(ML) - Wisdom's Delight in Marriage Love: Followed by Insanity’s Pleasure in Promiscuous Love

ML 13

Remove Highlights | Highlight Search Terms

NEXT | PREVIOUS | FIRST | LAST | NEXT BOOK | PREVIOUS BOOK 

13. After this, the angel said to them: "It is not yet noon; come with me into the garden of our prince, which is close by the palace." They went; and at the entrance he said: "Behold the most magnificent of all the gardens in this heavenly society." But they replied: "what are you saying? There is no garden here. We see only a single tree; and among its branches and on its top, fruits as though of gold, and leaves as though of silver, with their edges adorned with emeralds; and under the tree, little children with their nurses."
At this, the angel said with inspired voice: "This tree is in the center of the garden and is called by us the Tree of our Heaven, and by some the Tree of Life. But go farther in, draw near, and your eyes will be opened and you will see the garden." They did so; and, their eyes being opened, they saw trees entwined with the tendrils of vines and laden with delicious fruits; and the tree-tops with their fruit were bending towards the Tree of Life in the center.
[2] These trees were planted in an unbroken line which ran out and was extended into ever new circles or gyres after the manner of a perpetual helix. It was a perfect arboreal helix, wherein different species of trees followed each other in unbroken order according to the nobility of their fruits. The beginning of this great gyre was at a considerable distance from the Tree in the center; and the intervening space glittered with a stream of light from which the trees of the gyre shone with a splendor which was successive and continuous from the first trees to the last. The first trees, luxuriant with the choicest fruits, were the most excellent of all. They are called paradisal trees, and are never seen in any country of the natural world because they do not and cannot exist there. Next came trees of oil; after these, trees of wine; then trees of fragrance; and lastly, trees of wood useful for working. Here and there in this arboreal helix or gyre were seats, the backs of which were formed by the converging and intertwining of branches of trees, and were enriched and adorned by their fruits. In this perpetual circle of trees were gates which opened into flower gardens laid out in plots and beds, and from these into lawns.
[3] Seeing these things, the companions of the angel exclaimed: "Lo, heaven in form. Whithersoever we turn the sight of our eyes, some heavenly paradisal thing flows in, which is ineffable."
Rejoiced at hearing this, the angel said: "All the gardens in our heaven are representative forms or types of heavenly beatitudes in their origins; and it is because an influx of these states of blessedness uplifted your minds that you exclaimed, "Lo, heaven in form." Those who do not receive that influx view these paradisal things merely as forests. All who are in the love of uses receive the influx; but those do not receive it who are in the love of glory and not of use." For their instruction, he then explained what the several things in that garden represented and signified.

NEXT | PREVIOUS | FIRST | LAST | NEXT BOOK | PREVIOUS BOOK 



User-Contributed Related Pages

Be the First to Find a Related Page!


Add a Related Page


Translate This Page

Add Small Canon Search to Your Website

Add a Small Canon Search™ button to my Google Toolbar

Add Small Canon Search™ to my Firefox Search Bar!

Add to Google

Daily Bible Verse

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner

Green Hosting

5 FREE Domains with Select Hosting Plans. Get yours!