734. With these words the angel led the way, and was first accompanied by the group which had persuaded itself that heavenly joys were only entertaining meetings and charming conversations. These people were taken by the angel to join gatherings in the northern quarter, whose ideas of the joys of heaven had been in the previous world precisely this. There was a spacious building in which people of this sort were gathered; it contained more than fifty rooms, different ones being allocated to each of the various topics of conversation. In one set of rooms the talk was of what they had seen or heard in the square and the streets; in another there was charming talk of different kinds about the fair sex, with enough jokes included to make everyone present burst out into hilarious laughter. In other rooms they were discussing the news about royal courts, government departments, the political situation, leaks from various secret committees, together with deductions and guesses about what had happened. Other rooms were devoted to trade, others to literary subjects, others to matters concerned with public affairs and moral behaviour, others to ecclesiastical matters and different sects, and so on.
I was allowed to look inside that building, and I saw people running from one room to another, looking for gatherings which answered to their affection and thus to their idea of joy. In the gatherings I saw three sorts of people: some who were more or less panting to speak, some who were anxious to ask questions, and some keen on listening.
[2] The building had four doors, one on each side, and I noticed that many people were breaking up the gatherings and hastening to leave. I followed some of them to the east door, and saw some people sitting near it with long faces. So I went up to them and asked why they were sitting looking so sad. 'The doors of this building,' they replied, 'are kept shut against those who want to leave. It is now three days since we came in, and we have spent our time as we wished in meetings and conversations, and we have become so tired of continual talk that we can hardly bear to listen to the mere noise of it. We were so bored we made our way to this door and knocked; but we were told that the doors of this building are open for people to come in, but not to go out. "Stay and enjoy the joys of heaven," they told us. So we concluded from this reply that we shall have to stay here for ever. As a result our minds have fallen victim to sadness, our chests are beginning now to feel constricted, and we are becoming worried.'
[3] Then the angel addressed them and said: 'This state is death to your joys, the ones you thought were the only heavenly ones, though they are but concomitant to heavenly joys.' 'What then,' they asked the angel, 'is heavenly joy?' The angel replied briefly as follows: 'It is the pleasure of doing something which is of service to oneself or others. This pleasure derives its essence from love, and its coming-into-being from wisdom. The pleasure of service arising from love by means of wisdom is the soul and life of all heavenly joys. There are in the heavens most entertaining meetings, which cheer the angels' minds, delight their spirits, gladden their hearts and refresh their bodies. But these take place after they have performed services in their occupations and tasks. This is what gives the soul and life to all their pleasures and amusements. But if you deprive them of that soul or life, the concomitant joys one after another cease to be joys, first becoming matters of indifference, and then worthless, and finally the source of sadness and worry.'
When he had said this, the door was opened and the people sitting near leaped out. They hurried away home, each to his own occupation and his own task, and so were revived.
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