Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 1.djvu/109



HE second state of man after death is called the state of his interiors, because he is then let into the interiors which belong to his mind, or to his will and thought: and his exteriors, in which he had been in his first state, are laid asleep. Every one who observes the life of man, and his speech and actions, may know that with every one there are things exterior and interior, or exterior and interior thoughts and intentions. This may be known from the following considerations:

Every one in civil life thinks of others according to what he has heard and understood concerning them, either from report or from conversation. Yet he does not speak with them according to his thought; and although they are evil, still he treats them with civility. That this is the case is especially evident from pretenders and flatterers, who speak and act altogether different from what they think and will and from hypocrites, who talk about God, and heaven, and the salvation of souls, and the truths of the church, and their country's good, and their neighbor, as if from faith and love; when yet in