6931. From what has thus far been said about the spirits of the earth Mercury, it is very manifest that spirits retain what they see and hear in the other life, and can be instructed equally as when they were men, thus in the things that belong to faith, and in this way can be perfected. The purer spirits and angels are, the more readily and fully do they take in, and the more perfectly retain in the memory, what they hear. And as this goes on to eternity, it is evident that they are continually increasing in wisdom. But the spirits of Mercury are continually increasing in the memory-knowledge of things, yet not in wisdom from it, because they love knowledges, which are means, but not uses which are ends, as was related of them above (n. 6814, 6815).