[4] It has also been granted me to know the nature of the most crafty sensuous men. Their hell is deep down at the back, and they want to be inconspicuous. Therefore they appear to hover about there like spectres, which are their fantasies, and they are called genii. Some were sent out from that hell once for me to learn what they are like. They immediately addressed themselves to my neck below the occiput and thus entered my affections, not wanting to enter my thoughts, which they adroitly avoided. They altered my affections one by one with a mind to bend them imperceptibly into their opposites, which are lusts of evil; and as they did not touch my thought at all they would have bent and inverted my affections without my knowledge, had not the Lord prevented it.
[5] Such do they become who do not believe that there can be any divine providence, and who search only for cupidities and cravings in others and thus lead them along until they dominate them. They do this so secretly and artfully that one does not know it, and they remain the same on death; therefore they are cast down into that hell as soon as they enter the spiritual world. Seen in heaven's light they appear to be without a nose, and it is remarkable that although they are so crafty they are more sense-ridden than others.
[6] The ancients called a sensuous man a serpent, and such a man is more cunning and crafty and a more ingenious reasoner than others; therefore it is said,
The serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field (Ge 3:1), and the
Lord said:
Be prudent as serpents and simple as doves (Mt 10:16).
The dragon, too, called "that old serpent" and the "devil" and "satin," is described as
Having seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven crowns (Apoc 12:3, 9).
Craftiness is signified by the seven heads; the power to persuade by fallacies is meant by the ten horns; and holy things of the Word and the church which have been profaned are signified by the seven crowns.
311. From the description of one's own prudence and of those who are in it, the nature of prudence not one's own and of those who are in it may be seen. Those have prudence not their own who do not confirm in themselves that intelligence and wisdom are from man. They ask, "How can anyone be wise of himself or do good of himself?" When they speak so, they see in themselves that it is so, for they think interiorly. They also believe that others think similarly, especially the learned, for they are unaware that any-one can think only exteriorly.
[2] They are not in fallacies by any confirmation of appearances. They know and perceive, therefore, that murder, adultery, theft and false witness are sins and accordingly shun them on that account. They also know that wickedness is not wisdom and cunning is not intelligence. When they hear ingenious reasoning from fallacies they wonder and smile to themselves. This is because with them there is no veil between interiors and exteriors, or between the spiritual and the natural things of the mind, as there is with the sensuous. They therefore receive influx from heaven by which they see these things.