conscious labor, intentional suffering

I want to go back to that Boston quote about the 'walking of your soul':

"Since the hearts of our first parents flew out at their eyes, on the forbidden fruit, and a night of darkness was thereby brought on the world, their posterity have a natural disease which Solomon calls, "The wandering of the desire," or, as the word is, "The walking of your soul," Eccl. 6:9. This is a sort of diabolical trance, wherein the soul traverses the world; feeds itself with a thousand airy nothings; snatches at this and the other created excellency, in imagination and desire; goes here, and there, and everywhere, except where it should go. And the soul is never cured of this disease, until conquering grace brings it back to take up its everlasting rest in God through Christ—but until this be, if man were set again in paradise, the garden of the Lord, all the pleasures there would not keep him from looking, yes, and leaping over the hedge a second time." - Thomas Boston, Human Nature in its Fourfold State, pg. 75, Banner of Truth edition

You can see the language of cosmoses in this quote. The soul of a person is the cosmos of the person. It is walking around seeking to eat lower impressions. Impressions that draw it and come to it with no effort. Like a child putting anything and everything in its mouth with no discernment.

Cosmoses eat things. What did G. describe about human cosmoses? They want to come together and eat each other. Literally in some cases. Maybe just in terms of violence or control. Maybe just to wither them with a remark.

The main thing here is the difference in quality of impressions that can be eaten. Impressions have different sources too. The food of impressions. To eat higher impressions you need the first conscious shock. This accumulates the impressions into you. Impressions being units of energy of a higher or lower level of quality. To actually eat those higher impressions, the ones that come from the Absolute II and not the Absolute III, you have to effect the second conscious shock. You have to sacrifice your suffering, following Jesus in this act, and you, in the metaphor Jesus Himself gives, reach a place internally, high up internally, where you knock, it is opened, and you sup with the King. King Jesus. This is metaphor, but eating is a big metaphor in the Bible for a reason.

This is how you see the two sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper as mirroring the two conscious shocks.

A sub-theme of the New Testament is Jesus telling his disciples not to take what He says so literally. Like when they ask if they are to actually eat His flesh. Jesus says be awake and love your enemy, and it is the same thing. Conscious labor and intentional suffering. - C.