as to the spiritual light, in which the angels are, it has been given me to see it with my eyes. The light of the angels of the superior heavens is so bright that it cannot be described, not even by the whiteness of snow, and so glistening, that it cannot be described, even by the flaming rays of this world's sun; in a word, it a thousand times exceeds the sun's meridian light on earth. But the light of the angels of the inferior heavens may in some measure be described by comparisons, yet still it exceeds the greatest light of our world. The light of the angels of the superior heavens cannot be described, because their light makes one with their wisdom; and as their wisdom, relatively to the wisdom of men, is ineffable, so also is their light. From these few considerations it may appear, that there are degrees of light; and as wisdom and love resemble each other in degree, it follows that there are similar degrees of heat. 183. Since atmospheres are the receptacles and continents of heat and light, it follows that there are as many degrees of atmospheres as there are degrees of heat and light and as there are degrees of love and wisdom. The existence of several atmospheres, distinct from each other by degrees, has been manifested to me from much experience in the spiritual world; especially from the fact that the angels of the inferior heavens cannot breathe in the region of the superior angels, and that they seem to themselves to gasp for breath, as is the case with animals raised out of air into æther, or out of water into air; the spirits also below the heavens appear to those who are in the heavens as in a mist. That there are several atmospheres, distinct from each other by degrees, may be seen above, n. 176. 184. THAT DEGREES ARE OF TWO KINDS, DEGREES OF ALTITUDE AND DEGREES OF LATITUDE. The knowledge of degrees is as it were the key to open the causes of things, and enter into them : without it scarcely any thing of cause can be known: for without it, the objects and subjects of both worlds appear so general (univoca) as to seem to have nothing in them but what is seen with the eye; when nevertheless this, respectively to the things which lie interiorly concealed, is as one to thousands, yea to myriads. The interior things which lie hid can by no means be discovered, unless degrees be understood; for exterior things advance to interior things, and these to inmost, by degrees; not by continuous degrees, but by discrete degrees. Decrements or decreasing from grosser to finer, or from denser to rarer, or rather increments and increasings from finer to grosser, or from rarer to denser, like that of light to shade, or of heat to cold, are called continuous degrees. But discrete degrees are entirely different: they are in the relation of prior, posterior, and postreme, or of end, cause, and effect. They are called discrete degrees, because the prior is by itself, the posterior by itself, and the postreme by The atmo itself; but still, taken together, they make a one. spheres which are called æther and air, from highest to lowest, or from the sun to the earth, are discriminated into such degrees; and are as simples, the congregates of these simples, and again the congregates of these congregates, which taken together, are called a composite. These last degrees are discrete, because they exist distinctly; and they are understood by degrees of altitude; but the former degrees are continuous, because they continually increase; and they are understood by degrees of latitude. 185. All and singular the things which exist in the spiritual and natural worlds, co-exist at once from discrete and continuous degrees, or from degrees of altitude and degrees of latitude. That dimension which consists of discrete degrees is called altitude, and that which consists of continuous degrees, is called latitude: their situation relatively to sight does not change their denomination. Without a knowledge of these degrees nothing can be known of the difference between the three heavens, or of the difference between the love and wisdom of the angels there, or of the difference between the heat and light in which they are, or of the difference between the atmospheres which surround and contain them. Moreover, without a knowledge of these degrees, nothing can be known of the difference of the interior faculties of the mind in men; or, therefore, of their state as to reformation and regeneration; or of the difference of the exterior faculties, which are of the body, as well of angels as of men; and nothing at all of the difference between spiritual and natural, or therefore of correspondence; yea, or of any difference of life between men and beasts, or of the difference between the more perfect and the imperfect beasts; or of the differences between the forms of the vegetable kingdom, and between the materials which compose the mineral kingdom. Whence it may appear, that those who are ignorant of these degrees, cannot from any judgment see causes; they only see effects, and judge of causes from them, which is done for the most part by an induction continuous with effects; when nevertheless causes do not produce effects by continuity, but discretely, for a cause is one thing, and an effect another; there is a difference as between prior and posterior, or as between the thing forming and the thing formed. 186. That the nature and quality of discrete degrees, and the difference between them and continuous degrees, may be still better comprehended, let us take the angelic heavens for example. There are three heavens, and these distinct by degrees of altitude, so that one heaven is under another; and they do not communicate with each other but by influx, which proceeds from the Lord through the heavens in their order to the lowest, and not vice versa. But each heaven is distinct by itself, not by degrees of altitude, but by degrees of latitude: those who are in the midst, or in the centre, are in the light of wisdom, and those who are in the circumference to the boundaries, are in the shade of wisdom; thus wisdom decreases to ignorance as light decreases to shade, which is done by continuity. It is the same with men: the interiors of their minds are distinguished into as many degrees as the angelic heavens, and one of these degrees is above another; wherefore the interiors of their minds are distinguished by discrete degrees, or degrees of altitude: hence, a man may be in the lowest degree, or in the higher, or in the highest, according to the degree of his wisdom; and when he is only in the lowest degree, the superior degree is shut, and this is opened as he receives wisdom from the Lord. There are also in man, as in heaven, degrees of continuity or of latitude. A man is similar to the heavens, because as to the interiors of his mind, he is a heaven in its least form, so far as he is in love and in wisdom from the Lord: that a man, as to the interiors of his mind, is a heaven in its least form, may be seen in the work ON HEAVEN AND HELL, n. 51 to 58. 187. From these few considerations it may appear, that one who knows nothing of discrete degrees or degrees of altitude, can know nothing of the state of man as regards reformation and regeneration, which are effected by the reception of divine love and divine wisdom from the Lord, and by the consequent opening of the interior degrees of the mind in their order; nor can he know any thing of the influx through the heavens from the Lord, or of the order in which he was created. If any one think of these things, not from discrete degrees or degrees of altitude, but from continuous degrees or degrees of latitude, he can then see nothing of them but from effects, and not from causes; and seeing from effects alone is seeing from fallacies, whence come errors, one after another, which may be so multiplied by induction, that at length enormous falsities may be called truths. 188. Nothing, so far as I am aware, has hitherto been known of discrete degrees or degrees of altitude, but only of continuous degrees or degrees of latitude; yet without a knowledge of degrees of both kinds, not any thing of cause can be truly known; we shall therefore treat of them in this Part throughout: for the end of this little work is, that causes may be discovered, and effects seen from them, and that thereby the darkness in which the man of the church is involved with respect to God, and the Lord, and in general with respect to divine things which are called spiritual, may be dispelled. This I can declare, that the angels are in sadness on account of the darkness that prevails upon earth: they say that light is scarcely any where to be seen, and that men seize on and confirm fallacies, and thereby multiply falsities upon falsities; and to confirm them devise, by reasonings grounded in falses and in truths falsified, such figments as cannot be dispelled, so great is the darkness that prevails concerning causes, and the ignorance concerning truths. They principally lament the confirmations concerning faith separate from charity, and justification thereby, the ideas concerning God, angels, and spirits, and the ignorance of the nature of love and wisdom. 189. THAT THE DEGREES OF ALTITUDE ARE HOMOGENEOUS, AND ONE DERIVED FROM ANOTHER IN A SERIES, LIKE END, CAUSE, AND EFFECT. Since degrees of latitude or of continuity are like degrees from light to shade, from heat to cold, from hard to soft, from dense to rare, from gross to subtile, &c., and since these degrees are known from sensual and ocular experience, but not so the degrees of altitude or discrete degrees, therefore in this Part we shall treat especially of the latter; for without a knowledge of these degrees, causes cannot be seen. It is indeed well known that end, cause, and effect follow in order, like prior, posterior, and postreme; also that the end produces the cause, and by the cause, the effect, in order that the end may exist: several other things are also known on the subject. Nevertheless to know these things and not to see them in application to things which exist, is only to know abstractions; which remain only so long as there are analytical and metaphysical matters in the thought. Hence it is, that although end, cause, and effect proceed by discrete degrees, still little or nothing of those degrees is known in the world; for the bare knowledge of things in the abstract is like something aerial, which is soon dispersed; but if abstract things are applied to things in the world, they are then like visible objects, and remain in the memory. 190. All things which exist in the world, of which trinal dimension is predicated, or which are called compound, consist of degrees of altitude or discrete degrees. But to illustrate this by example. It is well known by ocular experience, that each muscle in the human body consists of very minute fibres, and that these fasciculated, constitute those larger ones, called moving fibres, and that bundles of these produce the compound which is called a muscle. It is the same with the nerves; very small nervous fibres are put together into larger ones, which appear like filaments, and by a collection of such filaments the nerve is produced. It is also the same in the other compaginations, confasciculations, and collections of which the organs and viscera consist; for these are compounds of fibres and vessels variously fashioned by similar degrees. The case is the same also with all and every thing of the vegetable kingdom, and with all and every thing of the mineral kingdom: in wood there is a compagination of filaments in three-fold order; in metals and stones there is a conglobation of parts also in three-fold order. These considerations show the nature of discrete degrees, namely, that one is formed from another, and by means of the second, a third, or composite; and that each degree is discrete from another. 191. Hence we may form conclusions respecting those things which are invisible, for the case is the same with them: as with the organic substances which are the receptacles and habitations of the thoughts and affections in the brain; with the atmospheres ; with heat and light, and with love and wisdom. The atmospheres are receptacles of heat and light, as heat and light are receptacles of love and wisdom; of consequence, since there are degrees of atmospheres, there are also similar degrees of heat and light, and of love and wisdom; for the mode of existence (ratio) of the latter does not differ from that of the former. 192. From what has now been said, it is evident, that these degrees are homogeneous, that is, of the same genius and nature; the moving fibres of the muscles, least, larger, and largest, are homogeneous; the nervous fibres, least, larger, and largest, are homogeneous; the filaments of wood, from least to composite, are homogeneous; so are stony and metallic parts of all kinds; the organic substances, which are the receptacles and habitations of the thoughts and affections, from the most simple to the common aggregate, which is the brain, are homogeneous; the atmospheres, from pure æther to air, are homogeneous; the degrees of heat and light in their series, following the degrees of the atmospheres, are homogeneous; and hence also the degrees of love and wisdom are homogeneous. Those things, which are not of the same genius and nature, are heterogeneous, and do not agree with things homogeneous; therefore they cannot form with them discrete degrees, but only with their like, which are of the same genius and nature, or with which they are homogeneous. 193. That these, in their order, are as ends, causes, and effects, is evident; for the first, or least, produces its cause by the intermediate, and its effect by the ultimate. 194. It is to be observed, that every degree is distinguished from another by its proper coverings, and all the degrees together are distinguished by their common covering; and that the common covering communicates with the inner and inmost in their order; hence there is a conjunction and unanimous action of all the degrees. 195. THAT THE FIRST DEGREE IS ALL IN ALL IN THE SUBSEQUENT DEGREES. For the degrees of every subject and of every thing are homogeneous, and they are homogeneous because they are produced from the first degree. The formation of them is such, that the first, by confasciculation or conglobation, in a word, by congregation, produces the second, and by it the third; and distinguishes each from the other by a superinduced covering. Hence it is evident, that the first degree is the principal and sole governing in the subsequent ones; consequently the first degree is all in all in the subsequent degrees. 196. When it is said that degrees are of this nature with respect to each other, the meaning is, that the substances are such in their degrees; speaking by degrees is speaking ab |