72. As regards the presence of spirits with inhabitants of the world of Jupiter in detail, there are some spirits who chastise, some who instruct and some who control them. The chastising spirits attach themselves to the left side and lean towards the back; when in position, they draw out from a person's memory all he has done and thought. This is easy for spirits, since on approaching a person they can take over his whole memory.# If they find fault with his actions or thoughts, they reprove him and also chastise him by means of pains in the joints, the feet or the hands, or around the epigastric region. This is something spirits are very clever at doing, when permitted. When such spirits approach a person, they strike horror and fear into him, which makes him aware of their approach. Wicked spirits are able to inspire fear in a person when they approach, especially whose who while living in the world were robbers.
[2] To allow me to know how these spirits behave on approaching a person of their world, one of them was permitted to approach me. When he was near, I had an unmistakable feeling of horror and fear, but it was an outward rather than inward horror, since I knew that he was a spirit of that kind. I could actually see him, looking like a dark cloud with moving stars in it. Moving stars indicate falsities, fixed stars truths.## He attached himself to my left side towards the back, and also began to reprove me for things I had done and thought, which he drew out of my memory, also putting a bad construction on them. But he was stopped by angels. On discovering that he was in the presence of someone other than a man of his own world, he began to talk with me, saying that on approaching a person he knew all the details of his deeds and thoughts, and he then uttered a severe reproof and chastised him with various sorts of pain.
[3] On another occasion too a similar chastising spirit visited me. He attached himself to me on the left side below the waist like the earlier one. He too wanted to punish me, but he was kept off by the angels. But he demonstrated to me the kinds of punishment they are allowed to inflict on people in their world, if they do or intend to do wicked deeds. Apart from the pain in the joints there was a painful contraction around the middle of the belly, which felt like being pulled in with a narrow belt; then another punishment was spells of choking until the victim was very distressed; also, preventing them eating anything but bread for a time; and finally a death sentence, if they failed to stop doing such things, and being deprived of the joys of wife, children and companions. These too were accompanied by a sensation of pain. # Spirits have access to the whole of a person's memory, but nothing passes from their memory into the person's (AC 2488, 5863, 6192-3, 6198-9, 6214). Angels have access to the affections and purposes which initiate and direct what a person thinks, wishes and does (AC 1317, 1645, 5854 [5844 in original]). ## Stars in the Word mean cognitions of good and truth, that is, truths (AC 2495, 2849, 4697). In the next life truths are represented by fixed stars, but falsities by wandering stars (AC 1128).
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