“The garments of the angels,” writes Swedenborg, “do not merely appear to be garments, but they really are garments; for they not only see them, but feel them, and have different ones, which they take off and put on, laying aside those which are not in use, and resuming them when they come into use again. That they are clothed with a variety of garments, I have witnessed a thousand times; and when I inquired whence they obtained them, they told me ‘from the Lord,’ and that they receive them as gifts, and that they are sometimes clothed without knowing how. They also said that their garments are changed according to the changes of their state.”
Since there are societies in heaven, and the angels live as men, it follows that they have habitations, various, like all else in heaven, according to the degree of love and wisdom in which they are principled. No words are like Swedenborg’s own on this subject. “Whenever I have conversed with the angels mouth to mouth, I have been present with them in their habitations, which are exactly like the habitations on earth called houses, but more beautiful. They contain chambers, parlors [conclavia], and bed-chambers, in great numbers; courts also, and around them gardens, shrubberies, and fields. Where the angels are consociated their habitations are contiguous, or near to each other, and arranged in the form of a city, with streets, ways, and squares, exactly like the cities on our earth.
“I have seen palaces in heaven, magnificent beyond description. Their upper parts were refulgent as if they were pure gold, and their lower parts as if they were precious stones: some were more splendid than others, and the splendor without was equaled by the magnificence within. The apartments were ornamented with decorations which neither language nor science can adequately describe. On the south were paradises, in which all things were similarly resplendent; for in some places the leaves of the trees were like silver, and the fruits like gold, while the colors of the flowers which were arranged in beds, appeared like rainbows; at the boundaries appeared other palaces, which terminated the view. Such is the architecture of heaven that one might say it is the very art itself; nor is this to be wondered at, because the art itself is from heaven. The angels said that such things, and innumerable others still more perfect, are presented before their eyes by the Lord, but that nevertheless they delight their minds more than their eyes, because in everything they see correspondences of things divine.
“The angels who constitute the Lord’s celestial kingdom, dwell for the most part in elevated places, or mountains; those who form the spiritual kingdom, on hills; but those who are in the lowest parts of heaven, in places which appear as rocks. There are also angels who do not live consociated, but separate. These dwell in the midst of heaven, and are the best of the angels.
“The houses in which the angels dwell, are not constructed by hand, like houses in the world, but are given them freely by the Lord, according to their reception of good and truth. All things whatsoever which the angels possess, they hold as gifts from the Lord; and they are supplied with everything they need.”
We thus learn that in heaven there are not external, physical, or mental occupations to support bodily wants, as in this world.
It was said above that the angels have not wings, as is commonly supposed. Their power of progression far exceeds anything that wings could supply. They have no idea of space, such as we have in the world. All who are of like disposition spontaneously associate together in the spiritual world. It thus follows that those are near each other who are in a similar state, and distant who are in a dissimilar state; and that what appears to be space in heaven is merely an external appearance, representative of internal differences of mind. From this cause alone the heavens are distinct from each other, and each society of heaven, and every individual in each society. Hence also the hells are altogether separated from the heavens.
From the same cause, any one in the spiritual world appears to be present if another intensely desires his presence; for from that desire he sees him in thought, and puts himself in his state. Again one person is removed from another in proportion as he holds him in aversion; for all aversion is from contrariety of the affections and disagreement of the thoughts; therefore many who appear together in one place in the spiritual world, so long as they agree, separate as soon as they disagree.
Further: when any one goes from one place to another, whether it be in his own city, in the courts, or the gardens, or to others out of his own city, he arrives sooner when he has a strong desire to be there, and later when his desire is less strong; the way itself being lengthened or shortened according to his desire of arrival. Hence again it is evident that distances, and consequently spaces, exist with the angels altogether according to the state of their minds.