3581. I spoke with them concerning objections and reasonings against the truth of faith, that they were mere shadow, and could turn the light of truth into shade, and could place the clear knowledges of faith, by a multitude of objections, in such doubt, that it was afterwards very difficult to believe, when yet truth is truth, and the knowledge of faith is the knowledge of faith, and that there [only] is light. I represented this at the same time by means of imagination and thought, thus inwardly according to their mode of speaking and understanding, and it seemed to me as if others about my head uttered such a speech as was within myself. There was represented a sparrow, as to which I know that such a bird actually lives, and is of such and such a quality. Now if I should contemplate its viscera and its brain, and thence reason whether the sparrow be alive, and whether it be such as it is, the fact will be denied; namely, if upon seeing its brain, and perceiving that it is like a jelly, I should reason [with myself] how this [brain] could live, and cause [the bird] to live with senses and a body, -then [again] if I should inspect the viscera, as the liver, the pancreas, the intestines, and also the vessels, with the fibers and their connections, and should thence reason whether [the bird] could live, when such and such things could never cohere, conspire, and operate to cause it to live, and so of all the contents of the body;-