Swedenborg's most widely read work and the foundation of his visionary theology. Drawing on decades of claimed direct experience of the spiritual world, it describes the structure of heaven, the intermediate spirit world, and hell with the systematic detail of a naturalist's field report. Angels and evil spirits are not abstract forces but former human beings whose loves and thoughts have become, after death, their entire world. Heaven is not a reward but a condition; hell is not punishment but the soul's freely chosen continuation of its earthly orientation. The work profoundly influenced Blake, Emerson, Balzac, and the Spiritualist movement.
