Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 2.djvu/39

 angels are what determine their situation in one or the other of these heavens; for the more their interiors are open to the Lord, the more interior is the heaven in which they dwell. There are three degrees of the interiors with every one, whether angel, spirit or man. They with whom the third degree is open, are in the inmost heaven; they with whom the second degree is open, are in the middle heaven; and they with whom only the first degree is open, are in the lowest heaven.

The interiors are opened by the reception of divine good and divine truth. They who are affected with divine truths, and admit them immediately into the life, that is, into the will and thence into act, are in the inmost or third heaven, and are situated in that heaven according to their reception of good from the affection of truth. But they who do not admit them immediately into the will, but into the memory and thence into the understanding, and from that will and do them, are in the middle or second heaven. While they who live a moral life, and believe in a Divine Being, and care but little about being instructed, are in the lowest or first heaven. Hence it may be manifest that the states of the interiors make heaven, and that heaven is within every one and not without him; as the Lord also teaches where he says, "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation; neither shall they say, Lo here! or, Lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you." Luke xvii. 20, 21.

All perfection also increases toward the interiors and