Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 1.djvu/65

 to love them for the sake of one's self, his reputation, honor or gain. Wherefore in proportion as man loves them from corporeal affection he is not rational, because he does not really love them, but himself whom the truths serve as servants a master. And when truths become servants, they do not enter into man and open any degree of his life, not even the first, but they reside only in the memory as scientifics under a material form, and there conjoin themselves with the love of self which is corporeal love.

From these considerations it may be seen how man becomes rational; namely, that he becomes rational to the third degree by the spiritual love of good and truth, which are the constituents of heaven and the church; to the second degree by the love of what is sincere and right; and to the first degree by the love of what is just and equitable. The two latter loves also become spiritual from the spiritual love of good and truth, because this flows into them, conjoins itself with them, and forms in them as it were its own likeness.

Spirits and angels have memory just the same as men; for whatever they hear, see, think, will and do, remains with them and is the means whereby their rational faculty is continually cultivated; and this forever. Hence it is that spirits and angels are perfected in intelligence and wisdom, the same as men, by means of the knowledges of truth and good.