But if we are yielding to the temptations, the days or states of light are disappearing; the Sun of Righteousness is setting; the moon of faith wanes into darkness; the stars of true knowledge grow dim and fade away, till the whole mind is inundated with ignorance and falsehood. Forty is a very peculiar number. It is the common multiple of 4 and 10. Ten denotes all we have. It is the termination of the hands and feet. It is the extent of our numbering. We count ten and begin again. Thus we reckon by tens and parts of tens. Four is also a peculiar number. It is the square of two. Two denotes the first two things of all existences-love and wisdom, or goodness and truth. Four denotes the fulness of those principles. That fulness is embraced, by correspondence, in the four cardinal points -East, West, North and South; in the four seasons of the year-Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter; in the four periods of life-infancy, childhood, youth and manhood; and in the four-square of the Holy City, which includes all the doctrines of the Holy Word. Forty, therefore, is that peculiar number which, by correspondence, denotes the whole process of any thing.

In the book of Numbers, the Lord says, "Ye shall bear your iniquity forty years; ye shall search the land forty days;" which means the whole time of their trials and troubles. The Psalms are a full prophecy of the states and trials through which the Lord Himself passed on the earth. And, in them, He says of the Israelites, "Forty years long was I grieved with this generation." Now what does He mean? He did

not live forty years on the earth. He means, by forty years, all the states of His temptations and trials. He assumed the depraved nature of the Israelites, and thus, forty years long He was grieved with this generation; or until He glorified His humanity by putting that generation out of it, and filling it with glory from above. Thus Ezekiel was commanded to lie forty days upon his right side, to bear the iniquity of the house of Judah ? Now, why this command ? Why lie forty days? Why on the right side? And why would he thus bear the iniquity of the house of Judah? The right side has relation to goodness, the left side to truth. To lie upon the right side is to rest or rely upon the goodness and mercy of God; and forty days would be during all the states and trials of the house of Judah, until their iniquity should pass away.

Hence it is evident why it was ordained, in Deuteronomy, that a wicked man should be beaten with forty stripes it means that he would receive punishment for all his transgressions: and, why it is said that Moses abode in the mount forty days and forty nights, neither did he eat bread nor drink water, praying for the people and also why the Lord was tempted in the wilderness forty days; and why the children of Israel were forty years in the wilderness to humble them and to prove them. It is by no means certain that the Israelites were just forty years in the wilderness; or that the Lord was there forty days; or that Moses was praying forty days and nights, on the mount, without eating or drinking: for forty means the whole time, or all the states of trial they passed through.

Let us now look into those strange contradictions of the literal sense, mentioned in this narrative, and see how clearly they are removed by the spiritual sense. In looking back, then, to the time they entered the ark, we behold the people of that age in a state of profound darkness and error: their whole mental earth inundated with falses. In the midst of this general gloom and wretchedness, we see a little band, called Noah and his family, hearkening to the new teachings of the Lord, and forming a little church. They call this church the ark: and they enter into its worship and instructions, bringing under its influence all their wayward and various thoughts, feelings and propensitiesevery living creature of their mind and heart; and they feed them there with food from heaven, or with divine goods and truths. In this ark or church, they keep their falses under, and thus the ark is raised in their estimation above their own and the surrounding waters of error, until its doctrines rise to the very summit of their affections. They truly love them; the ark rests on the Ararat of their hearts-their love to God and His truth.

And we can now understand how it is that the water could continue to rise so long after it had done raining; and also how it could return from off the earth continually for 113 days, and yet, Noah then send out a dove, and she find the water on the face of the whole earth. It was the earth or mind of the people in the ark, upon which the waters or falses thus rose and fell. They entered the ark, or came under the doctrines, with the waters or falses even over their own moun

tains. Their mental earth was immersed in falses, but they had some life left. And the church or ark was the means by which they were to get rid of those falses and bring their true life into action. They had some remains or germs of life that could be quickened by a righteous life; and the ark, or new doctrines, was given for this purpose. They were not aware of the depth of their own ignorance and depravity of heart. And it was only as they learned to practise and regard the new truths which were, at first, merely in their understandings, that they could see their falses of heart. For though they had new light in their understanding, adapted to their wants, yet it had not shined upon the mountains of their will. And, therefore, notwithstanding it had done raining, or that they had ceased to receive falses, yet they were ignorant of the extent of their darkness. But as they turned their thoughts inward and explored their hearts from externals to internals, they progressively perceived the various falses of their will. And as they pursued the investigation upwards towards the interior or summit of the heart, they still perceived that, at every new step or day they took, the waters of deceit were there.

Thus the waters are said to rise, after it had done raining, when the rising was all in the perceptions of the people of the church. It was only their increasing ability to see the deeper and still deeper, or higher extent of their falses. The waters were actually there in their hearts, when they entered the ark, or joined the church, but they had not seen them, and the ark had not risen above them. And when, by practising and

learning to love the new truths, they had seen and traced the waters of deception up to the very summit of their affections, then it was, and not till then, that the waters could begin to subside from the uppermost pinnacle of the will and let the ark of heavenly truths rest upon the top of the mountain of love and good will. It could not rest there till the waters of deceit were removed. They could not be removed till they were seen. They could be seen, in the more interior states of the heart, only as the people came into higher states of perception. These higher states of the perception of deeper falses are what is meant by the 73 days during which the waters continued to rise after it had done raining, or after they had done practising deceit. And it was not until they had thus obeyed the new truths and truly loved them, or until the ark was on the mountain, that they could effectually put away their evils and falses. And the returning of the waters from off the earth continually, immediately after the ark had rested, was the progressive work of purification of the heart from its falses. Thus it was from off the minds of the church or the people in the ark, and not from those of the world without, that the waters were returning continually till Noah sent forth the dove. And, as they were purified and came into states of true thoughts and feelings, they felt a sincere regard for the salvation of the world of mankind, around them, lying in darkness. And they kindly sent forth the dove to see if the waters or falses were abated from their minds.