292. With every individual there are good spirits and evil spirits. Through the good spirits, man has conjunction with heaven, and through the evil spirits with hell. These spirits are in the world of spirits, which lies midway between heaven and hell. This world will be described particularly in the following pages. When these spirits come to a man they enter into his entire memory, and thus into his entire thought, evil spirits into the evil things of his memory and thought, and good spirits into the good things of his memory and thought. These spirits have no knowledge at all that they are with a man, but when they are with him they believe that all things of his memory and thought are their own. Neither do they see the man, because nothing that is in our solar world falls within their vision.# The Lord exercises the greatest care that the spirits should not know that they are with a man; for if they knew it, they would speak with him. In that case evil spirits would destroy him. For evil spirits, being conjoined with hell, desire nothing so much as to destroy man, not alone his soul, that is, his faith and love, but also his body. It is otherwise when spirits do not speak with man, in which case they are not aware that what they are thinking and also what they are saying among themselves is from man. For they even speak among themselves from man, but believe that what they are thinking and saying is their own, and each esteems and loves what is his own. In this way, spirits are constrained to love and esteem man, although they do not know it. That such is the conjunction of spirits with man has become so well known to me as a result of many years' continual experience that there is nothing better known to me. # There are angels and spirits with every man, and by means of them man has communication with the spiritual world (n. 697, 2796, 2886, 2887, 4047, 4048, 5846-5866, 5976-5993). Man without spirits with him cannot live (n. 5993). Man is not seen by spirits, even as spirits are not seen by man (n. 5862). Spirits can see nothing in our solar world with man except the one with whom they are speaking (n. 1880).