Wise words from Emanuel Swedenborg

Emanuel Swedenborg (February 8, 1688–March 29, 1772) was Swedish inventor, scientist, philosopher, theologian, and mystic. He is most known for his book about the afterlife, Heaven and Hell.

His career as a scientist and inventor, involving mostly geometry, chemistry, and metallurgy, included several mathematical and mechanical inventions.

Emanuel Swedenborg also published an article explaining mental and spiritual events as tiny vibrations, and was intent on forming a theory to explain how matter relates to spirit.

He claims to have had a spiritual awakening at age 56, in 1744, along with regular prophetic dreams and visions, and believed God is within all living creatures.

Below we list some words of wisdom from Emanuel Swedenborg.

“Conscience is God's presence in humans.”

“This I can declare: things that are in heaven are more real than things that are in the world.”

“Worship does not consist in prayers and in external devotion, but in a life of kindness.”

“Kindness is an inner desire that makes us want to do good things even if we do not get anything in return. It is the joy of our life to do them. When we do good things from this inner desire, there is kindness in everything we think, say, want, and do.”

“God created us in such a way that our inner self is in the spiritual world and our outer self is in the physical world. This was so that the spiritual part of us, which belongs in heaven, could be planted in the physical part the way a seed is planted in the ground.”

“People who have intended and loved what is evil in the world intend and love what is evil in the other life, and then they no longer allow themselves to be led away from it. This is why people who are absorbed in evil are connected to hell and actually are there in spirit; and after death they crave above all to be where their evil is. So after death, it is we, not the Lord, who cast ourselves into hell.”

“We are all spirits inwardly. This is what's alive in the body, not the body on its own.”

“Seen in its own right, a loving person's inner spirit is an angel of heaven, and while we are living in the body we are also in the company of angels, even though we are not aware of it; and once we are released from the body we join them.”

“Angels never attack, as infernal spirits do. Angels only ward off and defend.”

“Angels can recognize the nature of our unique essence on the basis of nothing more than a brief conversation with us. From hearing the tone of our voice angels sense what we love; and from hearing what we say, angels sense our level of understanding.”

“Everything good or true that the angels inspire in us is God's, so God is constantly talking to us. He talks very differently, though, to one person than to another.”

“A person's life from infancy to old age is nothing else than an advance from the world towards heaven, the last stage of which is death; the actual transition from one life to the next.”

“A man after death, is not a natural but a spiritual man; nevertheless he still appears in all respects like himself.”

“Heaven is such that all who have lived well, of whatever religion, have a place there.”

“Man was so created by the Lord as to be able while living in the body to speak with spirits and angels, as in fact was done in the most ancient times; for, being a spirit clothed with a body, he is one with them.”

“Charity is to will and do what is just and right in every transaction.”

“There are angels that receive more interiorly the Divine that goes forth from the Lord, and others that receive it less interiorly; the former are called celestial angels, and the latter spiritual angels.”

Copyright © Scott Petullo, Stephen Petullo