Divine Love and Wisdom (Rogers) n. 310

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310. (1) The earth has in it an endeavor to produce useful ends in forms, or forms of use. That the earth has in it such an endeavor follows from its origin. As may be seen in nos. 305, 306 above, the substances and materials of which the earth consists are the final and terminal forms of the atmospheres, which emanate from the spiritual sun as forms of useful endeavor. Because the substances and materials of which the earth consists are from that origin, then, and because aggregates of these are held in connection by the surrounding pressure of the atmospheres, it follows that they have in them as a consequence an endeavor to produce forms of use. Their very character of being able to produce such forms is something they acquire from their origin, which lies in the fact that they are the final forms of the atmospheres, with which they therefore accord. We say that this endeavor and this character exist in the earth, but we mean that they exist in the substances and materials of which the earth consists, whether they are in the earth or are emitted from the earth into the atmospheres. People know that the atmospheres are filled with such emissions. [2] The existence of such an endeavor and such a character in the substances and materials of the earth is clearly apparent from the fact that seeds of every kind, having been opened to their inmost point by means of warmth, are impregnated by the subtlest of substances, substances which cannot but be from a spiritual origin; which in consequence have the power of uniting themselves to a useful end, from which they have their propagative ability; and which by conjunction then with materials of a natural origin are able to produce forms of use, and afterward send them forth as though from a womb, in order that they may come also into light and so sprout and grow. This endeavor subsequently continues from the earth through the root to the lasts of these forms, and from the lasts to the firsts of them, in which the useful end exists in its origin. Thus do useful ends pass into forms. And from the end, which is as though their soul, the forms in their progression from their first constituents to their last, and from their last constituents to their first, acquire as a characteristic that each and every part of them is of some use. We say that the useful end is as though the soul, because its form is as though its body. [3] It also follows that there is a still more interior endeavor, which is an endeavor to produce through the sproutings of plants things of use to the animal kingdom, for animals of every kind are fed by them. It follows, too, that there are in these substances and materials an endeavor to be of useful service to the human race. These conclusions follow from the fact, 1) that these substances and materials are final forms, and in final forms are present in succession all prior elements concurrently, as we have shown in previous discussions here and there above. 2) That degrees of both kinds exist in the greatest and least of all things, as we showed in nos. 222-229 above. So, too, in the case of this endeavor. 3) That the Lord produces all useful effects out of final forms, and therefore there must be in final forms an endeavor toward those effects.


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