This also just happened. Some who were known to despise me were driven toward me by the deceitful, who carried out their deceptions through them, namely to debase and then darken all the good and true things I have written-which also happened, namely that those things of great value seemed to me so trivial that they were regarded as nothing at all, and almost rejected. When I was given to observe that those spirits were with me, I was also given to observe that the other deceitful spirits were using them as mediums. Those deceitful ones were not debasing [those writings], but in order to darken them to appear as base, were substituting those spirits. About this matter, because it had been discovered, I spoke with them, and they admitted to it. This shows what the deceitful are like.

2936 1/2. When I spoke with them, it was confirmed that the same thing occurs in everyday life while they are living in the body, so that the same thing comes out in the other life, but with greater skill and adaptation to the differing states in that life. Therefore, when the states of spirits in the other life are known, one can recognize what they had been like in the life of the body. For similar things occur, with a difference in regard to states and other aspects of life. 1748, 26 Aug.