5718. A certain type of spirits exists who wish to dominate and have sole control over all others; and to achieve this end they stir up all kinds of enmity, hatred, and conflict among those other spirits. I have seen the conflicts stirred up by them and have been astonished. I have asked who these spirits were and have been told that they are a particular kind who stir such troubles up because their intention is to have sole dominion, acting according to the principle Divide and Rule. I was also allowed to talk to them, when immediately they said they were going to govern everyone. I was led to reply that they were madmen if they sought to gain dominion for themselves by creating those kinds of disturbances. These spirits spoke to me from a position above, a fair way up at the centre above my forehead. Their words flowed from them like a stream, for during their lifetime they had been clever speakers. I was informed that these spirits are ones that correlate with the crude mucus secreted in the brain, from which by their very presence they remove vitality and into which they introduce a sluggishness that leads to obstructions - which are the major causes of many forms of sickness - and to slowness of thought also.
[2] I noticed that these spirits were devoid of any conscience and that they thought that human prudence and wisdom lay in stirring up all kinds of enmity, hatred, and internal conflicts for the purpose of gaining dominion over others. I was led to ask them whether they knew that they were now in the next life where they were going to live for ever and where spiritual laws existed that completely forbade such actions. I also told them that while in the world they may have been considered and thought to be wise ones among the stupid, but in fact they had been the insane among the wise - which they did not like to be told. I went on to say that they ought to know that heaven consists in mutual love, or the love of one person towards another, which love gives rise to order in heaven and which love governs so many millions as a single whole. But the contrary of this, I said, existed with them since they filled others with nothing else than feelings of hatred, revenge, and cruelty towards their companions. They replied that they could not be anything other than what they were, to which I responded that from this they could know that each person's life remained with him.
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