of the nations there; and also about the things of heaven, which are
innumerable. I was further informed, that many of the men (_homines_)
of that earth converse with spirits, and that thence they have
knowledges respecting spiritual things and the states of life after
death, and that thence also they have a contempt for corporeal and
terrestrial things; for those who know for a certainty, and believe,
that there is a life after death, are concerned about heavenly things,
as being eternal and blessed, but not about worldly things, except so
far as the necessities of life require. Such being the character of
its inhabitants, such also is that of the spirits who are from it[k].

[Footnote k: The spirits who are with man are in possession of all
things of his memory, nos. 5853, 5857, 5859, 5860.]

13. How eagerly they search for and imbibe the knowledges of such
things as pertain to the memory raised above the sensual things of
the body, was made manifest to me from the circumstance that when they
looked into the things which I knew respecting heavenly subjects, they
ran over them all, and kept on stating the nature of each. For when
spirits come to a man, they enter into the whole of his memory, and
call forth from it what suits themselves; nay, what I have often
observed, they read its contents as from a book[k]. These spirits did
this more skilfully and quickly, because they did not linger over such
matters as are heavy and sluggish, and confine and consequently impede
the internal sight, as is the nature of all terrestrial and corporeal
things, when regarded as ends, that is, when alone loved; but they
devoted their attention to things themselves; for those matters to
which terrestrial things do not cling, carry the mind (_animus_)
upwards, and so introduce it into a wide field [of view], whereas
merely material things drag the mind (_animus_) downwards, and thus