4404. About dreams and inflow
Again I dreamed a dream but an ordinary one, as others do. Someone spoke with me, and when I awoke I told all of it from beginning to end. The angels said that it coincided completely with everything they had discussed among themselves - not that they were the same things as in my dream, for the thoughts of their speech were turned into entirely different things, so that they were figurative and symbolic. Indeed so were all the details, so that there was nothing that did not coincide.
I spoke with them about inflow, about how such things had been turned into entirely different ones, not recognizable as being of that origin, streaming in that way into mental imagery seized upon from various sources: namely, [saying] that every least thing with them aroused something in the mental image that was in agreement, just as there was in the dream a person about whom I had had that mental picture that he had earthly truth [cf. 4396], and this only because of his actions and utterances in life. There was a discussion with the angels about earthly truth, for which reason he was portrayed, and what he had spoken and done, these things following likewise in their order. From this it is somewhat evident what inflow is like, and that that is taken to be the subject which first occurs, the remaining points following likewise from the subject, whence something like a story is portrayed.
4404. CONCERNING DREAMS AND INFLUX.
I again dreamed a dream, but an ordinary one like those of other persons. A certain one spoke with me, and upon awaking I related the whole matter from beginning to end. The angels said that it coincided entirely with those things which they had spoken among themselves; not that the things seen in the dream were really the same, being in fact altogether different, but yet they were such that the thoughts of their speech were capable of being turned into them, so that they were representatives and correspondences; nay, this so extended to single things, that there was nothing which did not coincide. I spoke with them concerning influx, and the manner in which such things were turned into things quite different and not recognizable as coming from such an origin, and indeed flowing into ideas variously conceived, and how each particular with them excited something agreeing with it in the idea; as, for example, the person seen in the dream was one of whom I had the idea that he was in natural truth, and this only from the actions and speeches of his life; while with the angels, in the meantime, there was a discourse concerning natural truth, wherefore that person was represented, together with what he had spoken and done, all which followed in order. Hence it may in some measure be manifest of what nature influx is, and that what thus first falls in the way is held as a subject, and that the other things follow in like manner, thus from the subject whence it is, that a something historical is represented.
4404. De somniis et influxu
Iterum somniavi somnium sed vulgare sicut alii, quidam mecum loquutus, cum evigilatus narravi omnia a principio ad finem, angeli dicebant, quod prorsus coinciderent cum illis quae inter se loquuti, non quod essent illa quae in somnio, sed prorsus alia, in quae versa sunt eorum loquelae cogitata, sic ut essent repraesentativa et correspondentiae, imo ita singula, ut nihil non coincidisset. Loquutus cum illis de influxu, quomodo talia versa sint in prorsus alia non cognoscibilia quod a tali origine, quod influant ita in ideas captas varie; quod nempe unumquodvis apud eos excitaret conveniens quoddam in idea, sicut in somnio erat persona de qua illam ideam habui, quod esset in vero naturali [cf. 4396], et hoc solum ex ejus vitae actis et loquelis; apud angelos erat loquela de veritate naturali, quare ille repraesentabatur, et quid loquutus et egit, haec ordine sequebantur similiter. Inde constare potest aliquatenus qualis influxus; et quod teneatur pro subjecto quod primum ita obvenit, et caetera sequantur similiter sic a subjecto, inde sicut historicum repraesentatum est.