rrespondences which link to heaven all earthly things; they know,
too, the inner meaning of the prophetic words which foretell their
evolutions. Thus to these Spirits everything here below has its
significance; the tiniest flower is a thought,--a life which corresponds
to certain lineaments of the Great Whole, of which they have a constant
intuition. To them Adultery and the excesses spoken of in Scripture and
by the Prophets, often garbled by self-styled scholars, mean the state
of those souls which in this world persist in tainting themselves with
earthly affections, thus compelling their divorce from Heaven. Clouds
signify the veil of the Most High. Torches, shew-bread, horses and
horsemen, harlots, precious stones, in short, everything named in
Scripture, has to them a clear-cut meaning, and reveals the future of
terrestrial facts in their relation to Heaven. They penetrate the
truths contained in the Revelation of Saint John the divine, which human
science has subsequently demonstrated and proved materially; such, for
instance, as the following ('big,' said Swedenborg, 'with many human
sciences'): 'I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven
and the first earth were passed away' (Revelation xxi. 1). These Spirits
know the supper at which the flesh of kings and the flesh of all men,
free and bond, is eaten, to which an Angel standing in the sun has
bidden them. They see the winged woman, clothed with the sun, and the
mailed man. 'The horse of the Apocalypse,' says Swedenborg, 'is the
visible image of human intellect ridden by Death, for it bears within
itself the elements of its own destruction.' Moreover, they can
distinguish beings concealed under forms which to ignorant eyes
would seem fantastic. When a man is disposed to receive the prophetic
afflation of Correspondences, it rouses within him a perception of the
Word; he comprehends that the creations are transformations only; his
intellect is sharpened, a burning thirst takes possession of him which
only Heaven can quench. He conceives, according to the greater or lesser
perfection of his inner being, the power of the Angelic Spirits; and he
advances, led by Desire (the least imperfect state of unregenerated man)
towards Hope, the gateway to the world of Spirits, whence he reaches
Prayer, which gives him the Key of Heaven.

"What being here below would not desire to render himself worthy of
entrance into the sphere of those who live in secret by Lov