in his strength." (Rev. i. 10, 13, 16.) To be "in the spirit," is to be in an exalted spiritual state—in a state to see as those do who are in the spiritual world, or who have their spiritual eyes opened.
Then there is the testimony of Paul in his memorable speech before king Agrippa (and repeated elsewhere), which perfectly agrees with, and finds a rational explanation in, Swedenborg's disclosures. "Whereupon," says the apostle, "as I was going to Damascus, with authority and commission from the chief priests, at mid-day, O king, I saw in the way a light from heaven above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me and them that journeyed with me. And when we were all fallen to the earth. I heard a voice speaking unto me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? . . . And I said, Who art thou. Lord? And He said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest." (Acts xxvi. 12, 13.) Observe that the apostle beheld this dazzling brightness at mid-day, and says that it exceeded the brightness of the sun. The light was overpowering in its splendor. It was more than he and his fellow travellers could endure; and they fell prostrate on the earth.
Now what was the nature of that light? and to what realm did it belong, the natural or the spiritual? Certainly not to the natural; for what light in the realm of nature is so overpowering as that was? What natural light is above that of the sun at noonday? And why not seen by all the people in that region round about, if it were merely natural light? No: The light which Paul and his companions beheld on that occasion, was
