Heaven and Hell (Harley) n. 26

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26. It has been said that these angels have wisdom and glory above others for the reason that they have received and continue to receive Divine truths at once in their life; for, as soon as they hear Divine truths, they will them and do them instead of storing them up in their memory and afterwards considering whether they are true. Such angels know at once, by influx from the Lord, whether the truth which they hear is true, for the Lord inflows immediately into a man's willing, but mediately through his willing into his thinking. Or, what is the same, the Lord inflows immediately into good but mediately through good into truth.# For that which belongs to the will and action therefrom is called good while that which belongs to the memory and to thought therefrom is called truth. Indeed every truth is changed into good and implanted in love as soon as it enters the will, but so long as truth is in the memory and in the thought therefrom, it does not become good nor does it live, nor is it appropriated to man, since man is man from his will and thence from his understanding, and not from his understanding separated from his will.## # The Lord's influx is into good, and by good into truth, and not the reverse: thus into the will, and by it into the understanding, and not the reverse (n. 5482, 5649, 6027, 8685, 8701, 10153). ## The will of man is the very being (esse) of his life, and the receptacle of the good of love, while his understanding is the existing (existere) of his life therefrom and the receptacle of the truth and good of faith (n. 3619, 5002, 9282). Thus the life of the will is the chief life of man, and the life of the understanding goes forth therefrom (n. 585, 590, 3619, 7342, 8885, 9282, 10076, 10109, 10110). Whatever is received by the will comes to be the life, and is appropriated to man (n. 3161, 9386, 9393). Man is a man from his will and his understanding therefrom (n. 8911, 9069, 9071, 10076, 10109, 10110). Moreover, every one who wills and understands rightly is loved and valued by others, while he who understands rightly and does not will well is rejected and despised (n. 8911, 10076). Also, after death man remains such as his will and his understanding therefrom have been, while the things that pertain to the understanding and not also to the will then vanish, because they are not in the man (n. 9069, 9071, 9282, 9386, 10153).


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