Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 3.djvu/197

God, lead good lives, and thus make a part of this man, subsist and live from the conjunction of the Lord and heaven with the church by means of the Word; resembling in this respect the members and viscera without the thorax wherein are contained the heart and lungs. For the Word in the church, although the latter may consist of but few persons, is life to all the rest from the Lord through the heavens, just as the members and viscera of the whole body receive life from the heart and lungs. The communication also is similar; which is the reason why those Christians among whom the Word is read, constitute the breast of the before-mentioned man. They are also in the middle or centre of all the rest; next to them are the Roman Catholics; beyond these are the Mahometans, who acknowledge the Lord as a very great prophet, and the son of God; after these come the Africans; and the last circumference is occupied by the people and nations in Asia and the Indies. All who are in that man look toward the centre where are the Christians.

In the centre where the Christians are situated who are in possession of the Word, there is the greatest light; for light in heaven is divine truth proceeding from the Lord as a Sun there; and inasmuch as the Word is divine truth, the greatest light is with those who are in possession of the Word. Light thence, as from its centre, spreads itself around through all the circumference quite to the extremities. Hence the enlightenment of the nations and people without the church is also through the Word. (D. S. S, 104, '5, '6.)