e also recline with me; behold, there are your couches:"
so they reclined; and the attendants, who were before sent by the prince
to wait upon them, stood behind them. Then said the prince to them,
"Take each of you a plate from its supporting form, and afterwards a
dish from the pyramid;" and they did so; and lo! instantly new plates
and dishes appeared in the place of those that were taken away; and
their cups were filled with wine that streamed from the fountain out of
the tall pyramid: and they ate and drank. When dinner was about half
ended, the prince addressed the ten new guests, and said, "I have been
informed that you were convened in the country which is immediately
under this heaven, in order to declare your thoughts respecting the joys
of heaven and eternal happiness thence derived, and that you professed
different opinions each according to his peculiar ideas of delight
originating in the bodily senses. But what are the delights of the
bodily senses without those of the soul? The former are animated by the
latter. The delights of the soul in themselves are imperceptible
beatitudes; but, as they descend into the thoughts of the mind, and
thence into the sensations of the body, they become more and more
perceptible: in the thoughts of the mind they are perceived as
satisfactions, in the sensations of the body as delights, and in the
body itself as pleasures. Eternal happiness is derived from the latter
and the former taken together; but from the latter alone there results a
happiness not eternal but temporary, which quickly comes to an end and
passes away, and in some cases becomes unhappiness. You have now seen
that all your joys are also joys of heaven, and that these are far more
excellent than you could have conceived; yet such joys do not inwardly
affect our minds. There are three things which enter by influx from the
Lord as a one into our souls; these three as a one, or this trine, are
love, wisdom, and use. Love and wisdom of themselves exist only ideally,
being confined to the affections and thoughts of the mind; but in use
they exist really, because they are together in act and bodily
employment; and where they exist really, there they also subsist. And as
love and wisdom exist and subsist in use, it is by use we are affected;
and use consists in a faithful, sincere, and diligent discharge of the
duties of our calling. The love of use, and a consequent application to
it, preserve the powers of the min