489. (9) Adulteries committed by such people are imputable to them according as their intellect afterwards sanctions them or does not sanction them. In the measure that the intellect sanctions evils, in the same measure does the person assimilate them into himself and make them his own. To sanction them means to assent to them, and the assent induces on the mind a state of love for those evils. It is the same with adulteries which in the beginning were committed without the assent of the intellect, but which are afterwards sanctioned. The contrary is the case if they are not afterwards sanctioned. That is because evils or adulteries which are committed blindly without the assent of the intellect are prompted by a lust of the body, and are much like instinctive actions such as we find in the case of animals. In the human being the intellect is indeed present when they are committed, but having a passive or lifeless force, not an active or operative one. It follows of itself from this that such actions are not imputed except in the measure that they are afterwards sanctioned or not sanctioned. By imputation we mean here an indictment and judgment after death, which proceeds in accordance with the state of the person's spirit. We do not mean an indictment by man before a judge. The latter does not proceed in accordance with the state of the person's spirit, but in accordance with that of his body in the deed. If the two proceedings were not to differ, after death those people would be exonerated who are exonerated in the world, and those would be condemned who are condemned in the world; and in that case the latter would be without any hope of salvation.