162 HEAVEN and HELL §302
in our thought and affection. The angels have told me that they knew
this kind of [empty] belief and talk occurred in the world, and especially
(which astonished them) in the church, where people have the Word
that teaches them about heaven and its union with them. Yet in fact the
union is so vital that we could not think the least thought apart from the
spirits who are with us. Our spiritual life depends on this. They said that
the reason for this ignorance was that people believe they live on their
own, without any connection with the Ultimate Reality of life, and do
not know that there is this connection through the heavens. Yet if that
connection were severed, we would instantly drop down dead. If we
believed the way things really are, that everything good comes from the
Lord and everything evil from hell, then we would not take credit for the
good within us or blame for the evil. Whenever we thought or did any-
thing good, we would focus on the Lord, and any evil that fl owed in we
would throw back into the hell it came from. But since we do not believe
in any infl ow from heaven or from hell and therefore believe that every-
thing we think and intend is in us and from us, we make the evil our
own and defi le the good with our feeling that we deserve it.Heaven’s Union with Us through the Word
303
P
EOPLE who think from their deeper rationality can see that there is
a connection of all things, through intermediate ones, with a First,
and that anything that is not so connected will disintegrate. When they
think about it, they know that nothing can exist on its own, but requires
something prior to itself, which means that everything goes back to that
First. They know that the connection with what is prior is like that of an
effect with its effi cient cause, since when the effi cient cause is removed,
the effect comes apart and collapses. Since this has been the thought of
the learned, they have both seen and pronounced that existence is a con-
stant becoming, so that all things are constantly coming into being—
that is, existing—from that First from which they originated.