“These things I have spoken to you in parables, but the hour is coming when I will no more speak to you in proverbs, but will announce to you plainly concerning the Father.” - John 16:25
Kempton New Church

Week 2
Day 3

    Listen:

The Most Excellent Use

The use of conjugial love is the most excellent of all uses, because therefrom comes the procreation of the human race, and from the human race the angelic heaven. —Conjugial Love 183

Conjugial Love and the Most Excellent of All Uses

Mark 10:14. Let the little children come to Me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of God.

CL 68. As conjugial love is the fundamental of all good loves, and as it is inscribed upon the very least things of man, as has been shown before, it follows that its delights exceed the delights of all loves; and also that it imparts delight to them according to its presence and at the same time its conjunction with them. For it expands the inmost things of the mind, and at the same time the inmost things of the body, as the delicious current of its fountain flows through and opens them. It is because of the superior excellence of its use above all other uses that all delights from first to last are gathered into this love. Its use is the propagation of the human race and of the angelic heaven therefrom; and as this use was the end of ends of the creation, it follows that all the states of blessedness, satisfaction, delight, gratification, and pleasure that could ever be conferred on man by the Lord the Creator are gathered into this love.

CL 183. Finally, the angels said, “Let this be the conclusion: That all fructification [or bearing fruit], all propagation, and all prolification come originally from the influx of love, wisdom, and use from the Lord: from immediate influx from the Lord into the souls of men; from mediate influx into the souls of animals; and from influx still more mediate into the inmosts of plants. And all these are effected in the ultimates from the firsts. It is plain that fructifications, propagations, and prolifications are continuations of creation; for creation cannot be from any other source than from Divine Love, by Divine wisdom, in Divine use. All things in the universe therefore are procreated and formed from use, in use, and for use.”

Afterwards those who were sitting on the grassy banks asked the angels, “Whence are the delights of conjugial love, which are innumerable and ineffable?” The angels answered, “They are from the uses of love and wisdom. And this may be seen from the fact that in so far as one loves to be wise for the sake of genuine use he is in the vein and potency of conjugial love, and in so far as he is in these two he is in delights. Use effects this, because love by wisdom delight each in the other, and they play as it were like little children, and as they grow up, they enter into genial conjunction. This is as if by betrothals, nuptials, marriages, and propagations; and these continue with variety to eternity.

“These things take place between love and wisdom inwardly in use; but these delights in their beginnings are imperceptible, but become perceptible more and more as they descend thence by degrees and enter the body. They enter through degrees, from the soul into the interiors of man’s mind, from these into its exteriors, thence into the inmost bosom, and from this into the genital region. Yet these heavenly nuptial sports in the soul are not in the least perceived by man; but they insinuate themselves thence into the interiors of the mind, under the form of peace and innocence; and into the exteriors of the mind in the form of blessedness, pleasantness, and joy; but into the inmost bosom under the form of the delights of inmost friendship; and into the genital region, by influx continuous even from the soul, with the very sense of conjugial love, as the delight of delights.

“These nuptial sports of love and wisdom in use in the soul, in proceeding towards the inmost bosom become enduring, and in that bosom present themselves sensibly under an infinite variety of delights; and by virtue of the wonderful communication of the inmost bosom with the genital region, these delights become there delights of conjugial love, which are exalted above all delights that are in heaven and in the world, for the reason that the use of conjugial love is the most excellent of all uses, because therefrom comes the procreation of the human race, and from the human race the angelic heaven.

Questions and Comments
  1. What can each one of us do individually to serve the most excellent of all uses?
  2. How is the most excellent of all uses served by people in uses other than being a parent?
  3. How can the Kempton Society support the most excellent of all uses?
  4. How would communities be different if the most excellent of uses was the primary focus and every other use was seen as supporting that use?
previous next