4358. CONCERNING A HYPOCRITE. A hypocrite was remitted into an exterior state, when he spoke as in the world, or after the manner of preachers, in which state he did not acknowledge himself to be or to have been of such a quality as he was; but it was said to him that the worst of preachers speak in like manner; yea, they suppose while preaching that their characters agree with their words. They are then in external persuasion, and think concerning the words uttered, being led by their own spirit with a view to themselves and to the world thus to speak, even imagining at times that they speak from the Holy Spirit, as was said to him. It was said also that they speak otherwise with their friends and with those of their own households, provided that they are adepts in deception; that they speak otherwise also with those whom they casually encounter, and whose mind they discover; but that notwithstanding they think inwardly within themselves altogether differently, so that they have in fact three varieties of states, of which they first put off the exterior in the other life, and then at length the proximately interior, which leaves his remaining [state of] life to the last degree defiled, and full of hatred and cruelty. This was said in the presence of many spirits. - 1749, August 18. It was observed that this spirit could better comprehend, when in the external state, that he was evil, than in the proximately interior; for in the former he acknowledged his true quality, and that in such a way that it could scarcely be perceived that he was not entirely sincere; but in the latter it was not so.