se two
principles it may choose and do what is pleasing to it. 4. That after
this there is effected a twofold conjunction; one, in which the will
acts from within, and the understanding from without; the other in which
the understanding acts from within, and the will from without: thus are
distinguished the adulteries of the reason, which are here treated of,
from the adulteries of the will, which are next to be treated of. They
are distinguished, because one is more grievous than the other; for the
adultery of the reason is less grievous than that of the will; because
in adultery of the reason, the understanding acts from within, and the
will from without; whereas in adultery of the will, the will acts from
within, and the understanding from without; and the will is the man
himself, and the understanding is the man as grounded in the will; and
that which acts within has dominion over that which acts without.

491. XI. THE ADULTERIES COMMITTED BY SUCH PERSONS ARE GRIEVOUS, AND ARE
IMPUTED TO THEM ACCORDING TO CONFIRMATIONS. It is the understanding
alone that confirms, and when it confirms, it engages the will to its
party, and sets it about itself, and thus compels it to compliance.
Confirmations are affected by reasonings, which the mind seizes for its
use, deriving them either from its superior region or from its inferior;
if from the superior region, which communicates with heaven, it confirms
marriages and condemns adulteries; but if from the inferior region,
which communicates with the world, it confirms adulteries and makes
light of marriages. Every one can confirm evil just as well as good; in
like manner what is false and what is true; and the confirmation of evil
is perceived with more delight than the confirmation of good, and the
confirmation of what is false appears with greater lucidity than the
confirmation of what is true. The reason of this is, because the
confirmation of what is evil and false derives its reasonings from the
delights, the pleasures, the appearances, and the fallacies of the
bodily senses; whereas the confirmation of what is good and true derives
its reasons from the region above the sensual principles of the body.
Now, since evils and falses can be confirmed just as well as goods and
truths, and since the confirming understanding draws the will to its
party, and the will together with the understanding forms the mind, it
follows that the form of the human mind is according to confirmatio