Page:The New View of Hell.djvu/143

 stye is quite agreeable to their nostrils. Serpents and vipers love the clefts of rocks foxes love deserts; rats prefer cellars and subterranean regions; turtles and crocodiles seek marshy places; and to the eyes of wolves and bears their own dens, undoubtedly, seem more beautiful and home-like than would the palaces of kings.

Who cannot see that the things which such creatures prefer for food, the odors they delight to inhale, and the places they love to inhabit, affect their senses in a manner very different from what they do ours? And the only reason to be assigned is, that their life is very different from the properly human. Their loves and consequent tastes are different from ours. And they choose and delight in what is agreeable to their life, as we do what is agreeable to ours. Says Swedenborg:

"The delights belonging to the lusts of evil, and those belonging to affections for the good, cannot be compared; because resident within the former is the devil, and within the latter is the Lord. If a comparison must be drawn, the delights of the lusts of evil can only be compared to the lasciviousness of frogs in ponds, and of serpents in slimy places; while the delights of affections for the good may be compared to mental delights in gardens and flowers. For things similar to those which are pleasing to frogs and serpents, are also pleasing to those in the hells who are in the lusts of evil; and things similar to those which are pleasing to the mind in gardens and flowers, are also pleasing to those in the