LOVE PRODUCES HEAT.

Love produces heat for the reason that love is the very life, and living force of all things in the whole, world. All endeavors, forces, activities, and movements therein have no other origin than the Divine love which is the Lord, who appears in the heavens before the angels as a sun. That love is one thing and heat another is clearly evident from the difference between them in angel and in man. It is from love that an angel wills and thinks, and has perception and wisdom, and inmostly in himself is sensible of what is blissful and satisfactory, and also loves it. The same is true of man. All this is in their minds; while in their bodies they both feel what is hot apart from any sense of happiness or satisfaction. This makes clear that heat is an effect of the activity of life or of love. [2] That heat is an effect of love can be seen from many things, as that man from inmosts grows warm according to his life's loves, even in midwinter, and that the heat of the sun of this world has nothing in common with this heat; also that man grows warm, is enkindled, and is inflamed according to the increase of love; and he grows torpid, becomes cold, and dies according to the decrease of love; thus in exact accordance with the activities of love. The same is true of the animals of the earth and the flying things of heaven; for these are sometimes warmer in midwinter than in midsummer, for the heart then throbs, the blood becomes heated, the fibers grow warm, and every least part with the greatest performs its vital functions; and this heat is not from the sun but from the life of their soul, which is affection. Love produces heat for the reason that it is the life of all the forces in the universe; and this life can enter the recipient substances that have been created only through an active medium which is heat. In the creation of the universe the Lord prepared for Himself all the means, from firsts even to lasts, by which He might produce uses in every degree; and the universal and nearest means of conjunction is heat, in which the essence of the activity of love can exist. [3] As heat exists most nearly from love, there is a correspondence between love and heat, for there is a correspondence between every cause and its effect. It is from correspondence that the sun of heaven, which is the Lord, appears fiery; also that the love that goes forth therefrom is perceived by the angels as heat; likewise that the Lord's Divine wisdom in the heavens appears as light; also that:

The face of the Lord, when He was transfigured, shone as the sun (Matt. 17:2).

It is from the same correspondence that the holiness of the Lord's love was represented by the fire of the altar, and by the fire of the lamps of the lampstand in the tabernacle; also that the Lord appeared in fire on mount Sinai, and likewise in a flame of fire by night over the tabernacle. It was from this also that many nations made a sacred fire, and that they appointed virgins to its care, who at Rome were called the vestal virgins. [4] It is from the same correspondence that in the Word "fire" and "flame" in many passages mean love, and it is from an interior perception of that correspondence that we pray that holy fire may enkindle our hearts, meaning a holy love. It is from the same correspondence that celestial love appears in heaven at a distance as a fire, and for this reason the Lord said that:

The just shall shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of the Father (Matt. 13:43).

It is from the same correspondence that infernal love appears in hell at a distance as a fire (on which see the work on Heaven and Hell, n. 566-575).