Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 4659

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4659. It was stated towards the end of 4652 that man is a spirit and that the body serves him for functions he performs in the world, and in other places elsewhere that the spirit is a person's internal and the body his external. People who do not have a proper grasp of the relationship between a person's spirit and his body may suppose from this that the spirit accordingly dwells within the body and that the body so to speak surrounds it and clothes it. But it should be recognized that a person's spirit exists within the body, within the whole of it and within each part of it, and that its substance is purer, both in its motor organs and in its sensory organs, as well as in every other part, whereas the body is something material linked to it at every point and suited to the world it inhabits at that time. This is what is meant by the statement that man is a spirit and that the body serves him for functions performed in the world, and that the spirit is man's internal and the body his external. From this it is also evident that after death a person continues to lead a life which is just as active, involving the senses, as before; also, that he exists in a human form as in the world, though it is now a more perfect one.


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