the regenerate life; this sense is therefore the top of the ladder, and leads to, because it is itself, in heaven; while the literal sense, inasmuch as it is for the use of men in the world, is the foot of the ladder placed on earth. As the Divine Word is from Jehovah alone, therefore he is described as standing above the ladder, upon which the angels were ascending and descending.
Turn. O my soul, thy thoughts upward and inward! look upon this spiritual ladder—the Word of God! approach the foot placed on the earth; the first truth acquired may be but comparatively dim, yet it will be as a step to lead thee to a higher and more perfect knowledge. Every truth acquired and loved is a step made up the spiritual ladder; and while the angels of God first ascend, as it were with our ardent affections and thoughts from earth to heaven, so the divine truths and goodnesses from above, as angels of God, are descending from heaven to earth, bringing celestial consolations and blessings to help us on in our upward road.
As our desires ascend heavenward, blessings descend earthward, or into the lowest affections of the natural mind; and by this Holy Word of God, the symbolic ladder, the Lord keeps up an eternal communication with the human race. The Word of God, then, which opens angelic scenes and joys to the humble and sincere, which, like the mystical ladder, enables us to hold communication with heaven, must be to all, what Jacob declares it to be, "the house of God, and the very gate of heaven."
