2422. Lot said unto them, Nay I pray my lords. That this signifies weakness, so that he could not, is evident from the affection in the very words, as also from what follows. There is here treated of the third state of the church represented in this chapter by Lot, which is that they no longer think and act from the affection of good, but from the affection of truth; which state succeeds, when the affection of good begins to be diminished, and as it were to recede. Good is indeed present, but has withdrawn itself more toward the interiors, and therefore is in obscurity; and yet it manifests itself in a certain affection, which is called the affection of truth. (What the affection of good is, and what the affection of truth, may be seen above, n. 1997, and in what presently follows, n. 2425.) That there are these states is not apparent to man, still less what is the nature of them; but they are apparent to the angels as in clear light, for the angels are in every good affection of man; and they are apparent also to man himself when he comes into the other life. It is in accordance with these affections, and the quality of them, that the good are distinguished into societies (n. 685).