142. No one is reformed in a state bodily disease, because the reason is then not in a free state, for the state of the mind depends upon the state of the body. When the body is sick the mind also is sick, because of its separation from the world - if for no other reason. For a mind removed from the world thinks indeed concerning God, but not from God, for it does not have freedom of reason. Man has freedom of reason from this circumstance, that he is in the midst between heaven and the world and can think from heaven and the world, also from heaven about the world and from the world about heaven. When, therefore, a man is in sickness, and is thinking about death and the state of his soul after death, he is not then in the world but is withdrawn in spirit; and when in this state only, no one can be reformed; but he may be strengthened by this experience if he was reformed before he fell sick.
[2] It is the same with those who renounce the world and all business in it and give themselves up solely to thoughts about God, heaven and salvation; but on this subject more will be said elsewhere. If these persons, therefore, were not reformed before their sickness, they become after it such as they were before the sickness. Hence it is vain to think that any can repent or receive any faith during sickness, for there is no action in that repentance and no charity in that faith; thus it is all lip-service and nothing of the heart in both cases.