4753. CONCERNING THE VASTATION AND CONDEMNATION OF THE EVIL - THAT THESE ARE FROM THEMSELVES. It is granted me to know, by continued experience of some [years], how the evil vastate themselves, and at length cast themselves into damnation. From their acquired nature, they cannot do otherwise than engage in wicked practices, and so infest those whom the Lord protects; and when they do this they thereby assail the Divine, and summon infernal societies; and the more they infest those the Lord protects, the more of these societies do they summon, and so more and more imbibe the hells, until their acquired nature becomes full. According to the degree of the infestation, the Divine is resisted; and, then, in that degree they summon the hells, that is, imbibe such things from the hells, and associate themselves with them. Hence it is evident that the Lord vastates, or condemns, no one, but that they themselves do it by dashing against the Divine more and more, until at length, when they have become full, they cast themselves into the hells, and then into damnation, or spiritual death.