that particular heaven which has been previously opened and formed in him; for every one then comes into the state of his interiors, or into the enjoyment of just that kind of life which agrees with the kind of truth he had received and religiously obeyed. If only the lowest form of truth has been received, and the lowest degree of his mind opened, he enters the first or lowest heaven. If the second degree of his mind has been opened, he enters the middle or second heaven. And if the third degree has been opened, he enters the third or highest heaven.
Thus the heaven which each one will enter after death, will depend upon the kind or degree of life to which he has attained, or upon the heaven which has been opened and formed within him during his sojourn on earth. He cannot then receive and appropriate a higher degree of life, and therefore cannot enter any higher heaven. And in any lower heaven his measure or degree of life would not be full.
We thus see that the existence of three angelic heavens in general (there are innumerable societies in each of these heavens), follows as a logical conclusion from the existence of three degrees of life in man. And these degrees exist from the trinity in God, in whose image and likeness, the Scripture tells us, man was originally created. Many passages might be cited from Swedenborg in confirmation of what we have here said; but the following are sufficient:
