5983. A person's communication with hell and with heaven through two spirits and two angels may be recognized from the consideration that in the next life no one community can have any communication with another community or any person except through spirits who are sent out from it. These emissary spirits are called 'subordinates', for communities speak through them as their subordinates. Sending out subordinates to other communities with whom they thereby come in contact is one of the common features of the next life. I have been made very aware of it through the fact that such subordinates have been sent to me a thousand times over, and that without them their communities could not have known anything at all about me or have communicated anything to me about themselves. From this it may be seen that the spirits and genii present with people are nothing else than subordinates through whom they come in contact with hell, while the celestial and spiritual angels are subordinates through whom they come in contact with heaven.