AC 6078 - Memory-knowledges; AC 6089 - General Truth

AC 6078

That memory-knowledges and truths
sustain the soul of a person is very evident
from man's longing to know things,
and also from the correspondence
of food with memory-knowledges,
which correspondence also shows itself in a person
when he is partaking of food,
for if this is done while he is speaking and listening,
the vessels which receive the chyle are opened,
and he is more fully nourished than if he is alone.
Spiritual truths and instructions in them
would have the same effect with people
if they were in the affection of good.
That truths nourish the spiritual life
is especially manifest with good spirits
and with the angels in heaven,
for both good spirits and angels
have a constant longing to know things and to be wise;
and when they lack this spiritual food they feel desolate,
their life is languid, and they are hungry;
and they are not restored
and raised into the bliss of their life
until their longing is satisfied.
But in order that memory-knowledges
may yield healthful nourishment to the soul,
there must be in them life from the goods of truth.
If there is no life from this source,
the memory-knowledges do indeed
sustain the person's interior life,
but only his natural life, and not his spiritual life.

AC 6089

. . . general truth is insinuated with a person first of all.
This is afterward enriched with particular truths,
and lastly there comes forth the view of them
from the internal, that is,
there come forth reason and understanding.
This is very clear in the case of a person,
for his judgment increases from infancy.
It is the same with spiritual truths and goods,
when a person is being born anew,
or is being regenerated.
But after the internal has come forth 
from general truth in the natural,
the state is changed,
and the internal no longer acknowledges truth 
in the natural as father, but as servant.