Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 1.djvu/105

 Hence it is that all, when they first come into the other life, are recognized by their friends, relations, and those with whom they were at all acquainted; and that they also converse together, and afterwards associate according to their friendship in the world. I have frequently heard that those who came from the world, rejoiced at seeing their friends again, and that their friends in turn rejoiced that they had come to them.

This is a common occurrence: that one married partner meets the other, and they mutually congratulate each other; they also remain together for a time, longer or shorter according to the delight that had attended their dwelling together in the world. Nevertheless, if love truly conjugial,—which is the conjunction of minds from heavenly love,—had not conjoined them, after remaining together for some time, they are separated. But if their minds had been discordant, and they interiorly had an aversion to each other, they break out into open enmity, and sometimes actually quarrel; notwithstanding which, they are not separated until they enter the second state which will be treated of in what presently follows.

Because the life of spirits recently deceased is not unlike their life in the natural world, and because