767. A person who has faith in the Lord and charity towards the neighbour is a church on a small scale. The church on the large scale is composed of people like this. It is a remarkable fact that every angel, no matter how he turns his body and face, sees the Lord in front of him. For the Lord is the sun of the heaven of angels, and it is this which appears before their eyes, when they meditate on spiritual matters. It is much the same with a person in the world who has the church in him as regards his spiritual sight. But because his spiritual sight is obscured by his natural sight, and the remaining senses endorse this, being directed towards bodily and worldly matters, he remains in ignorance of this condition of his spirit. This way of looking at the Lord, however one turns, is due to the fact that every truth, from which wisdom and faith arise, and every kind of good, which leads to love and charity, come from the Lord, and they are the Lord's with him. As a result every single truth of wisdom is as it were a mirror in which the Lord is seen, and every kind of good which is part of love is an image of the Lord. That is the origin of this remarkable fact.
[2] An evil spirit, however, continually turns away from the Lord, and constantly looks towards his own love; and he does this however he turns his body and face. The reason is the same, but in the opposite sense; for every evil takes the form of a kind of image of his ruling love, and the falsity which comes from it presents that image as in a mirror.
[3] Some similar principle must be implanted in nature, as can be deduced from the way some plants spring up amid a thicket of grasses, and strive to overtop them so as to get the sunlight. Some plants turn towards the sun as it travels from east to west during the day, so that they can ripen under its influence. I have no doubt that every shoot and branch of every tree attempts and strives to do likewise; but its action is baulked by its lack of flexibility and ability to turn. Research shows plainly that every whirlpool in water and maelstrom in the ocean automatically rotates in the direction of the sun's movement.
[4] Why then should a person who has been created to be an image of God not do likewise, if he did not divert in other directions that effort and striving implanted in him by the Creator, by the exercise of the gift of his free will? This too can be compared with a bride who constantly keeps before the sight of her spirit some likeness of her husband, and sees him in his gifts as if in mirrors; and she longs for him to come to her, and is delighted to receive him when he comes, for this makes her heart leap for love in her bosom.
This page is part of 
© 2000-2001 The Academy of the New Church