Spiritual Experiences (Odhner) n. 1615

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1615. The third general action of heaven was into the dilations and contractions of the heart, an action I felt clearly, but it was gentler than at any other time. Its pulsations resembled the breathing in gentleness, but the periods were regular, like my usual heartbeat, during one breathing interval about three beats, but still ending together with the pulmonic periods and thus somehow controlling them. The pulmonic periods were the compound of the heartbeats, that is, were composed of them, the ends of the heart-periods coinciding with those of the lungs, their arrangement reminiscent of the whirling motions of the angels, spoken of elsewhere [489-91, 600-8]. However, I was unable to find out how [the heartbeats] begin the pulmonic periods, but was only able to observe how they slip into them at the end of each breathing period. Therefore, since the heart relates to what is heavenly, but the lungs to what is spiritual, these actions resemble the manner in which the heavenly flows into the spiritual. The pulsations of my heart, which were gentle and regular, were so observable that I could count every one of them.


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