295. THE STATE OF SOULS AFTER DEATH AS TO THE MEMORY Spirits, like souls after the death of the body, suppose that they enjoy all the memory just as they did in the life of the body. But by manifest experience I have learned today, as also on several former occasions,* and I have conversed with souls and spirits about this same subject. They had to admit that this was so, namely, that they have no memory of particular things, but the more interior memory which is that of their nature, on which is inscribed each and every thing they have ever thought in the life of the body and what they did, knowledges as it were occupying the surface, and the things that were of the affections, making as it were the nucleus, as it may be called. To souls and spirits it could by no means appear otherwise, than that they have retained all the memory of their bodily life; (1) for from their own nature they could speak according to the knowledges that are with me, which they put on as if they were theirs, in one way in the case of those I had known in their life, and in another way in the case of those I had not known; thus they could not know otherwise than that it was their own memory. This can thus be evident from this single testimony, that all spirits, when they came to me, could speak in my native language, no matter where they had been born, not knowing otherwise than that it was their own language and that they were born into it; of their own language they knew nothing whatever. Their nature takes the place of their memory, so that they are either averse to, or love, things that are true or good as if by a kind of knowing sphere; (2) for as soon as anything applies itself with which their nature is not in agreement, they bend it into the things that their nature approves, and this so skillfully and wonderfully that they know no otherwise than that they have acted from their own memory. Moreover, they can mutually converse with each other from the things that are in man, and this in various ways, which is also wonderful, although I did not hear this. From this also they cannot know otherwise than that they are speaking from their own former memory. Some who were known to me were astonished at this, but still they could not but acknowledge its truth. But it is rightly to be observed, that each and all things are so directed by God Messiah that they cannot take anything from the memory of anyone, except that which can serve for use, so that each and all things are directed in a wonderful manner. Nor can it be doubted that each and all things that have been inscribed on the life of the body can also be drawn forth and shown to them, as I have experienced very manifestly in my own case; for the most minute things are drawn forth, and indeed in their own time, which I cannot resist in any way. (3) To adduce the particular experiences would be tedious and superfluous. 1747, Dec. 4. * Crossed out: "I have the evidence."