Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 9.djvu/23

 blessed and happy from this circumstance, that he is then spiritual, and the spiritual man feels and perceives spiritual pleasure which is superior to natural pleasure, exceeding it a thousand times.

ANGELS AND SPIRITS ARE HUMAN BEINGS.

That angels and spirits are men, is proved by those seen by Abraham, Gideon, Daniel and the prophets, and especially by John when he wrote the Apocalypse, also by the women in the Lord's sepulchre; yea, the Lord himself was seen by the disciples after his resurrection. They were seen, because the eyes of the spirits of those who saw them were opened; and when these are opened, angels appear in their own form which is human; but when these eyes are closed, that is, veiled by the sight of the eyes which derive their all from the material world, then they do not appear.

But it is to be known that man after death is not a natural but a spiritual man; and yet that he appears to himself altogether similar, so much so that he does not know but that he is still in the natural world; for he has a similar body, countenance, speech and senses, because similar affection and thought, or similar will and understanding. He is not, indeed, actually similar, because he is a spiritual and thence an interior man, but the difference does not appear to him, because he cannot compare his present with his former natural state, for he has put off this latter, and is in the former. Therefore I have often heard them say that they do