4115. On the life of conviction
The life that remains after death is the life of conviction and the life of passion. When a spirit is in the life of his own conviction, he arouses everything whatsoever in man's memory that conforms with his own conviction, as if the spirit 1had known it from himself. It was granted me to learn this from experience. When spirits were present in their own conviction, they aroused whatever agreed with the conviction, so that I sometimes wondered where such prudence, cunning, skill, and sharpness for finding out things they had never known, came from. I thought that it had come from his bodily memory, but it did not, but from the memory of man that is of service to them. A spirit no sooner comes into his own conviction than at once all conforming elements are aroused.
That these lives are with spirits, constituting a kind of instinct remaining from confirmations and convincing arguments drawn from bodily life, by means of which [instinct] the spirit arouses other confirmations, and more, and much more keenly than in bodily life, of which he had been entirely ignorant - all this was made evident by much experience.
Footnotes:
1. The original has homo, "man," where context calls for spiritus, "spirit."
4115. CONCERNING THE LIFE OF PERSUASION.
The life which remains after death is the life of persuasion and the life of cupidity. When a spirit is in the life of his persuasion he excites everything in the memory of a man, that is in the conformity with the persuasion, just as if the man knew it from himself. This it was given to know by experience when spirits were present in their persuasion, as they then excited whatever was conformable to the persuasion, so that I sometimes wondered whence flowed such prudence, astuteness, cunning, and keenness of discovery in regard to things which they had never known. I supposed it to be taken from the corporeal memory [of spirits], but the fact is not so; it comes from the memory of the man which is made subservient to them; the spirit merely comes into his persuasion, when immediately whatever is conformable is excited. That there are such lives with spirits, that they are a kind of remaining instinct from the confirming and persuading things of the bodily life, that by means of this instinct the spirit excites other confirmations, with many things besides, and that much more acutely than in the life of the body, things too which were previously unknown - all this was made evident by much experience.
4115. De persuasionis vita
Vita quae remanet post mortem, est vita persuasionis et vita cupiditatis: in persuasionis suae vita cum est spiritus, excitat omnia quodcunque in memoria hominis est, suae persuasioni conforme, sicut novit homo ex se; quod ab experientia scire datum, cum spiritus ex persuasione sua aderant, excitabant quodcunque conforme persuasioni, sic ut miratus quandoque, unde talis prudentia, astutia, calliditas, acumen inveniendi ea quae nusquam noverant, putavi quod ex memoria corporea suamet, sed non ita est, sed ex hominis, quae eis inservit, modo spiritus in suam persuasionem venit, tunc illico excitantur conformia; quod tales vitae apud spiritus sint, quae est quasi instinctus ex confirmantibus et sic persuadentibus [ex] vita corporis, remanens, et per eum excitans alia confirmantia, et plura, et multo acutius, quam in vita corporis, quae prorsus ignoravit, hoc ex multa experientia constitit.