have entertained extremely low, not to say false, ideas of the whole subject of marriage. They have generally looked upon it as a union of bodies rather than of souls; and regarded it, therefore, as a relation belonging exclusively to the natural world—rejecting, and sometimes scouting, the idea of anything like marriage in the great Hereafter. The moment a spiritual idea is admitted into the thought respecting marriage, and anything like a union of souls is conceded to be possible, that moment it is seen that the marriage relation must exist in the world beyond, or wherever souls exist.
On account of the low and merely natural view of marriage which has been generally held and taught, people have entered into this relation from low and earthly motives; and innumerable evils have been the result. And before the evils resulting from a low and false view of marriage can be avoided, people must obtain a higher and truer view of it. The men and women of Christendom need to have their ideas on this subject elevated and spiritualized. They need to have the institution lifted up from the earth, to be shown the spiritual nature of the marriage relation, the spiritual uses it was meant to subserve, and the spiritual considerations from which it should be entered into, if they would realize the blessings it was meant to confer. There is no deeper need of Christendom to-day, however little it may generally be felt. And it was to satisfy this need, that the Lord has revealed through Swedenborg the heavenly doctrine concerning marriage, or the view which the angels take of this relation. And as the love from which marriages in heaven spring, is the foundation or
