principal cause. Moreover, from this spiritual murder moral murder is
derived; consequently he who is in the one is also in the other; for he
who wills to take away a man's spiritual life is in hatred against him
if he cannot take it away, for he hates the faith and love in him, and
thus the man himself. These three, namely, spiritual murder, which
pertains to faith and love, moral murder, which pertains to reputation
and honor, and natural murder, which pertains to the body, follow in a
series one from the other, like cause and effect. (A.E., n. 1012.)

As all who are in hell are in hatred against the Lord, and thus in
hatred against heaven, for they are against goods and truths, so hell is
the essential murderer or the source of essential murder. It is the
source of essential murder because man is man from the Lord through the
reception of good and truth; consequently destruction of good and truth
is destruction of the human itself, thus the killing of man.

That those who are in hell are such has not yet been known in the world,
because in those who belong to hell and therefore after death come into
hell no hatred against good and truth, or against heaven, or still less
against the Lord, is evident. For everyone while he lives in the world
is in externals; and these externals are taught and trained from infancy
to counterfeit such things as are honest and decorous, right and
equitable, and good and true. Nevertheless, hatred lies concealed in
their spirit, and this in equal degree with the evil of their life. And
as hatred is in the spirit it breaks forth when the externals are laid
aside, as is the case after death.

This infernal hatred against all who are in good is deadly hatred
because it is hatred against the Lord. This can be seen particularly in
their delight in doing evil, which is such as to exceed in degree every