re desires to give its
own to another, and so far as it can do so is in its _esse,_ peace, and
blessedness. Spiritual love derives this from the Lord's divine love
which is such infinitely. It follows that the divine love and hence
divine providence has for its object a heaven consisting of human beings
who have become or are becoming angels, on whom the Lord can bestow all
the blessings and felicities of love and wisdom and do so from Himself in
men. It must be in this way, for the Lord's image and likeness are in men
from creation, the image in them wisdom and the likeness love.
Furthermore, the Lord in them is love united to wisdom and wisdom united
to love or (what is the same) is good united to truth and truth united to
good (this union was treated of in the preceding chapter).

[3] What heaven is in general or with a number, and in particular or with
an individual, is not known. Nor is it known what heaven is in the
spiritual world and what it is in the natural world. Yet this knowledge
is important, for heaven is the purpose of providence. I therefore desire
to set the subject in some light in this order:

i. Heaven is conjunction with the Lord.
ii. By creation the human being is such that he can be conjoined more and
more closely to the Lord.
iii. The more closely one is conjoined to the Lord the wiser one becomes.
iv. The more closely one is conjoined to the Lord the happier one
becomes.
v. The more closely one is conjoined to the Lord the more distinctly does
he seem to himself to be his own, and the more plainly does he recognize
that he is the Lord's.

28. (i) _Heaven is conjunction with the Lord._ Heaven is heaven, not from
the angels but from the Lord. For the love and wisdom in which angels are
and which make heaven are not theirs, but the Lord's, indeed are the Lord
in them. And as love and wisdom are the Lord's, and are the Lord in
heaven, and make the life of angels, it is plain that their life is the
Lord's, indeed is the Lord. The angels themselves avow that they live
from the Lord. Hence it is evident that heaven is conjunction with the
Lord. But conjunction with Him is various and one man's heaven is not
another's; therefore heaven is also according to the conjunction with the
Lord. In the following proposition it will be seen that conjunction is
more and more close or more and more remote.

[2] Here let something be said about how the conjunction takes place and
what the nature of it is. It i