24. You must know therefore that nothing else is meant by the former heaven and the former earth which John saw to have passed away (Rev. xxi 1) but those grim expanses, where those of the Dragon and of Babel have made their dwellings, and called them heavens. So long as those expanses last, men's communication with the angelic heavens is cut off, and thus too to some extent their communication with the Lord. When that communication is cut off, then all the truth and good of the Word is falsified and adulterated. Such is the appearance of the abomination of desolation amongst us. But with the inhabitants of the earth it is not marked by any signs. Therefore they induce belief in falsities, and by confirmations from the natural man they surround that belief with deceptive light, as a result of which falsities are believed to be true.'