148. Implanted in every man from creation and thence by birth is an internal conjugial and an external conjugial. The internal is spiritual and the external natural. Man comes first into the latter, and he comes into the former as he becomes spiritual. If therefore he remains in the external or natural conjugial, the internal or spiritual conjugial is being veiled over until at last he knows nothing of it, yea, and calls it a vain idea. But if man becomes spiritual, then he begins to know something of it, and later to have some perception of its nature, and successively to feel its pleasantness, its delights, and its delightsomeness; and as this takes place, the above-mentioned veiling between the external and the internal begins to grow thin, then, as it were, to melt away, and finally, to dissolve and disappear. When this comes to pass, the external conjugial does indeed remain, but it is being continually purged and purified of its dregs by the internal, and this until the external becomes, as it were, the face of the internal and derives its delight and at the same time its life and the delights of its potency from the blessedness which is in the internal. Such is the renunciation of whoredoms by which the chastity of marriage comes into existence. [2] It may be thought that the external conjugial which remains after the internal has separated itself from it, or it from itself, is the same as the external not separated. But I have heard from angels that they are so entirely unlike, that the external from the internal, which they called the external of the internal, is devoid of all lasciviousness, inasmuch as the internal cannot be lascivious but can be delighted only chastely; and that it carries the like into its external wherein it feels its own delights. It is wholly otherwise with the external separated from the internal. This, they said, is lascivious in its whole and in every part. They compared the external conjugial from the internal to a noble fruit whose pleasant savor and fragrance insinuate themselves into its surface and form this into correspondence with themselves. [3] They also compared the external conjugial from the internal to a granary whose store never diminishes, what is taken from it being constantly restored anew. But the external separated from the internal, they compared to wheat in a winnower, which, if it is scattered about, there remains only chaff which is dissipated by the wind. Such is the case with conjugial love unless what is scortatory is renounced.