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10
GENESIS.
[Chap. i.

Lord to what is good and true; and thus that each and every moment of regeneration proceeds from evening to morning, thus from the external man to the internal, or from earth to heaven; wherefore now the expanse, or internal man, is called heaven.

25. To spread out the earth and stretch out the heavens, is a common form of speaking with the prophets, when they are treating of the regeneration of man ; as in Isaiah; "Thus saith Jehovah thy Redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb; I am Jehovah that maketh all things, that stretcheth forth the heavens alone, that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself," (xliv. 24.) And again, where he plainly speaks of the coming of the Lord: "A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench; he shall bring forth judgment unto truth;" that is, he does not break the fallacies, nor quench the desires of the senses, but inclines them to what is true and good; therefore it follows, "He that created the heavens, and stretched them out; he that spread forth the earth, and that which cometh out of it; he that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein," (xlii. 3, 5.) Not to mention many other passages to the same purport.

26. Verse 8. And the evening and the morning were the second day. The meaning of evening, morning and day, was shown above, verse 5.

27. Verse 9. And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together into one place, and let the dry [land] appear. When it is known that there is both an internal and external man, and that truths and goods descend by influx from, or through, the internal man to the external, from the Lord, although this is contrary to appearance, then those things, or the knowledges of the true and the good in the regenerate man, are stored up in his memory, and become scientifics: for whatsoever is insinuated into the memory of the external man, whether it be natural, or spiritual, or celestial, abides there as a scientific, and is called forth thence by the Lord. These knowledges are the waters gathered together into one place, and are called seas; but the external man himself is called dry [land], and presently earth, according to what follows.

28. Verse 10. And God called the dry [land] earth, and the gathering together of the waters called he seas; and God saw that it was good. That waters signify knowledges and scientifics, is plain from the sense in which they are most generally used in the Word, and hence it is that seas signify their being gathered together; as in Isaiah : "The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea," (xi. 9.) And in the same prophet, where he speaks of a want or failure of knowledges and scientifics: " The waters shall fail from the sea, and the river shall be wasted and dried up, and they shall