The New View of Hell/Chapter 7
VII.
SOME EVIDENCE OF ITS DURATION— PHILOSOPHICAL AND SCRIPTURAL.
EVERY individual has some ruling love; and this love is his life. His character is according to the nature of this love;—heavenly if the love be good, infernal if the love be evil. And this love each one takes with him into the other world, because he takes there his life—his character—his own spiritual organism which the ruling love has moulded; and he can take nothing else.
And according to Swedenborg the ruling love cannot be changed after death. If, therefore, it be of an infernal character, it remains so for ever. The individual will have no desire to change his character in the other world, or to be anything else than his ruling love makes him; and without such desire we cannot conceive how any essential change in him can possibly take place. And if the character or ruling love undergoes no change after death, then the wicked will remain so for ever, and the hells will be unending in their duration.
And this is the solemn fact disclosed by Swedenborg. Upon no single subject is he more explicit in his teachings, than upon the unchangeable state of the wicked in the other world, and the consequent eternity of the hells. The extracts in the preceding chapter furnish sufficient evidence of this. And although this question, like all others concerning the life beyond the grave, is one to be settled mainly by the light of revelation, yet revelation rightly understood will ever be found in agreement with the highest reason. Let us, then, examine Swedenborg's teaching on this subject in the light of reason and of that comprehensive system of spiritual philosophy which his own writings furnish.
Consider, first, what takes place with the evil in this world;—and by the evil I mean all those who act, not from principle, or from any regard to what in itself is just and right, but from purely selfish considerations. We know that the love of self is strengthened by being indulged; and weakened only as its cravings are denied. Like every other faculty and propensity, it acquires strength by exercise. The more it is allowed to have complete sway, and to outwork itself in all the multifarious forms of villany—such as falsehood, fraud, theft, adultery, murder—the more hardened does the soul become, the more benumbed its sensibilities, the dimmer its perceptions and the feebler its desire for whatever is true and just and right in itself. Let a person go on cheating and defrauding from month to month and year to year, and he will find himself steadily growing more and more blind to the odiousness and moral deformity of this vice, and less and less inclined to change his course. Or let him practice for a considerable time, lying, stealing, profane swearing, adultery, or any other vice, and his perception of its sinfulness will gradually grow more and more obscure, and his inclination to turn from it more and more feeble.
So with every sinful habit in which a man indulges. The longer it is pursued the more fully does the evil inclination take possession of him, the more overmastering becomes its sway, the darker his understanding, and the weaker his inclination to return to the path of innocence and rectitude. No fact is better established and no law of the human soul is more certain than this.
Now, under the operation of this law, can we conceive how spirits in the other world, when self-love, which is essential evil, has taken full possession of them, so that they are the very forms of that love;—so that they turn from and loathe the society of the good, and love and seek the companionship of the wicked;—so that they put darkness for light and light for darkness, and say to evil, "Be thou my good";—so that they hate and shun the light of heaven as owls and bats shun the light of day;—so that they find their delight in doing evil, as a wolf finds his in destroying sheep, or a hog his in wallowing in the mire;—so that they go from choice each one to some congenial society in hell, as freely as the tippler, the gambler and the profligate go to their chosen haunts;—when spirits, I say, are brought into this state, can we see in any rational light how they are ever to be brought out of it? Can any one give us any rational or philosophical explanation of the modus operandi? To suppose that they may be brought out some time or other and in some way or other, is scarcely less absurd than to suppose that a wolf may be changed into a lamb or a serpent into a dove. The supposition has neither reason, philosophy, experience, nor historical fact to support it.
If heaven could be given by an act of immediate mercy, undoubtedly all would finally go there; and there would be no hell. But it cannot. It is an internal state which cannot be developed or reached without the individual's own volition and active co-operation. The heavenly character must be developed, the heavenly organism and tissues must be formed, else the light and warmth of that sweet realm would be as uncongenial as our atmosphere is to fishes, or as the light of the noon-day sun is to owls and bats. Agreeably to this Swedenborg says:—
"Many spirits entertain the opinion that heaven may be given to every one from immediate mercy; and on account of their belief they have been taken up into heaven; but when they came there, because their interior life was contrary to that of the angels, they grew blind as to their intellectual faculties till they became like idiots, and were tortured as to their will faculties so that they behaved like madmen; in a word, they who go to heaven after living wicked lives, gasp there for breath, and writhe about like fishes taken from the water into the air, and like animals in the ether of an air-pump, after the air has been exhausted."—Heaven and Hell, 54.
Again he says:
"Conscience is the Lord's presence with man; and this is nearer in proportion as a man is in the affection of good and truth. If his presence is nearer than is suitable to the degree of a man's affection for good and truth, the man comes into temptation. The reason is, that the evils and falsities in him tempered with the goods and truths in him, cannot endure a nearer presence. This may appear from circumstances existing in another life, viz., that evil spirits cannot possibly approach any heavenly society without beginning to experience anguish and torment:—also that hell is removed from heaven, because it cannot endure heaven, that is, the Lord's presence which is in heaven. Hence it is said of them in the Word: 'Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills. Cover us.' Luke xxiii. 30."—Arcana Cœlestia 4299. See also n. 4225, '6, 5057, '8, 4674, 7519.
It is in tenderest mercy to the wicked, therefore, that they are not compelled to live in heaven; for they would be far more wretched among the angels, than they are in their own chosen and congenial homes in hell.
But the heavenly life, some think, will be at last and gradually developed in the devils, so that they will all finally become angels. Again I ask, How? Will it be developed like vegetable life, without the volition or active co-operation of the spirits themselves? Is moral character ever developed or formed under the laws of the vegetable kingdom? Can it be? And are the conditions and surroundings and influences in the hells, and the kind of government that exists there, favorable to the development of the heavenly life? Or is this life to be gradually unfolded and strengthened there, in spite of all the adverse influences? If so, will any one tell us how. Will he show us the law, or give us some hint of the philosophy of this development.
But God, it is said, wills the salvation and happiness of all men. And can we suppose that His will is to be frustrated?—that He will not be able finally to accomplish his purpose?
And does not God will that men live righteously here on earth?—that they shun falsehood, theft, hatred, adultery, murder, as sins?—that they practice toward each other the laws of neighborly love? But is the Divine will accomplished? As a matter of fact, do all men live as the Lord wills that they should? And if not, then is not the Divine purpose so far frustrated? And if frustrated here and now, then why not there and always? No argument for the non-eternity of the hells can be based upon the omnipotence of the Divine will, unless it can be shown that this will with reference to man is never frustrated. And in order to show this, we must concede that all the abominable deeds which men commit, are done in accordance with the will of God. For if not, then the omnipotence of that will does not always ensure the accomplishment of the Divine purpose.
But the mistake arises from overlooking the proper characteristics of man, or the nature of the properly human faculties. If he were a machine, he might be dealt with as a machine; and the builder or operator would alone be responsible for its movements or defects. But being man, and endowed with the faculties of liberty and rationality, he becomes himself responsible for his actions and his character. His salvation and happiness are not things that can be forced upon him—no, not even by Omnipotence itself. They are states to be freely chosen, sought after, labored for, by himself; and in no other possible way can they ever be attained. If we could conceive of those, who have become so thoroughly confirmed in evil as to love and seek the companionship of devils, desiring and laboring for the exalted and unselfish life of heaven, then we might concede the possibility of the devils being all ultimately converted into angels, and the hells blotted out or changed into heavens.
Then there is a judgment which all have to undergo in the other world. And Swedenborg has described very fully the nature of that process. It consists in such a complete development of each one's internals, or such a thorough immersion of the individual in his own dominant love, whatever that may be, that he no longer has a divided mind;—no longer wears any disguise, or appears outwardly different from what he is inwardly. This judgment, or letting each man drop, as it were, into himself, takes place in the intermediate state, or world of spirits. And it is accomplished by means of the all-revealing light of truth. "The Word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." Swedenborg says:
"With the wicked, all those things which belong to the exterior thought from which they speak, and to the exterior will from which they act, are not properly theirs, but those things which belong to their interior thought and will.
"When the first state [after death] is passed through, which is the state of the exteriors, the spirit is let into the state of his interiors. . . . In this state he thinks from his own will, therefore from his own affection or from his own love; and then his thought makes one with his will, and so completely one that he scarcely appears to think but merely to will.
"All men without exception are let into this state after death, because it is the proper state of their spirits. . . . When a spirit is in the state of his interiors, it manifestly appears of what character the man was in himself when in the world; for he then acts from his selfhood. He who was evil in the world, then acts foolishly and insanely—more insanely, indeed, than he did in the world, because he is in freedom and under no restraint.
"No one goes to hell until he is in his own evil and in the falsities of evil [or until there is a perfect union of will and understanding]; since it is not allowed any one there to have a divided mind, that is, to think and speak one thing and to will another. Every evil spirit must there think what is false derived from evil, and must speak from such falsity; in both cases from the will, thus from his own proper love and its delight and pleasure, as he did in the world when he thought in his spirit, that is, as he thought in himself when he thought from interior affection. The reason is, that the will is the man himself, and not the thought, except so far as it partakes of the will; and the will is the man's very nature or disposition; therefore to be let into his will is to be let into his nature or disposition, and also into his life, for man puts on a nature according to his life; and after death, he remains of such a nature as he had procured to himself by his life in the world, which, with the wicked, can no longer be amended and changed by means of thought, or the understanding of truth.
"Every one goes to his own society in which his spirit was while he lived in the world; for every man as to his spirit is conjoined to some society, either infernal or heavenly. . . .The spirit is led to that society by successive steps, and at last enters it. An evil spirit, when he is in the state of his interiors, is turned by degrees toward his own society, and at length directly to it before this [second] state is completed; and when completed, the evil spirit of his own free choice casts himself into the hell of those whose character is similar to his own."—Heaven and Hell 502-510.
We see from this that the judgment which every one undergoes after death, is merely the bringing of a man's externals into perfect agreement with his internals, or his thoughts, words and actions, into agreement with his ruling love. It is turning the "whited sepulchres" inside out. It is letting the man drop into himself; so that he no longer has a divided mind as he had when in the flesh, but is of the same character all through from centre to circumference. Unless, therefore, he is subsequently to undergo another stupendous change, of which revelation has told us nothing—unless he is to be brought back again into his former double-minded state, and the heavenly part of him then to be aroused into strong and persistent action so as to completely overpower the infernal part, we cannot see how he is ever to be brought out of his hellish state. For we must remember that there are no germs of heavenly life in man—no "remains" of good and truth implanted by the Lord—which can develop under the laws of vegetable growth, or without the individual's own volition. We know of no such involuntary development of the heavenly life in this world; nor can we conceive of any such in the world to come.
Equally unphilosophical, too, and alike unsupported by reason and revelation, is the idea that, at some indefinite period after the judgment here referred to, the sinner will die or be destroyed "that the man may be saved"—meaning by the sinner "the inverted forms of the natural degree, which constitute the external body of the infernal in the hells." There is no such "sinner" then and there, apart from the living, conscious, immortal individual;—no such "external body" that may be sloughed off, leaving "the man in his original infant state of conscious existence"—"the actual state of the infant man of the New Heaven." All this is mere theory, without the slightest foundation in fact, philosophy, or duly authenticated divine revelation.
Swedenborg's teaching, then, in regard to the eternity of the hells, is clearly in accordance with reason and the highest spiritual philosophy of which the world has any knowledge.
And the Bible, so far as it teaches anything on the subject, confirms the testimony of reason and philosophy. It speaks of the wicked in the Hereafter, going away "into everlasting punishment," while the righteous go into "everlasting life";—of a great gulf between the evil and the good, which cannot then be passed over;—of a fire that "never shall be quenched." It assures us that, in the other world, every one will be judged and rewarded according to his works. "The dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works." "The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." The blessing of the higher, even the heavenly life, is promised to none but those who keep or do the Lord's commandments; nor do we find in Scripture any warrant for the belief that others will ever enter in through the gates into the city—for what other way is there, save by religious obedience to the laws of the heavenly life?
"Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
"For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie."
Nor does the Bible tell us, or any where intimate, that these latter will ever enter into the blessedness of eternal life. But all who thirst for and are willing to take of its waters, may enter in. Therefore it is written again: "Let him that is athirst, come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely."
But Swedenborg has himself told us why a man's ruling love cannot be changed after death; and why, therefore, the hells must be unending in their duration. It may be alike interesting and instructive to consider some of his reasons, which I shall proceed to do in the next chapter.