Such are those that have been led and drawn away
from heaven by riches.
363. Every man's ruling affection or love remains with him after
death, nor is it rooted out to eternity, since a man's spirit is
wholly what his love is, and what is unknown, the body of every
spirit and angel is the outward form of his love, exactly
corresponding to his inward form, which is the form of his
disposition and mind; consequently the quality of his spirit is known
from his face, movements, and speech. While a man is living in the
world the quality of the spirit would be known if he had not learned
to counterfeit in his face, movements, and speech what is not his
own. All this shows that man remains to eternity such as his ruling
affection or love is. It has been granted me to talk with some who
lived seventeen hundred years ago, and whose lives are well known
from writings of that time, and it was found that the same love still
rules them as when they were on the earth. This makes clear also that
the love of riches, and of uses from riches, remains with everyone to
eternity, and that it is exactly the same as the love acquired in the
world, yet with the difference that in the case of those who devoted
their riches to good uses riches are changed in the other world into
delights which are in accord with the uses performed; while in the
case of those who devoted their riches to evil uses riches are turned
into mere filth, in which they then take the same delight as they did
in the world in their riches devoted to evil uses.
Pages:
417
418
419
420
421
422
423
424
425
426
427
428
429
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439
440
441