es: but it was granted me to tell him,
that adulteries are wicked, although from the delight attending them,
and from the persuasion thence resulting, they appear to the adulterer
as not wicked but allowable; which also he might know from this
consideration, that marriages are the seminaries of the human race, and
thence also the seminaries of the heavenly kingdom, and therefore that
they ought not to be violated, but to be accounted holy; also from this
consideration, that he ought know, as being in the spiritual world, and
in a state of perception, that conjugial love descends from the Lord
through heaven, and that from that love, as a parent, is derived mutual
love, which is the main support of heaven; and further from this
consideration, that adulterers, whenever they only approach the heavenly
societies, are made sensible of their own stench, and throw themselves
headlong thence towards hell: at least he might know, that to violate
marriages is contrary to the divine laws, to the civil laws of all
kingdoms, also to the genuine light of reason, and thereby to the right
of nations, because contrary to order both divine and human; not to
mention other considerations. But he replied, that he entertained no
such thoughts in the former life: he wished to reason whether the case
was so or not; but he was told that truth does not admit of reasonings,
since they favor the delights of the flesh against those of the spirit,
the quality of which latter delights he was ignorant of; and that he
ought first to think about the things which I had told him, because they
are true; or to think from the well-known maxim, that no one should do
to another what he is unwilling another should do to him; and thus, if
any one had in such a manner violated his wife, whom he had loved, as is
the case in the beginning of every marriage, and he had then been in a
state of wrath, and had spoken from that state, whether he himself also
would not then have detested adulteries, and being a man of strong
parts, would not have confirmed himself against them more than other
men, even to condemning them to hell; and being the general of an army,
and having brave companions, whether he would not, in order to prevent
disgrace, either have put the adulterer to death, or have driven the
adulteress from his house.

482. III. DUPLICATE ADULTERY IS THAT OF A HUSBAND WITH ANOTHER'S WIFE,
OR OF A WIFE WITH ANOTHER'S HUSBAND. This adultery is called duplicate,
be