ll" they understand the
truths protecting it; by "the measure of the wall, a hundred and
forty-four cubits, which is the measure of a man, that is, of an
angel," they understand all those protecting truths in the complex
and their character; by its "twelve gates, which were of pearls,"
they understand introductory truths, "pearls" signifying such truths;
by "the foundations of the wall, which were of precious stones," they
understand the knowledge on which that doctrine is founded; by "the
gold like unto pure glass," of which the city and its street were
made, they understand the good of love which makes the doctrine and
its truths transparent. Thus do the angels perceive all these things;
and therefore not as man perceives them. The natural ideas of man
thus pass into the spiritual ideas with the angels without their
knowing anything of the sense of the letter of the Word, that is,
about "a new heaven and a new earth," "a new city Jerusalem," its
"wall, the foundations of the wall, and its dimensions." And yet the
thoughts of angels make one with the thoughts of man, because they
correspond; they make one almost the same as the words of a speaker
make one with the understanding of them by a hearer who attends
solely to the meaning and not to the words. All this shows how heaven
is conjoined with man by means of the Word: [3] Let us take another
example from the Word:

In that day there shall be a highway from Egypt to
Assyria, and Assyria shall come into Egypt and Egypt into
Assyria; and the Egyptians shall serve Assyria. In that
day shall Israel be a third to Egypt and to Assyria, a
blessing in the midst of the land, Which Jehovah of hosts
shall bless, saying, Blessed be My people the Egyptian,
and the Assyrian the work of My hands, and Israel Mine
inheritance (Isaiah 19:23-25).

What man thinks when these words are read, and what the angels think,
can be seen from the sense of the letter of the Word and from its
internal sense. Man from the sense of the letter thinks that the
Egyptians and Assyrians are to be converted to God and accepted, and
are then to become one with the Israelitish nation; but angels in
accordance with the internal sense think of the man of the spiritual
church who is here described in that sense, whose spiritual is
"Israel," whose natural is the "Egyptian," and whose rational, which
is the middle, is the "Assyrian."{1} Nevertheless, these two senses
a