the whole is made up of the parts, and the parts constitute the whole; therefore they provide for each other, have respect to each other, and are conjoined in such a form that all and each have reference to the whole and its good. Hence it is that they act as one.
Consociations in the heavens are similar. They are joined together there according to their uses in a like form. Therefore they who do not perform use to the community, are cast out of heaven as things foreign to its nature. To perform use is to desire the welfare of others for the sake of the common good; and not to perform use is to desire the welfare of others, not for the sake of the common good but for the sake of self. These latter love themselves supremely, but the former love the Lord above all things.
Hence it is that they who are in heaven act in unison, not from themselves but from the Lord; for they regard Him as the one only Source of all things, and his kingdom as the community whose good is to be sought. This is meant by the Lord's words, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all things shall be added unto you." Matt. vi. 33. To seek his righteousness is [to seek] his good.
They who, in the world, love the good of their country more than their own, and the good of their neighbor as their own, are they who, in the other life, love and seek the kingdom of the Lord,—for there the kingdom of the Lord is in the place of their country. And they who love to do good to others, not for their
