Conjugial Love (Chadwick) n. 71

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71. Only those who receive conjugial love from the Lord, those who approach Him directly and live the life of the church coming from Him, can enjoy truly conjugial love. The reason is that this love, regarded from its origin and correspondence, is more celestial, spiritual, holy, pure, and clean than any love to be found among angels in heaven or people in the church (as said in 64 above). These attributes of it are only possible in the case of those who are linked with the Lord and associated by Him with angels in heaven. For these shun extra-marital loves, that is, unions with others than one's wife or husband, like the damnation of the soul or the lakes of hell. In so far as a married person shuns such unions, even in the lusts of the will and the intentions this produces, so far is that love in their case purified, becoming by stages spiritual, at first while they live on earth, and afterwards in heaven.

[2] No love among human beings, nor among angels, can become pure; so neither can this one. But since it is the intention of the will which is chiefly regarded by the Lord, in so far as one has this intention and keeps to it, so far is one set on the road to and so far does one advance towards its purity and holiness. None but those whom the Lord makes to be such can enjoy spiritual conjugial love, because it has heaven in it. A natural man, for whom that love draws its pleasure only from the flesh, cannot approach heaven or any angel, nor in fact any person who possesses that love, since this love is the foundation of all celestial and spiritual loves (see 65-67 above). [3] I have had this proved to me by experience. I have seen genii* in the spiritual world, who were being prepared for hell, approach an angel who was taking his pleasure with his partner. While they were still at a distance, they became like furies, the more so the nearer they approached, and they looked for caves and ditches into which to throw themselves to take refuge. Wicked spirits love whatever matches their own affection, however unclean it is, and loathe the spirits of heaven for their purity, as being the reverse of themselves. This can be inferred from what I related in the Preliminaries (10). * A name for the most wicked spirits; see 514 end.


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