THERE ARE DEGREES OF AFFECTIONS AND OF USES.

There are continuous degrees and there are discrete degrees. Both of these are in every form in the spiritual world and in the natural world. All are acquainted with continuous degrees; few, however, have any knowledge of discrete degrees, and those who have no knowledge of these grope as in the dark when they are investigating the causes of things. Degrees of both kinds are described in the work on Heaven and Hell (n. 38). Continuous degrees, which all know about, are like the degrees from light to shade, from heat to cold, from rarity to density. Such gradations of light, of heat, of wisdom and of love, are in every society of heaven within itself. They who are in the midst of a society are in clearer light than those who are in the ultimates, the light diminishing according to distance from the center even to the ultimates. It is the same with wisdom; those who are in the midst or center of a society are in the light of wisdom, while those who are in the ultimates or circumferences are in the shade of wisdom and are simple. It is the same with love within societies. The affections of love, which make the wisdom of those in societies and the uses of the affections which make their life, continually lessen from the midst or center even to the ultimates or circumferences. [2] Such are continuous degrees. But discrete degrees are wholly different. These do not advance in one plane to the sides around, but from highest to lowest; and for this reason they are called descending degrees. They are separated as efficient causes and effects are, which in their turn become efficient causes even to the lowest effect. They are also like a producing force in relation to the forces produced, which in turn become producing even to the last product. In a word, they are degrees of the formation of one thing from another; thus they are the degrees from first or highest to last or lowest, where formation subsists. Therefore things prior and posterior, also things higher and lower, are such degrees. All creation was effected through such degrees, and all production is by means of them, and likewise all composition in the nature that belongs to this world; for in analyzing anything that is composite you will see that one thing therein is from another, even to the very last, which is the general of them all. [3] The three angelic heavens are distinguished from each other by such degrees and in consequence one is above another. The interiors of man, which belong to his mind, are distinguished from each other by such degrees; so, too, are light which is wisdom and heat which is love, in the heavens of angels and in the interiors of men; and the same is true of the light itself that proceeds from the Lord as a sun, and of the heat itself that also proceeds from Him; and for this reason the light in the third heaven is so refulgent, and the light in the second heaven is of such shining whiteness as to exceed the noonday light of the world a thousand fold. The same is true of the wisdom, for in the spiritual world light and wisdom are in equal degree of perfection. The same is true of the degrees of affections; and as this is true of the degrees of affections it is true also of the degrees of uses, for the subjects of affections are uses. It is to be known further that in every form, both spiritual and natural, there are both discrete and continuous degrees. Without discrete degrees there is not that within a form that constitutes a cause or soul, and without continuous degrees there is no extension or appearance of it.