741. After this the angel said to them, "It is not yet noon; come with me into the garden of our prince which adjoins this palace." They went; and at the entrance the angel said, "Behold the most magnificent garden in this heavenly society."
But they replied, "What do you say? There is no garden here; we see only one tree, with what seems like fruits of gold on its branches and top, and like leaves of silver, with their edges adorned with emeralds; and under the tree we see little children with their nurses."
To this the angel with inspired voice replied, "This tree is in the midst of the garden, and is called by us the tree of our heaven, and by some the tree of life. But go on and draw nearer, and your eyes will be opened, and you will see the garden."
This they did; and their eyes were opened, and they saw trees heavily laden with delicious fruit, about which vines entwined their tendrils, and their tops were bent down with fruit toward the tree of life in the center. [2] These trees were planted in a continuous row, which went out and on in endless circles or curves like those of a perpetual spiral; it was a perfect spiral formed by trees, wherein one species followed another in unbroken order according to the excellence of their fruit. There was quite a space between the beginning of the spiral and the tree in the center, and this space gleamed with a radiance that made the trees of the spiral beam with an unbroken and unceasing splendor from the first to the last. The first trees were the noblest of all, luxuriant with the rarest fruit; these were called trees of paradise, never having been seen in any country of the natural world, because they do not and cannot exist there. These were followed by olive trees, then those that yielded wine, then fragrant trees, and finally trees useful to workmen for the wood. Here and there in this coil of trees or spiral there were seats formed of branches of the trees behind drawn forward and interlaced and enriched and adorned with their fruits. In that perpetual circle of trees were passages opening to flower-plots, and from these to lawns, divided off into squares and beds.
[3] The companions of the angel, on seeing these things, ex-claimed, "Behold heaven in form! Wherever we turn our eyes something heavenly and paradisal meets them, which is ineffable."
The angel was delighted with these exclamations, and said, "All our heavenly gardens are representative forms or types of heavenly beatitudes in their origin, and because your minds were exalted by the influx of these beatitudes, you exclaimed, 'Behold heaven in form!' But those who do not receive that influx look upon these paradisal objects only as upon a mere forest. All who are in a love of use receive the influx; but those who are in the love of glory not from use do not receive it." Afterwards he explained and taught what was represented and signified by each thing in the garden.