angels, although they are with angels. But when they become intelligent and wise, then for the first time they become angels. Yea,—a thing that I have wondered at,—they then no longer appear as infants, but as adults; for they are then no longer of an infantile genius, but of a more mature angelic genius. Intelligence and wisdom produce this effect. As infants are perfected in intelligence and wisdom, they appear more mature, thus as youths and young men, because intelligence and wisdom are real spiritual nourishment. For this reason the things which nourish their minds nourish their bodies also,—and this from correspondence; for the form of the body is but the external form of the interiors.
"It is to be observed that infants in heaven do not advance in age beyond the period of early manhood; and there they stop forever [i.e. so far as apparent progress in age is concerned]. That I might be assured of this, it was granted me to converse with some who were educated as infants in heaven, and who had grown up there; with some also when they were infants, and afterwards with the same when they had become young men; and I heard from them the progress of their life from one age to another." —H. H. n. 340.And so we find that, on this as on other subjects, Swedenborg's revealings "from things heard and seen" are in perfect agreement with the intuitions of the highest reason, and with all that is known of the wisdom and dealings of Providence and of the laws of divine order. It is impossible to conceive of any different view of the subject, which will so completely satisfy the demands of sober reason and an enlightened understanding.
In view of such sublime revealings, what a precious boon is heaven!—yet a boon which all are made capable of attaining, and which it is the Lord's ceaseless desire
