Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 5865

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5865. There was once a spirit, not an evil one, who was allowed to pass over to a certain person and to talk to me from there. Having arrived the spirit said that he could see what looked like a black inanimate object or black lifeless mass; it was that person's bodily life which the spirit was allowed to see. Then it was said that when one is allowed to see the bodily life of a person in possession of the good of faith, it does not look like a black object but a wooden one, the colour of wood. I learned much the same by another experience. A certain evil spirit was let into the bodily state by forming his thoughts from the impressions of the bodily senses, thus from his external memory. At this time I saw him too as a black lifeless mass. When restored to his normal state he said that he had thought he was living a bodily life. Spirits are not under any other circumstances allowed to see the bodily aspects of a person, for a person's bodily aspects belong to the world and worldly light, and when spirits see things belonging to worldly light they look like utter darkness.


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