28. The Lord appeared in a shining cloud together with angels, and a sound was heard from there like that of trumpets. This signal represented the Lord's protection of the angels of heaven and the gathering of the good from all sides. The Lord never brings ruin on anyone, but only protects His own, withdrawing them from contact with the wicked. When they have been withdrawn, the wicked follow their own appetites, which lead them into every kind of crime. Then all those who were about to be destroyed were seen together looking like a great dragon with a long curving tail lifted up towards heaven and lashing on high in different directions, as if it wanted to destroy heaven and drag it down. But its efforts were in vain, for the tail was cast down, and the dragon which still stood high began to sink.

I was allowed to see this representation, so that I should know and publish who it is who are meant by the dragon in Revelation. They are in fact all who read the Word, listen to sermons and attend the holy rites of the church, while inwardly they think nothing of indulging their appetites for evil in which they are ensnared. Inwardly they ponder theft and deceit, adultery and lewdness, hatred and revenge, lies and blasphemies, so that in spirit they live like devils, but in the flesh like angels. These were the people who made up the body of the dragon; those composing the tail were those who in the world had a faith divorced from charity, resembling the former group in their thoughts and intentions.