THE END OF A CHURCH IS NEAR WHEN IN THE NATURAL WORLD THE POWER OF EVIL THROUGH FALSITIES BEGINS TO PREVAIL OVER THE POWER OF GOOD THROUGH TRUTHS, AND THEN AT THE SAME TIME AS THAT THE POWER OF HELL ABOVE THE POWER OF HEAVEN

1. Every man comes after death into his own good and the truth thence, in which he was in the world; or similarly into his own evil and the falsity thence. 2. Those who are in good and thence in truth come into heaven: those in evil and thence in falsity come into hell. 3. Those who are in good on earth are interiorly in truths, and, if they are in falsities, still after death they receive truths agreeing with their good; the reverse is the case, however, with those who are in evils. This is because good and evil are of the will, and the will is a man's being (esse), the understanding having existence therefrom. 4. To what extent good is prevailing on earth over evil, or evil over good, is discerned in the spiritual world from the state of heaven and of hell; inasmuch as every man is gathered to his own after death, that is, he comes into his own evil or his own good, and as heaven and hell are from the human race. 5. This for many reasons cannot be discerned at all on earth. 6. Between heaven and hell there is an interval, wherein evil breathed out from hell ascends and good from heaven descends, and where they meet. 7. Midway in this interval there is equilibrium between good and evil. 8. It is from this equilibrium that the extent to which good is prevailing against evil, or evil against good, is discerned. 9. There the Lord weighs it, as in a balance. 10. This equilibrium becomes raised towards heaven as evil prevails against good, and is depressed towards hell as good prevails against evil, the fact being that good from heaven depresses it and evil from hell raises it. 11. This equilibrium is as it were a footstool for the angels of heaven into which their good comes to a termination and upon which it rests. 12. In the degree that this equilibrium is raised, the happiness of the angels of heaven, arising from their goods and the truths thence, is diminished. 13. When evil prevails against good on earth, then at the same time hell prevails against heaven. 14. It is clear from the above that the end of the Church is near, when the power of evil prevails over the power of good. 15. It is said "the power of good through truths" and "power of evil through falsities" because it is through truths that good has power, and through falsities that evil has power.