3754. THAT THE DIFFUSED IDEA OF SPIRITS PRESENTS AN IDEA AS IF THERE WERE NO SOCIETY. When such spirits are present and operate as have no idea of spirits and spiritual things - like those above mentioned, who ascribe everything to their own prudence, and despise the Word and worship, saying that they are merely bonds of conscience for the vulgar - then, although they speak, it appears so diffused as to resemble an atmospheric emptiness [inane]. [There appears to be] no society, still less any order, for all such things as distinguish and determine vanish, as it were, in consequence of their idea, which is of the same quality. I then spoke with them concerning this, [saying] that although it appeared thus, yet still the utmost order was maintained by the Lord, and that it was like the case of the starry heaven, which appears to the view of man as if void of order, when yet notwithstanding this appearance, everything was in the most exact order. That no one could speak except in society, often appeared on former occasions [very] similar. - 1748, October 28.