Next day my angel guide and companion came again, and said: 'Get ready, so that we can visit the inhabitants of heaven in the west, who are some of the people who lived in the third or copper age. Their homes extend from the south through the west towards, but not into, the north.'

When I was ready, I accompanied him, and we entered their heaven on its southern side. There we found a magnificent wood composed of palms and laurels. We passed through this, and then exactly on the border of the west we saw some giants twice as tall as the average human. They asked us: 'Who let you in through the wood?' 'The God of heaven,' said the angel. 'We,' they answered, 'are the guardians of the approach to the ancient western heaven; but you may go in.'

[2] We passed through and from a view-point we saw a mountain soaring to the clouds. Between the view-point where we were and the mountain we saw one village after another, with gardens, woodland and fields between them. After passing through the villages we reached the mountain and climbed it. Its summit turned out to be not a peak, but a plain, on which was a large and spacious city. All its houses were of the wood of resinous trees, and their roofs of planks.

'Why, I asked, 'are the houses here made of wood?' 'Because,' the angel answered, 'wood stands for natural good, which was the good of the people of the earth's third age. Copper also stands for natural good, so the early people called this the copper age. There are also sacred buildings here made of olive-wood, and in their centre is a sanctuary containing in a chest the Word which was given to the inhabitants of Asia before the Israelite Word. Its historical books are called The Wars of Jehovah, its prophetic books The Utterances. Both of these are mentioned by Moses (Numb. 21:14, 15, 27-30). This Word is now lost in the kingdoms of Asia and is only preserved in Great Tartary'.*

Then the angel took me to one of the buildings, and we saw the sanctuary in the middle, all in the whitest light. 'The light,' said the angel, 'comes from the ancient Asiatic Word; for all Divine truth shines in the heavens.'

[3] On leaving the building we heard that the presence of two strangers had been reported in the city, and they were to be questioned about their origin and what business they had there. An officer hurried up to us from the assembly and summoned us to court. Asked where we came from, and what our business was there, we replied, 'We have passed through the palm-tree forest and also the homes of the giants, who are the guardians of your heaven, and after that the region of villages. You can tell from that that it is not we ourselves, but the God of heaven, who has brought us here. Our business here is to learn about your marriages, whether you are monogamous or polygamous.' 'What does polygamous mean? they answered. 'Is it not the same as promiscuous?'

[4] Then this court of law delegated an intelligent man to take us home and teach us about this subject. When he reached home, he asked his wife to join him, and then spoke as follows. 'The earliest or most ancient people, who enjoyed truly conjugial love, so that they excelled others in the strength and power of that love while in the world, and who now live in the most blessed condition in their own heaven in the east, handed on commandments about marriage for us to keep. We are their descendants, and like fathers to sons they gave us rules of life, amongst which are these about marriage. "Children, if you wish to love God and the neighbour and to be wise and happy for ever, we advise you to adopt a monogamous life. If you depart from this commandment, all heavenly love will desert you, and along with it inner wisdom, and you will be banished." We have obeyed, as sons should, this commandment of our fathers, and we have seen how true it is. To the extent that anyone loves his wife alone, to that extent he becomes a heavenly and an inward person. To the extent that anyone does not love his wife alone, to that extent he becomes a natural and an outward person; and he loves only himself and the ideas he thinks up, becoming mentally unbalanced and foolish.

[5] 'This is why we in this heaven are all monogamous, and being so, we keep all the borders of our heaven closed to polygamists, adulterers and fornicators. If polygamists break in, they are cast out into the darkness of the north; if adulterers, into the furnaces of the west; if fornicators, into the deceptive lights of the south.'

On hearing this I asked what he meant by the darkness of the north, the furnaces of the west and the deceptive lights of the south. He replied that the darkness of the north was darkness of mind and ignorance of truths; the furnaces of the west were loves for evil; and the deceptive lights of the south were falsifications of truth. These are types of spiritual fornication.

[6] After this he said, 'Come with me to our treasure house.' So we followed him, and he showed us the scriptures of the most ancient people; they were on boards of wood and stone, and later on books of smoothed tablets. The second age wrote its scriptures on skins; and he brought a skin on which the rules of the earliest people had been copied from stone tablets, and among them was that about marriage.

[7] When we had looked at these and other things remarkable for their extreme antiquity, the angel said, 'It is now time for us to leave.' Then our host went out into the garden and plucked a few twigs from a tree, which he tied into a bundle, and gave it to is with these words, 'These are twigs from a tree native and restricted to our heaven; its sap smells sweetly of balsam.' We brought this bundle with us as we came down by a path close to the east, where there were no guards. The twigs we saw turn to shining bronze, and their tips to gold; this was a sign that we had visited the people of the third age, which is called the copper or bronze age. * Apparently Western China and Tibet.