4088. After the above was written I perceived that the societies around me reasoned concerning it. Their reasoning flowed in in a most general way, so that nothing was perceived but a certain obscure confused something which affected the brain with a kind of dull disagreeable sensation of pain. Wherefore if all the reasonings of spirits should flow in, man would be brought into just such an obscure general state, attended with a similar dull feeling of pain, and would perceive nothing distinctly; so that the fact of man's having any distinct idea is owing to the Lord's precaution lest any such confused impressions should enter the mind. The quality of their reasoning was also previously evinced by a white cloud in the azure vault, which raised, depressed, and bent itself about, and which was nothing else than the reasoning of a number of societies. I had also observed many years before that when I was in an obscure idea, just such a dull heavy pain affected the head. - 1748, November 27. But when I was freed [from the obscurity] the pain was dissipated, like the light shining forth from a previously clouded sky.