The light into which men are lifted means intelligence and wisdom, because spiritual light radiated from the sun of the spiritual world (this sun being in essence love) acts equally or as one with intelligence and wisdom. The heat into which women are lifted means conjugial love, because spiritual heat radiated from the sun of the spiritual world is in essence love; and in women it becomes specialised into the love which links itself with intelligence and wisdom in men, what taken all together is called conjugial love.

[2] We speak of being lifted into a higher light and heat, because it is being lifted into the light and heat enjoyed by the angels of the higher heavens. There is also a real lifting, as from a cloud into clear air, and from the lower level of this to a higher one, and from this into the ether. So the lifting into a higher light in the case of men is lifting into higher intelligence, and from this into wisdom. Lifting into wisdom can proceed higher and higher. But in the case of women, lifting into a higher heat is into more chaste and pure conjugial love, and a constant striving towards marriage, something hidden in their inmost regions from creation.

[3] This process of lifting regarded in itself is an opening up of the mind. The human mind is divided into separate levels, as the world is into atmospheric levels; the lowest of these is that of water, the next higher that of air, higher still that of the ether, and there is a highest level above this. As a person's mind is opened up, it is lifted to similar levels, by wisdom in the case of men, by truly conjugial love in the case of women.