409. CONCERNING THE MANIFOLD AND VARIOUS PURIFICATION OF SPIRITS WHO INSINUATE THEMSELVES INTO HEAVEN, AND SUPPOSE THAT THEY ARE IN HEAVEN BECAUSE THEY ARE ADMITTED BY THE HEAVENLY ONES; THEY LOVE ALL WHO COME, AND BELIEVE ALL THINGS TO BE GENUINE BEFORE THEY ARE EXPOSED By a continuous spiritual vision I have found by experience, and have also been frequently instructed by a living voice, that heaven by diverse means is purified of those who insinuate themselves into it, and outwardly clothe themselves with a wedding garment as it were, and pretend they are angels, that is, who in external form represent angels, but inwardly are wolves, and continually seduce the faithful. Such spirits are admitted by the faithful, and it follows as a consequence that there are also many such among the multitude who are liberated from the pit, who have not yet been devastated. These wander about amongst good spirits and angels, insinuating themselves under an angelic form, and according to the genius of their cunning and the nature of the deceit remaining with them, they allure by their engrafted machinations the inoffensive to their side. They are especially those who are imbued with the love of self, also those who are imbued with the diverse loves of the world, who indeed hide in those loves that there is a heavenly marriage, which is the same as the "feast" to which the whole world is called, [Matthew xxii]; they thus insinuate themselves into this feast, and afterwards want to destroy it, in order that they may obtain the chief power, and thus from hatred they want to act against all in heaven, however many they are. How the case is with regard to these things, and in what manner these spirits are exposed, and how they are forcibly ejected from that heaven in troops, would be too tedious to say. Those who are forcibly ejected from that feast, however, are treated miserably, for they are cast into the lake. When they may be taken out again can be known to no one, for the time of their incarceration in that lake varies in accordance with the malice of each one, and the deeper the malice, the more deeply [are they inserted]. If they are only on the surface their punishment is easier than that of those who from actual evil have formed deeper roots. Very many have wondered that there should be such crowds in this sphere, for there appears to be nothing but disturbance, confusion and condemnation; wherefore, in order that it might be shown to them of what quality and how great is the heaven of God Messiah, this was also represented by the wonderful flow of the indefinite number of stars, and it was then said with a living voice, that such and so great is the heaven of God Messiah, and that that crowd is only apparently a multitude. For a similar purification takes place every day and every moment, otherwise man can never be purified, so that as to all states he may be able to subsist in heaven. 1747, Dec. 29.