III. Swedenborg: An Example of Difficulties in Entering the Spiritual World

We must learn to stand in the same relationship to the beings of the higher hierarchies as our own thoughts stand in relationship to us. Swedenborg could not do that. If he had been able to do it, he would have known that as long as he remained within himself he would not be able to understand those Mars beings. However, if he had stepped outside of himself and become an object, a thought, an idea for the Angeloi, then, as expanded self, he would have been able to understand both the Angeloi and that category of Mars beings. He would then have had the same understanding of the essential nature of these Mars beings as the Angeloi had. He was unable to reach this stage because he always remained within the limits of his own consciousness and was never able to let the Angeloi observe and experience him, so that he himself would simply be their field of perception. If he had been able to do that, he would have known what the Angeloi know, for our knowledge of higher worlds comes through higher spirits, spirits of the higher hierarchies, knowing in us.