Some also
who lead a solitary life sometimes hear spirits talking with them,
and without danger; but that the spirits with them may not know that
they are with man they are at intervals removed by the Lord; for most
spirits are not aware that there is any other world than that in
which they live, and therefore are unaware that there are men
anywhere else; and this is why man is not permitted to speak with
them in return. If he did they would know. Again, those who meditate
much on religious subjects, and are so intent upon them as to see
them as it were inwardly within themselves, begin to hear spirits
speaking with them; for religious persuasions, whatever they are,
when man dwells upon them by himself and does not adapt them to the
various things of use in the world, penetrate to the interiors and
rest there, and occupy the whole spirit of the man, and even enter
into the spiritual world and act upon the spirits there. But such
persons are visionaries and enthusiasts; and whatever spirit they
hear they believe to be the Holy Spirit, when, in fact, such spirits
are enthusiastic spirits. Such spirits see falsities as truths, and
so seeing them they induce not themselves only but also those they
flow into to believe them.
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