305. The substances and materials of which the earth consists have in them nothing of the Divine in itself, but still they originate from that which is Divine in itself. From the origin of the earth, as discussed under the previous heading, it can be seen that its substances and materials have in them nothing of the Divine in itself, but that they are bereft of everything that is Divine in itself. For as we said, they are the final and terminal forms of the atmospheres, whose warmth ends in coldness, whose light ends in darkness, and whose activity ends in inertness. But still, by their evolution from the substance of the spiritual sun, they have retained that which was from the Divine there, which, as we said in nos. 291-293 above, was the atmosphere surrounding the human God or the Lord. From that atmosphere, by their evolution from the sun by means of the succeeding atmospheres, have arisen the substances and materials of which the earth consists.