455.
Those things which have now been said can be understood by the rational man, for he can see it from the connection of causes and from truths in their order. But it is not understood by a man who is
not rational, and for several reasons, the chief of which is that he has no desire to understand them because they are opposed to his falsities which make his truths; and he, who is unwilling to understand
for this reason, has closed to his rational, the way to heaven, although that way can still be opened if only the will does not resist (see above, n. 424). That man is able to understand truths
and be rational whenever he so wishes has been shown to me by much experience. Evil spirits who have become irrational in the world by rejecting the Divine and the truths of the Church, and confirming
themselves against them, have quite often been turned by Divine power towards those who were in the light of truth, and they have then comprehended all things as the angels do, and have acknowledged
them to be true, and also that they comprehended them all. But the moment these spirits relapsed into themselves, and turned back to the love of their will, they understood nothing and affirmed the opposite.
[2] I have even heard certain dwellers in hell say that they knew and perceived that which they did to be evil and that which they thought to be false, but that they were unable to resist the
delight of their love, that is, their will, and that it is their will that drives their thought to see evil as good and falsity as truth. Hence, it was clear that those who are in falsity from evil can
understand and therefore be rational, but have no wish to do so; and they have no wish for the reason that they have loved falsities more than truths, because these agreed with the evils in which they
were. To love and to will is the same thing, for what a man wills he loves, and what he loves he wills. [3] Because the state of men is such that they are able to understand truths if they wish to,
I have been permitted to confirm spiritual truths, which are truths of heaven and the Church, even by reasonings, and this in order that the falsities by which the rational in many has been closed up
may be dispersed by reasonings, and thus the eye may perhaps in some degree be opened; for to confirm spiritual truths by rational truths is permitted to all who are in truths. Who could ever understand
the Word from the sense of its letter, unless he saw the truths there from an enlightened rational? Is not this the source of so many heresies from the same Word?# # The truths of doctrine of the
Church derived from the Word must be the starting-point, and these must first be acknowledged, and afterwards it is permissible to consult knowledges (n. 6047). Thus it is permissible for those who
are in an affirmative state towards the truths of faith to confirm them rationally by knowledges, but it is not permissible for those who are in a negative state (n. 2568, 2588, 4760, 6047). It is
in accordance with Divine order to enter rationally from spiritual truths into knowledges, which are natural truths, but not to enter from the latter into the former, because spiritual influx into natural
things is possible, but not natural or physical influx into spiritual things (n. 3219, 5119, 5259, 5427, 5428, 5478, 6322, 9109, 9110).
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