r fibers in every muscle, the fibers in every nerve, also the
fibers and the little vessels in all viscera and organs, are in such
an order. Innermost in these are the most simple things, which are the
most perfect; the outermost is a composite of these. There is a like
order of these degrees in every seed and in every fruit, also in every
metal and stone; their parts, of which the whole is composed, are of
such a nature. The innermost, the middle, and the outermost elements
of the parts exist in these degrees, for they are successive compositions,
that is, bundlings and massings together from simples that are their first
substances or matters.

208. In a word, there are such degrees in every outmost, thus in every
effect. For every outmost consists of things prior and these of their
firsts. And every effect consists of a cause, and this of an end; and
end is the all of cause, and cause is the all of effect (as was shown
above); and end makes the inmost, cause the middle, and effect the
outmost. The same is true of degrees of love and wisdom, and of heat
and light, also of the organic forms of affections and thoughts in man
(as will be seen in what follows). The series of these degrees in
successive order and in simultaneous order has been treated of also in
The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Concerning the Sacred Scripture
(n. 38, and elsewhere), where it is shown that there are like degrees
in each and all things of the Word.

209. THE OUTMOST DEGREE IS THE COMPLEX, CONTAINANT AND BASE OF THE PRIOR
DEGREES.

The doctrine of degrees which is taught in this Part, has hitherto been
illustrated by various things which exist in both worlds; as by the
degrees of the heavens where angels dwell, by the degrees of heat and
light with them, and by the degrees of atmospheres, and by various things
in the human body, and also in the animal and mineral kingdoms. But
this doctrine has a wider range; it extends not only to natural, but
also to civil, moral, and spiritual things, and to each and all their
details. There are two reasons why the doctrine of degrees extends also
to such things. First, in every thing of which anything can be predicated
there is the trine which is called end, cause, and effect, and these
three are related to one another according to degrees of height. And
secondly things civil, moral, and spiritual are not something abstract
from substance, but are substances. For as love and wisdom are not
abstract thi