c heaven is like one man whose soul and life is the Lord. In each
particular of his form this divine man is man, not only as to the
external members and organs but as to the more numerous internal members
and organs, also as to the skins, membranes, cartilages and bones; but in
that man all these, both external and internal, are not material but
spiritual. Further, the Lord has provided that those who cannot be
reached by the Gospel but only by some form of religion shall also have a
place in this divine man, that is, in heaven, by constituting the parts
called skins, membranes, cartilages and bones, and like others should be
in heavenly joy. For it does not matter whether their joy is that of the
angels of the highest heaven or of the lowest heaven, for everyone
entering heaven comes into the highest joy of his own heart; joy higher
still he does not endure; he would suffocate in it.

[4] A peasant and a king may serve for comparison. A peasant may reach
the height of joy when he steps out in a new suit of homespun wool or
seats himself at a table with pork, a piece of beef, cheese, beer and
fiery wine on it. He would feel constricted at heart if he was clothed
like a king in purple, silk, gold and silver, or if a table was set for
him on which were delicacies and costly viands of many kinds with noble
wine. It is plain from this that the last as well as the first find
heavenly happiness, each in his measure, those outside Christendom also,
therefore, provided they shun evils as sins against God because these are
contrary to religion.

[5] Few are entirely ignorant of God. If they have lived a moral life
they are instructed after death by angels and receive what is spiritual
in their moral life (see _Doctrine of the New Jerusalem about Sacred
Scripture,_ n. 116). The same is true of those who worship sun and moon,
believing that God is there. They know no better, therefore it is not
imputed to them as a sin, for the Lord says,

If you were blind (that is, if you did not know), you would have no sin
(Jn 9:41).

But there are many who worship idols and graven images even in the
Christian world. This, to be sure, is idolatrous, yet not with all. There
are those for whom graven images serve as a means of exciting thought
about God, for by an influx from heaven one who acknowledges God desires
to see Him, and these, unable to raise the mind above the sensuous as
those do who are inwardly spiritual, rouse it by means of s