7790. 'And after that I will go out' means that God's truth will depart. This is clear from the meaning of 'going out' as departing; and from the representation of 'Moses' as God's truth. These words mean that when those who have molested the upright are damned all God's truth departs from them, for then their state is one in which their own evil reigns, and evil rejects and eliminates all God's truth. Previously, before they were damned, they were, it is true, acquainted with the truths of faith; but even so, they did not have truths within themselves. Truths were on their lips but not in their hearts. Consequently, when they underwent vastation of those truths evil remained, and the falsity of evil that had lain concealed within them emerged at the same time also. For although they declared a belief in truths they were not guided by them but by falsities. Their declaration of belief in what is true did not spring from its proper origin - from good - but from evil; for gain, important positions, and reputation, and so self and the world, were the reasons for its existence with them. Truths which spring from that kind of origin cling to the surface, and therefore, when they are laid waste, they fall off like scales; and when they fall off they leave behind places with a terrible, rotten stink because of the falsities that emanate from the evils there. Such is the fate of those who have been acquainted with the truths of faith and yet have led a life contrary to them, as accords with the Lord's words in Luke,