2488. Before I had learned otherwise through actual experiences, I like others had imagined that no spirit could possibly know the contents of my memory and of my thought, but that these were solely my own and hidden away. But I can positively declare that the spirits present with a person know about and detect the smallest contents of his memory and thoughts, doing so far more clearly than man himself does. And angels know and detect the ends in view there - how they bend from good to evil, and from evil to good, and many things more than man knows of, such as the things which he immerses in his pleasures, and thus so to speak in his nature and disposition. And when this happens they are no longer apparent because he does not reflect on them any more. Let no one from now on suppose therefore that his thoughts lie hidden away and that he will not have to account for his thoughts, or for his deeds insofar as these have his thoughts within them and are qualified by them. For the true nature of deeds is determined by the thoughts, and the thoughts by the ends in view.