The angel who had previously been my guide and companion on my visits to the people of antiquity, who had lived in the four ages, golden, silver, copper and iron, came to me again and said: 'If you want to see what the age which followed those ancient ones was and still is like, follow me and you will see. These are the people of whom Daniel prophesied:

There shall arise after those four a kingdom in which iron will be mixed with common clay. They will mix together by the seed of man, but one will not stick together with another, even as iron will not mix with clay. Dan. 2:41-43.

'The seed of man,' he said, 'by which iron will be mixed with clay, but without sticking together, means the truth of the Word falsified.'

[2] After this speech I followed him, and on the way he informed me: 'They live on the border between the south and the west, but a long way behind those who lived in the four earlier ages, and also lower down.' We travelled through the south until we came to the region bordering the west, and passed through a terrifying forest. For it had lakes in it, from which crocodiles raised their heads, gaping at us with their wide, toothy jaws. Among the lakes there were frightening hounds, some with three heads like Cerberus, some with two; all with horrid jaws, watching us pass with their savage eyes. On entering the western sector of this region we saw dragons and leopards, as described in Rev. 12:3, 13:2.

[3] 'All these beasts,' the angel told me, 'which you have seen are not beasts at all, but correspondences and so forms which represent the lusts of the inhabitants we are to visit. The lusts themselves are represented by those horrid hounds, their tricks and cunning by the crocodiles, their falsities and erroneous attitude to religious matters by the dragons and leopards. But the inhabitants, of whom they are a picture, live not near the end of the forest, but across a great intervening desert, so that they can be kept apart and separated from the peoples of earlier ages. They are too of quite an alien and different nature from them. Admittedly they have their heads above their chests, their chests above their hips, their hips above their feet, like the primeval people. But their heads contain not a scrap of gold, their chests not a scrap of silver, and their hips not a scrap of bronze; nor indeed is there a scrap of unmixed iron in their feet. But their heads contain iron mixed with clay, their chests iron and clay mixed with bronze, their hips the same too mixed with silver, their feet these mixed with gold. This inversion has turned them from human beings into sculptures of human beings, lacking all internal cohesion. For what was highest has become lowest, the head has become the heel and vice versa. As we look from heaven they seem like clowns who stand upside down and walk on their hands; or like animals that lie flat on their backs, lifting their feet in the air, and burying their heads in the ground, to look up to the sky.

[4] Crossing the forest we entered the desert, which was no less frightening. It was composed of heaps of stones, with ditches between them, out of which crept poisonous snakes and vipers, and fiery serpents flew out. The whole of this desert kept sloping downwards, and we went down a long descent, finally reaching a valley inhabited by the peoples of that region and age.

Here and there we saw huts, which eventually seemed to come together and join up to form a town. We went into it and found the houses were built of tree-branches, charred and stuck together with mud; they were roofed with black slates. The streets were irregular, all of them narrow to begin with, but opening out as you went on, and widening out at the end to form squares. So there were as many squares as were streets.

On entering the town it grew dark, as the sky was not to be seen. So we looked up and light was granted us to see by. Then I asked any I met on the way, 'Surely you can't see, since the sky is not to be seen above you?' 'What sort of a question is that?' they answered, 'we can see clearly, we walk in broad daylight.' On hearing this the angel told me: 'Darkness is light to them, and light is darkness, just as it is for night birds. They look down and not up.'

[5] We went into some houses here and there, and saw in each a man with his woman. So we asked whether they all live in their own homes with only one wife. To this they replied with a whistle, 'Why do you say with one wife? Why not with only one trollop? What is a wife but a trollop? Our laws do not allow us to fornicate with more than one woman; still there is nothing indecent or improper in doing it with more, so long as it is not at home. We boast about this among ourselves, thus taking more delight and pleasure in it than polygamous people. Why is it that we are not allowed to have several wives, when it used to be allowed, and is still today in all parts of the world around us? What is living with only one woman, but being shut up and imprisoned? But we are breaking down the bars of this prison, rescuing ourselves from slavery and setting ourselves free. No one can be cross with a prisoner who grabs his freedom when he can.'

[6] We replied to this: 'Friend, you speak as if you had no knowledge of religion. Is there anyone with any rationality, who does not know that adultery is profane and hellish, and that marriage is holy and heavenly? Surely adultery is to be found among the devils in hell, and marriage among the angels in heaven? Haven't you read the sixth commandment, or Paul's statement that adulterers can by no means reach heaven? [1 Cor. 6:9]'

This amused our host so much he roared with laughter, looking on me as a simpleton and almost crazy. But then suddenly a messenger arrived from the chief man of the town, who said: 'Bring the two newcomers to the court, and if they refuse, drag them there. We have seen them in the shades of light;* they have crept in secretly to spy on us.'

The angel said to me: 'They saw us in shade, because the light of heaven we brought with us is shade to them; their light is in the shade of hell. This happens because they think nothing of sinning, not even of committing adultery, so that falsity to them looks exactly like truth. Falsity shines brightly before the satans in hell, and the truth darkens their eyes like the shades of night.'

[7] 'We shall not,' we told the messenger, 'be forced, much less dragged, to court, but we shall go with you of our own free will.' So we went and found there a large crowd. Some lawyers detached themselves from the crowd and whispered in our ears: 'Take care not to say anything against religion, our kind of government and good behaviour.' 'No,' we replied, 'we shall not say anything against them, but speak in their favour and as they dictate.'

'What,' we asked, 'is the rule of your religion about marriage?' This produced a murmuring among the crowd, 'What business of yours are marriages?' they said, 'marriages are marriages.'

We asked another question: 'What is the rule of your religion about licentious conduct?' Again there was a murmur from the crowd. 'What business of yours is licentious conduct?' they said. 'Licentiousness is licentiousness. Let him who is without guilt throw the first stone.'

Our third question was: 'Surely your religion teaches that marriages are holy and heavenly and that adulteries are profane and hellish?' This made many in the crowd cackle, laughing and making fun of us. 'Address,' they said, 'your questions on religion to our priests, not to us. We fully accept their pronouncements, because no religious matters fall within the scope of intellectual judgment. Surely you have been told that the intellect is deranged when it comes to mysteries, and these are what religion is all about. And what have actions to do with religion? Isn't it heartfelt mumbling about expiation, satisfaction and imputation which make souls blessed, not deeds?'

[8] Then some men came up sent by the so-called wise men of the town, who said: 'Leave here at once. The crowd is growing angry and there will soon be a riot. Let us have a talk about this subject by ourselves. Behind the courthouse there is a walk, where we can be private. Come with us.'

So we followed them, and then they asked us where we came from and what our business was there. 'We came,' we said, 'to learn about marriage, whether like the ancient peoples of the golden, silver and copper ages you regarded marriages as sacraments or not.' 'Sacraments indeed!' they answered, 'Aren't they the work of flesh and darkness?' 'Aren't they too,' we replied, 'the work of the spirit? Isn't what the flesh does under the direction of the spirit itself spiritual? Everything the spirit does is directed by the marriage of good and truth. So isn't it this spiritual marriage which enters into the natural marriage, that between husband and wife?'

To this the so-called wise men replied: 'You are being too sharp and lofty in your treatment of the subject. You are going beyond the realm of reason into the spiritual realm. How can anyone start there, and come down from there to make any judgment?' They added with a mocking grin, 'Perhaps you have eagle's wings so that you can soar to the heights of heaven and spy such things out? We cannot.'

[9] Then we asked them to tell us, from their height, that is, the region where the volatile ideas of their minds flit about, whether they knew or could know of the existence of the conjugial love of one man with one wife, a love on which are conferred all the blessedness, bliss, pleasures, charms and gratifications of heaven; this love being given by the Lord in proportion to one's ability to receive good and truth from Him, and so depending on the state of the church.

[10] On hearing this they turned away and said: 'These men are crazy. They soar about the atmosphere with their judgments, and indulge in the folly of playing with toys.' Then turning back to us, they said: 'We will give you a straight answer to your vain and vacuous prognostications. What connexion is there between conjugial love and religion or Divine inspiration? Surely everyone has this love in proportion to his sexual potency? Don't those outside the church feel it just as much as those inside? The heathen just as much as Christians? In fact, the irreligious as much as the religious? Doesn't the strength of that love depend on heredity, state of health, self-discipline or climate? It can also be strengthened and aroused by drugs. Isn't it shared with animals, especially with birds, which form loving pairs? Surely it is a fleshly love. What has the flesh to do with the spiritual state of the church? When it comes to the effects at the lowest level, there is surely not the slightest difference between a wife and a trollop. The lust is the same and the delight felt is the same. It is therefore disrespectful to derive the origin of conjugial love from the holy things of the church.'

[11] On hearing this we told them: 'Your reasoning arises from the goadings of lewdness, not from conjugial love. You are totally ignorant of what conjugial love is, because for you it is cold. Your remarks have proved to us that you come from the age named after a mixture of iron and clay, which do not hold together, as prophesied by Daniel (2:43). You make conjugial love and scortatory love one and the same. Can these two hold together any more than iron and clay? You think you are wise and you have that reputation, yet you are in fact anything but wise.'

On hearing this they shouted out in fury and summoned the crowd to throw us out. Then by the power given us by the Lord we held out our hands, and at once fiery serpents, poisonous snakes and vipers, and also dragons, appeared from the desert, moving into and filling the town, so that the inhabitants were terrified and fled.

The angel said to me: 'Newcomers from earth are daily arriving in this region, and the earlier inhabitants are from time to time banished and cast into quagmires in the west. These look from a distance like lakes of fire and brimstone. All the people there are both spiritually and naturally adulterers.' * Not a mistake for 'night', as the next sentence shows.