I spoke with Melanchthon and with others concerning him. After Melanchthon came into the spiritual world, he confirmed himself more than ever in faith alone, to the point that he was scarcely willing to hear about charity and its goodness. And because he was unable to persuade any others than those who had led very little of a Christian life, he therefore acquired for himself a persuasive power, which is such that the speech of one flows into another's thought and so binds it that the person is incapable of thinking anything other than what the one is saying, even if it is false. It is a power that enchants minds, on which account it is forbidden in the spiritual world, because it extinguishes all the light of the intellect. Moreover, if he could not convince people by reasonings, he looked into their eyes and infused this persuasive force into their minds, so that they were unable to see his false sophistries and so could not respond, occasioning them to complain about him. He attempted this with me, too, but in an endeavor without effect. A leek and its odor, or garlic, corresponds to this persuasiveness, the odor of which by its pungency hurts the left eye. I spoke with Melanchthon about this persuasive power, and about the nephilim** who possessed it, who could almost kill a person by their persuasive power (concerning which in Arcana Coelestia [The Secrets of Heaven]***). * Philipp Melanchthon (born Philipp Schwarzert or Schwarzerd), 1497-1560, a German Protestant reformer, who collaborated with Martin Luther in drawing up the Augsburg Confession, a summation of the Lutheran faith, for whose formulation he was mainly responsible. Endorsed by the Lutheran princes, the statement was presented at the Diet of Augsburg in 1530, and it became the chief creed of the Lutheran Church. ** Giants mentioned in Genesis 6:4 and Numbers 13:33. *** See Arcana Coelestia (The Secrets of Heaven) nos. 557, 567, 580-583, 640, 1673:1, 2, 4454, 7686, et al.