Heavenly Doctrine (Tafel) n. 48

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48. The Natural and the Spiritual. How wrong it is for the world at the present day, to attribute so much to nature, and so little to the Divine, no. 3483. Why this is, no. 5116. When, nevertheless, each and all things in nature not only have existed, but also continually subsist from the Divine, and indeed through the spiritual world, nos. 775, 8211. Divine, celestial, and spiritual things terminate in nature nos. 4240, 4939. Nature is the ultimate plane, in which they reside, nos. 4240, 5651, 6275, 6284, 6299, 9216. Celestial, spiritual, and natural things follow and succeed each other in order; thus Divine things with them, because they are from the Divine, nos. 880, 4938, 4939, 9992, 10005, 10017, 10068. Celestial things are the head, spiritual things the body, and natural things the feet, nos. 4938, 4939. In the same order in which they follow or succeed [each other], they also flow in, nos. 4938, 4939. The good of the inmost or third heaven is called celestial, the good of the middle or second heaven is called spiritual, and the good of the ultimate or first heaven is called spiritual-natural; from this it may be known, what the Celestial, the Spiritual, and the Natural are, nos. 4279, 4286, 4938, 4939, 9992, 10005, 10017, 10068; also in the work on Heaven and Hell, nos. 20-28, and 29-40. All things of the natural world are from the Divine through the spiritual world, no. 5013. In everything natural, there is consequently something spiritual; even as in the effect there is the efficient cause, nos. 3562, 5711; or as in the motion there is the effort, no. 5173; and as in the External there is the Internal, nos. 3562, 5326, 5711. And since the cause is the very essential in the effect, and in like manner the effort in the motion, and the Internal in the External; it follows from it, that the Spiritual is the very essential in the Natural, and consequently the Divine, from which [it is], nos. 2987-3002, 9701-9709. Spiritual things are exhibited in what is natural, and the things exhibited are representatives and correspondences, nos. 1632, 2987-3002. Hence it is that the whole of nature is a theatre representative of the spiritual world, that is, of heaven, nos. 2758, 2999, 3000, 4939, 8848, 9280. All things in nature are arranged in order and in a series according to ends, no. 4101. This is due to the spiritual world, that is, to heaven, because ends which are uses, reign in it, nos. 454, 696, 1103, 3645, 4054, 7038. Man has been created so, that the Divine things which descend into nature, according to order, are perceived with him, no. 3702. With every man who is in Divine order, there is an Internal and an External; his Internal is called the Spiritual, or the spiritual man, and his External is called the Natural, or the natural man, nos. 978, 1015, 4459, 6309, 9701-9709. The spiritual man is in the light of heaven, and the natural man in the light of the world, no. 5965. The natural man from himself can discern nothing afar off except from the Spiritual, no. 5286. The Natural is a kind of face in which interior things behold themselves; and it is thus that man thinks, no. 5165. The spiritual man thinks in the natural, and thus naturally, so far as a thing reaches his sensual perception, nos. 3679, 5165, 6284, 6299. The Natural is the plane in which the Spiritual terminates, nos. 5651, 6275, 6284, 6299, 9216. The Spiritual beholds nothing, unless the Natural corresponds, nos. 3493, 3620, 3623. The spiritual or internal man can see what is being transacted in the natural or external man; but not conversely, because the Spiritual flows into the Natural, and not the Natural into the Spiritual, nos. 3219, 4667, 5119, 5259, 5427, 5428, 5477, 6322, 9110. From his own light which is called the lumen of nature, the natural man knows nothing concerning God, nor concerning heaven, nor concerning a life after death; neither does he believe, if he hears respecting such things, unless spiritual light which is light from heaven, flows into that natural lumen, no. 8944. The natural man of itself, because from birth, is opposed to the spiritual man, nos. 3913, 3928. Wherefore, so long as they are in opposition, the man feels it irksome to think of spiritual and celestial things, but pleasant to think of natural and bodily things, no. 4096. The things belonging to heaven, and also the bare mention of anything spiritual, sicken him; from experience, nos. 5006, 9109. Merely natural men look upon spiritual good and truth as [things of] service, nos. 5013, 5025. When nevertheless the natural man ought to be subordinated to the spiritual man, and to serve the latter, nos. 3019, 5168. The spiritual man is said to serve the natural, when the latter from the Intellectual acquires confirming proofs concerning such things as he covets, particularly from the Word, nos. 3019, 5013, 5025, 5168. How merely natural men appear in the other life, and what their state and lot there, nos. 4630, 4633, 4940-4952, 5032, 5571. The truths which are in the natural man are called scientifics and knowledges, no. 3293. The natural man, regarded in himself, has a material imagination, and affections like those which belong to the beasts, no. 3020. But the genuine faculty of thought and imagination comes from the internal or spiritual man, when the natural man sees, acts, and lives from it, nos. 3493, 5422, 5423, 5427, 5428, 5477, 5511. The things which are in the natural man, compared with those which are in the spiritual man, are respectively general, nos. 3513, 5707; and thus they are respectively obscure, no. 6686. There are with man an interior and in exterior Natural, nos. 3293, 3294, 3793, 5118, 5126, 5497, 5649. There is also an intermediate between those two, nos. 4570, 9216. The excretions of the spiritual man take place into the natural man, and are discharged through it, no. 9572. Those who do good merely from a natural disposition, and not from religion, are not received in heaven, nos. 8002, 8772.


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