life in the world; and with such he finds his own life, and what is
surprising, he then leads a life like that which he led in the world.

451. This opening state of man's life after death lasts only a few
days. How he is afterwards led from one state to another, and finally
either into heaven or into hell, will be told in what follows. This,
too, I have been permitted to learn by much experience.

452. I have talked with some on the third day after their decease,
when the process described above (n. 449, 450) had been completed,
especially with three whom I had known in the world, to whom I
mentioned that arrangements were now being made for burying their
bodies; I said, for burying them; on hearing which they were smitten
with a kind of surprise, saying that they were alive, and that the
thing that had served them in the world was what was being buried.
Afterwards they wondered greatly that they had not believed in such a
life after death while they lived in the body, and especially that
scarcely any within the church so believed. Those that have not
believed in the world in any life of the soul after the life of the
body are greatly ashamed when they find themselves to be alive. But
those that have confirmed themselves in that disbelief seek
affiliation with their like, and are separated from those that have
had faith. Such are for the most part attached to some infernal
society, because they have also denied the divine and have despised
the truths of the church; for so far as any one confirms himself
against the eternal life of his soul he confirms himself also against
whatever pertains to heaven and the church.

453. XLVII. MAN AFTER DEATH IS IN A COMPLETE HUMAN FORM

It has already been shown in several previous chapters that the form
of the spirit of man is the human form, that is, that the spirit is a
man even in form, especially where it is shown that every angel has a
complete human form (n. 73-77) that in respect to his interiors every
man is a spirit (n. 432-444); and that the angels in heaven are from
the human race (n. 311-317). [2] This can be seen still more clearly
from the fact that it is by virtue of his spirit, and not by virtue
of his body that man is a man, and that the bodily form is added to
the spirit in accordance with the spirit's form, and not the reverse,
for it is in accordance with its own form that the spirit is clothed
with a body. Consequently the spirit of man acts into eve