194 HEAVEN and HELL §351
believe that it is the source of everything true and good and therefore of
all intelligence and wisdom. We believe the Deity when we want to be
led by the Deity. This is the only way our deeper levels are opened.
[ 3 ] When we are devoted to this faith and are in a life in keeping with
it, we enjoy the ability to understand and to be wise. However, in order
to be intelligent and wise, it is fi tting that we learn a great deal not only
about heavenly matters but also about earthly ones. We learn about heav-
enly matters from the Word and the church and about earthly ones from
the arts and sciences. To the extent that we learn and apply our learning
to our lives, we become intelligent and wise, for to that extent our deeper
vision, the sight of our understanding, and our deeper affection, which is
the affection of our intentions, are perfected.
Of people like this, the simple ones are the ones whose deeper levels
have been opened but have not been so much developed through spiri-
tual, moral, civil, and natural truths. They grasp truths when they hear
them, but do not see them within themselves. In contrast, the wise ones
are the ones whose deeper levels have been not only opened but also
developed. They both see truths within themselves and grasp them.
We can see from all this what true intelligence and wisdom are.352 By pseudo-intelligence and wisdom we mean not seeing and grasping
what is true and good (and therefore what is false and evil) from within
oneself, but only believing that things are true and good or false and evil
because someone else says so, and then ratifying it. Since such people are
not seeing what is true on the basis of its truth but only on someone’s
authority, they can just as well latch onto something false as something true
and believe it, and even rationalize it until it actually seems to be true.
Whatever is rationalized takes on the appearance of truth, and there is noth-
ing that cannot be rationalized. Their deeper levels are open only down-
ward, and their outer levels are opened to the extent that they have made up
their minds. So the light they see from is not heaven’s light but the world’s
light, which is called “natural illumination.” In this light, false things can
shine as though they were true. In fact, once they have become matters of
complete conviction, they can even glow, though not in heaven’s light.
The less intelligent and wise people of this sort are those who have
convinced themselves of a great many opinions, and the more intelligent
and wise are the ones who have convinced themselves of fewer.
We can see from all this what pseudo-intelligence and wisdom are.
[ 2 ] However, this category does not include people who as children
believed as true what they heard from their teachers, if in later youth,
when they began to think on their own, they did not hang on to these