own merit, and are thence continually desirous of being admitted into heaven, and think of heavenly joy as a reward, being totally ignorant of what heavenly joy is. And when they are admitted among the angels, and to a perception of their joy which is without the thought of merit, and consists in active duties and services openly performed, and in the blessedness arising from the good which they thereby promote, they are astonished like persons who witness things altogether foreign to their expectation. And because they are not receptible of that joy, they depart and associate with spirits like themselves, who have lived a similar life in the world.
But they who have lived in outward sanctity, continually frequenting temples and there repeating prayers, and who have afflicted their souls, and at the same time have thought continually about themselves that they would thus be esteemed and honored above others, and at length after death be accounted saints, in the other life are not in heaven, because they have done such things for the sake of themselves. And since they have defiled divine truths by the love of self in which they have immersed them, some of them are so insane as to think themselves gods. Therefore they are in hell among those like themselves. Some are cunning and deceitful, and are in the hells of the deceitful; these are they who have performed such pious acts outwardly with
