituali sunt. Quod spiritus angelici illius Telluris ex Regno coelesti essent, videre etiam dabatur ex flammeo, ex quo ideae eorum; lux enim flammea est in Regno coelesti, et lux candida in Regno spirituali. Qui e Regno coelesti sunt, illi cum sermo est de Veris, non plus dicunt quam ita ita, vel non non, et nusquam ratiocinantur de illis num ita sit vel non ita sit; illi sunt, de quibus Dominus dicit, "Sermo vester erit ita ita, non non; quod ultra est ex malo est;" inde est quod spiritus illi dixerint, quod non sciant quid sit fidem habere seu credere; considerant hoc, sicut si aliquis diceret ad socium, qui oculis suis videt domos aut arbores, quod fidem habere debeat seu credere quod sint domus ac arbores, cum clare videt quod ita sit: tales sunt qui e Regno coelesti Domini sunt, et tales erant hi spiritus angelici. 1Dicebamus illis, quod pauci in nostra Tellure sint qui interiorem perceptionem habent, ex causa quia in juventute sua discunt vera et non faciunt illa: sunt enim binae facultates homini, quae vocantur Intellectus et Voluntas; qui non ultra quam in memoriam et inde aliquantum in Intellectum admittunt vera, et non in vitam, hoc est, in voluntatem, illi quia in nulla illustratione aut interiori visu a Domino possunt esse, dicunt quod credenda sint seu quod fides habenda, et quoque ratiocinantur de illis num vera sint vel non, imo nec volunt ut percipiantur aliquo visu interiori seu quadam illustratione per intellectum; ita dicunt, quia vera apud illos sunt absque luce e coelo, et illis, qui absque luce e coelo vident, falsa possunt apparere ut vera, ac vera ut falsa: inde plures ibi tanta occupavit caecitas, ut tametsi homo non faciat vera, seu vivat secundum illa, usque dicant eum per solam fidem posse salvari, sicut quod homo non foret homo ex vita et secundum illam, sed ex scientia talium quae fidei absque vita. Postea loquebamur cum illis de Domino, de amore in Ipsum, de amore erga proximum, deque regeneratione; dicendo, quod amare Dominum sit amare praecepta, quae ab Ipso, quod est, ex amore vivere secundum illa. 2Quod amor erga proximum sit velle bonum et inde facere bonum Concivi, Patriae, Ecclesiae, Regno Domini, non propter se ut videatur vel ut mereatur, sed ex affectione boni. 3De Regeneratione, quod illi qui regenerantur a Domino, et immittunt vera illico in vitam, in interiorem perceptionem de illis veniant; at quod illi qui recipiunt vera primum in memoria, et dein volunt illa et faciunt illa, sint qui in fide sunt; nam ex fide, quae tunc vocatur conscientia, agunt. Haec dixerunt se percipere quod ita sit, proinde etiam quid fides. Loquutus sum cum illis per ideas spirituales, per quas sisti et comprehendi possunt talia in luce.
Footnotes:
1. Quod Coelum in duo Regna distinctum sit, quorum unum vocatur Regnum coeleste, alterum Regnum spirituale, Arcana Coelestia 3887, 4138. Quod Angeli in Regno coelesti innumerabiliasciant et immensum sapiant prae angelis in Regno spirituali, Arcana Coelestia 2718. Quod coelestes Angeli non cogitent et loquantur ex fide prout Angeli spirituales, sed ex perceptione interna, quod ita sit, Arcana Coelestia 202, 597, 607, 784, 1121, 1387, 1398, 1442, 1919, 7680, 7877, 8780. Quod Angeli coelestes de veris fidei modo dicant ita ita, aut non, at quod Angeli spirituales ratiocinentur num ita sit vel non ita sit, Arcana Coelestia 202, 337, 2715, 3246, 4448, 9196.
2. Quod amare Dominum sit vivere secundum praecepta Ipsius, Arcana Coelestia 10143, 10153, 10310, 10578, 10648.
3. Quod amare proximum sit facere bonum, justum et rectum in omni opere in omni functione ex affectione boni, justi et recti, Arcana Coelestia 8120, 8121, 8122, 10310, 10336. Quodvita amoris erga proximum sit vita secundum praecepta Domini, Arcana Coelestia 3249.