162. II. MAN IS LED AND TAUGHT BY THE LORD ALONE THROUGH THE ANGELIC HEAVEN AND FROM IT. It is said that man is led by the Lord through [i.e., by means of, per] the angelic heaven and from it; but it is only an appearance that he is led through the angelic heaven while it is the truth that he is led from that heaven. The appearance that he is led through the angelic heaven arises from the fact that the Lord appears over that heaven as the Sun; but the truth that man is led from that heaven arises from the fact that the Lord is in that heaven as the soul is in man. For the Lord is omnipresent, and is not in space, as was shown above; and therefore distance is an appearance according to conjunction with the Lord, conjunction being according to the reception of love and wisdom from Him; and since no one can be conjoined to the Lord as He is in Himself, He appears to the angels at a distance as a Sun; nevertheless, He is in the whole angelic heaven, as the soul is in man. In like manner He is in every society of heaven and also in every angel there; for a man's soul is not only the soul of the whole man but also the soul of every part.
[2] But since it is according to the appearance that the Lord rules the universal heaven and through it the world from the Sun which is from Him and in which He is (concerning which Sun see the treatise THE DIVINE LOVE AND WISDOM, Second Part), and since everyone is permitted to speak from the appearance, nor can he do otherwise, therefore everyone who is not in wisdom itself is permitted to think that the Lord rules all things in general and in particular from His Sun; and also that He rules the world through the angelic heaven. From this appearance also the angels of the lower heavens think; but the angels of the higher heavens speak indeed from the appearance but they think from the truth, which is, that the Lord rules the universe from the angelic heaven, that is, from Himself.
[3] That the simple and the wise speak alike but do not think alike, may be illustrated from the sun of the world. All speak about it according to the appearance, saying that it rises and sets; but the wise, although they speak in the same way, nevertheless think of it as standing still, which also is the truth while the other is the appearance. The same may also be illustrated from appearances in the spiritual world; for there spaces and distances appear as in the natural world; but yet they are appearances according to the dissimilarity of affections and of thoughts therefrom. It is the same with the appearance of the Lord in His Sun.
