"This, as you know, is the reason why, in this spiritual
world, no one is allowed to stand behind another, and to speak to him;
for thereby there is inspired into him a love, which his own
intelligence favors and obeys for the sake of its delight; but since it
is from man, and not from God, it is a love of evil, or a love of the
false. In addition to the above, I will relate to you another similar
circumstance. On certain occasions I have heard goods and truths let
down from heaven into hell; and in hell they were progressively turned
into their opposites, good into evil, and truth into the false; the
cause of this, the same as above, because all in hell turn themselves
from the Lord." On hearing these two things the two angels thanked me,
and said, "As you are now meditating and writing concerning a love
opposite to our conjugial love, and the opposite to that love makes our
minds sad, we will depart;" and when they said, "Peace be unto you," I
besought them not to mention that love to their brethren and sisters in
heaven, because it would hurt their innocence. I can positively assert
that those who die infants, grow up in heaven, and when they attain the
stature which is common to young men of eighteen years old in the world,
and to maidens of fifteen years, they remain of that stature; and
further, that both before marriage and after it, they are entirely
ignorant what adultery is, and that such a thing can exist.
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