[Footnote bbb:  Loving the Lord means living according to His commandments, nos. 10143, 10153, 10310, 10578, 10645.]

[Footnote ccc:  Loving the neighbour consists in doing what is good, just, and right, in every work and in every function, from the affection of what is good, just, and right, nos. 8120, 8121, 8123, 10310, 10336.  A life of love towards the neighbour is a life according to the Lord’s precepts, no. 3249.]

170.  The spirits with whom I had now spoken were from the northern part of their earth.  I was afterwards led to others who were on the western part.  These also, wishing to examine who and what I was; immediately said that there was nothing in me but evil, thinking that thus I might be deterred from approaching nearer.  I apperceived that this was their manner of accosting all who come to them.  But it was given me to reply that I well knew it to be so, and that in them likewise there was nothing but evil, by reason that every one is born into evil, and therefore whatever comes from man, spirit, or angel, as from what is his own, or from his proprium, is nothing but evil; inasmuch as all the good that is in every one, is from the Lord.  Hence they apperceived that I was in the truth, and I was admitted to converse with them.  They then showed me their idea concerning evil in man, and concerning good from the Lord, how they are separated from each other.  They placed one near the other, almost contiguous, but still distinct, yet as if bound in an inexpressible manner, so that the good led the evil, and restrained it, insomuch that it was not allowed to act at pleasure; and that thus the good bent the evil in whatever direction it desired, without the evil knowing anything of it.  In this manner they exhibited the dominion of good over evil, and at the same time a state of freedom.  They then asked how the Lord appeared amongst the angels from our Earth.  I said that He appeared in the sun as a Man, encompassed therein with a fiery solar [sphere], from which the angels in the heavens derive all light; and that the heat which proceeds thence is the Divine Good, and that the light which proceeds thence is the Divine Truth, both from the Divine Love, which is the fiery [sphere] appearing around the Lord in that sun; but that that sun only appears to the angels in heaven, and not to the spirits who are beneath, since the latter are more remote from the reception of the good of love and of the truth of faith, than the angels who are in the heavens (see above, no. 40).  It was given them thus to inquire concerning the Lord, and concerning His appearance before the angels from our Earth, because it pleased the Lord then to become present among them, and to reduce into order the things which had been disturbed there by the evil spirits of whom they complained.  The reason also why I was led thither, was in order that I might be an eye-witness of these things.