Consequently, so far as man loves these truths from a bodily
affection he fails to become rational, for he loves, not them, but
himself; and the truths are made to serve him as servants serve their
Lord; and when truths become servants they do not enter the man and
open any degree of life in him, not even the first, but merely rest
in the memory as knowledges under a material form, and there conjoin
themselves with the love of self, which is a bodily love. [3] All
this shows how man becomes rational, namely, that he becomes rational
to the third degree by a spiritual love of the good and truth which
pertain to heaven and the church; he becomes rational to the second
degree by a love of what is honest and right; and to the first degree
by a love of what is just and equitable. These two latter loves also
become spiritual from a spiritual love of good and truth, because
that love flows into them and conjoins itself to them and forms in
them as it were its own semblance.
469. Spirits and angels, equally with men, have a memory, whatever
they hear, see, think, will and do, remaining with them, and thereby
their rational faculty is continually cultivated even to eternity.
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