AC 1472 - Memory-knowledges and the Celestial Use

AC 1472

Anyone can see, if he pays attention,
that in itself the memory-knowledge of knowledges
is nothing but a means whereby
a person may become rational,
and then spiritual, and at last celestial;
and that by means of the knowledges
his external person may be adjoined to his internal;
and when this is done,
he is in the use itself.

The internal person regards nothing but the use.
For the sake of this end also,
the Lord insinuates the delight that childhood
and youth perceives in memory-knowledges.
But when a person begins to make his delight consist
in memory-knowledge alone,
it is a bodily greed which carries him away,
and in proportion as he is thus carried away
(that is,
makes his delight consist in mere memory-knowledge),
in the same proportion
he removes himself from what is celestial,
and in the same proportion
do the memory-knowledges close themselves
toward the Lord,
and become material.
But in proportion as
the memory-knowledges are learned
with the end of use,
-- as for the sake of human society,
for the sake of the Lord's church on earth,
for the sake of the Lord's kingdom in the heavens,
and still more for the Lord's own sake,
--the more are they opened toward Him.
On this account also the angels,
who are in the memory-knowledge of all knowledges,
and indeed to such a degree
that scarcely one part in ten thousand
can be presented to the full understanding of a person,
yet esteem such knowledge
as nothing in comparison with use.

From what has been said
it may be seen what is signified by the words,
"When the Egyptians shall see you, they will say,
This is his wife; and they will kill me,
and will make thee to live."
These things were said
because the Lord when a child knew this
and thought in this way, namely,
that if He should be carried away by a mere desire
for the memory-knowledge of knowledges,
this memory-knowledge is of such a character
that it would care no more for celestial things,
but only for the knowledges
which the desire for memory-knowledge
would carry away.