1826. It is amazing that mental images are enriched more by the Lord when a person is not paying attention or trying to fill them in, or is not looking. Thus I believe the mental images of little children are enriched much more than those of adults while they are praying the Lord's prayer. Adults disturb them with their own mental imagery, so that they are rendered unsuitable to be enriched, because they are from their own thoughts. Although this certainly sounds paradoxical, yet I have learned it from actual experiences.
1826. It is wonderful that ideas are more filled by the Lord while man does not particularly attend to them or does not aim himself to fill them, and so does not advert to them. Thus I think the ideas of little children are much more filled than those of adults while praying the Lord's Prayer; for the adult is liable to be disturbed in his ideas, so that they are less easily filled, the things of his proprium interfering; which will indeed sound like a paradox, while I have learned it by lively experience.
1826. Mirum est, quod a Domino impleantur ideae magis, dum homo non ita attendit, seu is vult eas implere; sic cum non advertit, sic reor infantum ideae, multo plus implentur, quam adultorum, dum illi orationem Domini orant; adultus enim, suis ideis perturbat, sic ut non evadant habiles, ut impleantur, quia ex ejus propriis, quod quidem ut paradoxon audit, usque tamen per vivas experientias id didici.