the appearance that it is his own a man cannot be in any affection to
know or to understand. Every joy and pleasure, thus everything of the
will, is from an affection of some love. Who can wish to know or to
understand anything except that an affection of his takes pleasure in it?
Who can feel this pleasure unless what he is affected by seems to be his?
Were it not his, but another's altogether, that is, if another from his
affection should infuse something into his mind when he himself felt no
affection for knowing or grasping it, would he receive it? Indeed, could
he receive it? Would he not be like one called a dullard or a clod?
[2] It should be manifest then that although everything that a man
perceives, thinks, knows and, according to perception, wills and does,
flows into him, nevertheless it is of the Lord's divine providence that
it seems to be the man's. Otherwise, as we said, a man would not receive
anything and so could be given no intelligence or wisdom. It is known
that all good and truth are the Lord's and not man's, and yet appear to
be man's. As good and truth so appear, so do all things of the church and
of heaven, and all things of love and wisdom, and all things of charity
and faith; yet none of them is man's. No one can receive them from the
Lord unless it seems to him that he perceives them for himself. Plainly,
the truth of the matter is that whatever a man does in freedom, whether
with reason or not, provided only that it accords with his reason, seems
to him to be his.
77. Who cannot from his faculty called rationality understand that a
given good is serviceable to society, and a given evil harmful to
society? That, for example, justice, sincerity, the chastity of marriage
are serviceable to it, and injustice, insincerity, and misconduct with
the wives of others, harmful? Consequently that these evils are in
themselves injuries, and those goods in themselves benefits? Who then
cannot make this a matter of his reason if only he will? He has
rationality and he has liberty; the two faculties are bared, show, take
charge and enable him to perceive and do in the measure that he avoids
those evils because they are evils. So far as a man does this he looks on
those goods as a friend looks on friends.
[2] By his faculty called rationality a man can conclude from this what
goods are useful to society in the spiritual world and what evils are
hurtful there, if instead of evils he sees sins and instead of goods
works of charity. This he can also make a matter of his reason if he
will, since he has liberty and rationality. His rationality and liberty
emerge, become manifest, take charge and give him perception and power so
far as he shuns evils as sins. So far as he does this he regards the
goods of charity as neighbor regards neighbor in mutual love.
[3] For the sake of reception and union the Lord wills that whatever a
man does freely according to reason shall seem to him to be his; this
agrees with reason itself. It follows that a man can from his reason will
something on the ground that it means his eternal happiness and can
perform it by the Lord's divine power, implored by him.
78. (iii) _Whatever a man does in freedom according to his thought is
appropriated to him as his and remains._ The reason is that a man's own
and his freedom make one. His proprium is of his life, and what he does
from his life he does in freedom. His proprium is also of his love, for
love is one's life, and what he does from his life's love he does in
freedom. We speak of his acting in freedom "according to his thought"
because what is of his life or love he also thinks and confirms by
thought, and what is so confirmed he does in freedom then according to
thought. What a man does, he does from the will by the understanding;
freedom is of the will and thought is of the understanding.
[2] A man can also act freely contrary to reason, likewise not freely in
accord with reason: then nothing is appropriated to him--what he does is
only of the mouth and body, not of the spirit or heart; only what is of
the spirit and heart, when it is also of the mouth and body, is
appropriated. The truth of this can be illustrated by many things, but
this is not the place.
[3] By being appropriated to man is meant entering his life and becoming
part of it, consequently becoming his own. It will be seen in what
follows that there is nothing, however, which is man's very own; it only
seems to him as if it were. Only this now: all the good a man does in
freedom according to reason is appropriated to him as if it were his
because it seems to be his in that he thinks, wills, speaks and does it.
Good is not man's, however, but the Lord's with man (above, n. 76). How
evil is appropriated to man will appear in a section of its own.
79. We said that what a man does in freedom in accord with his thought
also remains. For nothing that a man has appropriated to himself can be
eradicated; it has been made part of his love and at the same time of his
reason, or of his will and at the same time of his understanding, and so
of his life. It can be put aside indeed, but not cast out; put aside, it
is borne from center to periphery, where it stays; this is what we mean
by its remaining.
[2] If, for example, in boyhood or youth, a man appropriated an evil to
himself by doing it with enjoyment from love of it--a fraud, blasphemy,
revenge, or fornication--having done it freely with the assent of thought,
he made it his; but if later he repents, shuns it and considers it a sin
to be averse from, and so desists from it freely according to reason,
then the opposite good is appropriated to him. Good then takes the center
and removes evil to the periphery, farther according to his aversion and
abhorrence for it. Still the evil cannot be so thrust out that one can
say it is extirpated; it may indeed in that removal seem extirpated. What
occurs is that the man is withheld from the evil by the Lord and held in
good. This can happen with all inherited evil and all a man's actual
evil.
[3] I have seen this verified by the experience of some in heaven who
thought they were without evil, being held in good as they were by the
Lord. Lest they should believe that the good in which they were was their
own, they were let down from heaven and let into their evils until they
acknowledged that of themselves they were in evil, and in good only from
the Lord. Upon this acknowledgment they were returned to heaven.
[4] Be it known, therefore, that goods are appropriated to man only in
that they are constantly with him from the Lord, and that as a man
acknowledges this the Lord grants that good shall seem to be the man's,
that is, that it shall seem to him that he loves the neighbor or has
charity, believes or has faith, does good and understands truth, thus is
wise, of himself. From this an enlightened person may see the nature and
the strength of the appearance in which the Lord wills man to be. The
Lord wills it for salvation's sake, for without that appearance no one
can be saved. Also see what was shown above on the subject (nn. 42-45).
80. Nothing that a person only thinks, not even what he thinks to will,
is appropriated to him unless he also wills it so that he does it when
opportunity offers. For when a man then does it, he does it from the will
by the understanding or from affection of the will by thought of the
understanding. If it is something thought only, it cannot be
appropriated, for the understanding does not conjoin itself to the will,
or the thought of the understanding to the affection of the will, but the
latter with the former, as we have shown many times in the treatise
_Divine Love and Wisdom,_ Part V. This is meant by the Lord's words,
Not that which enters the mouth renders a man unclean, but that which
goes forth from the heart by the mouth renders a man unclean ( Mt 15:11,
17, 18, 19).
In the spiritual sense thought is meant by "mouth," for thought is spoken
by it; affection which is of love is meant by "heart"; if the man thinks
and speaks from this he makes himself unclean. In Luke 6:45 also by
"heart" an affection of love or of the will is meant, and by "mouth" the
thought of the understanding.
81. Evils which a man believes are allowable, though he does not do them,
are also appropriated to him, for the licitness in thought is from the
will, as there is assent. When a man deems an evil allowable he loosens
the internal bond on it and is kept from doing it only by external bonds,
which are fears. As his spirit favors the evil, he commits it when
external bonds are removed as allowable, and meanwhile is committing it
in spirit. But on this see _Doctrine of Life for the New Jerusalem,_ nn.
108-113.
82. (iv) _A man is reformed and regenerated by the Lord by means of the
two faculties and cannot be reformed or regenerated without them._ The
Lord teaches that,
Unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God (Jn 3:3,5,7).
Few know what it is to be born anew or regenerated. For most do not know
what love and charity are, therefore what faith is, either. One who does
not know what love and charity are cannot know what faith is because
charity and faith make one as good and truth do, and as affection which
is of the will, and thought which is of the understanding, do. On this
union see the treatise _Divine Love and Wisdom,_ nn. 427-431; also
_Doctrine for the New Jerusalem,_ nn. 13-24; and above, nn. 3-20.
83. No one can enter the kingdom of God unless he has been born anew for
the reason that by heredity from his parents he is born into evils of
every kind, with the capacity of becoming spiritual through removal of
the evils; unless he becomes spiritual, then, he cannot enter heaven. To
become spiritual from being natural is to be born again or regenerated.
Three things need to be considered if one is to know how man is
regenerated: the nature of his first state, which is one of damnation;
the nature of his second state, which is one of reformation; and the
nature of his third state, which is one of regeneration.
[2] Man's first state, which is one of damnation, is every one's state by
heredity from his parents. For man is born thereby into self-love and
love of the world, and from these as fountains into evils of every kind.
By the enjoyments of those loves he is led, and they keep him from
knowing that he is in evil, for the enjoyment of any love is felt to be
good. Unless he is regenerated, therefore, a man knows no otherwise than
that to love himself and the world above all things is good itself, and
to rule over others and possess their riches is the supreme good. So
comes all evil. For only oneself is regarded with love. If another is
regarded with love it is as devil loves devil or thief thief when they
are in league.
[3] Those who confirm these loves with themselves and the evils flowing
from them, from enjoyment in them, remain natural and become
sensuous-corporeal, and in their own thinking, which is that of their
spirit, are insane. And yet, as long as they are in the world they can
speak and act rationally and wisely, for they are human beings and so
have rationality and liberty, though they still do this from self-love
and love of the world. After death and on becoming spirits, they can
enjoy nothing that they did not enjoy in the world. Their enjoyment is
that of an infernal love and is turned into the unpleasant, sorrowful
and dreadful, meant in the Word by torment and hell-fire. Plain it is,
then, that man's first state is one of damnation and that they are in it
who do not suffer themselves to be regenerated.
[4] Man's second state--of reformation--is his state when he begins to
think of heaven for the joy there, thus of God from whom he has heaven's
joy. But at first the thought comes from the enjoyment of self-love; to
him heaven's joy is that enjoyment. While the enjoyments of that love and
of the evils flowing from it rule, moreover, he cannot but think that to
gain heaven is to pour out prayers, hear sermons, observe the Supper,
give to the poor, help the needy, make offerings to churches, contribute
to hospitals, and the like. In this state a man is persuaded that merely
to think about what religion teaches, whether this is called faith or
called faith and charity, is to be saved. He is so minded because he
gives no thought to the evils in the enjoyments of which he is. While
those enjoyments remain, the evils do. The enjoyments of the evils are
from the lust for them which continually inspires them and, when no fear
restrains, brings them to pass.
[5] While evils remain in the lusts of love for them and so in one's
enjoyments, there is no faith, piety, charity or worship except in
externals, which seem real in the world's sight, but are not. They may be
likened to waters flowing from an impure fountain, which one cannot
drink. While a man is such that he thinks about heaven and God from
religion but gives no thought to evils as sins, he is still in the first
state. He comes into the second state, which is one of reformation, when
he begins to think that there is such a thing as sin and still more when
he thinks that a given evil is a sin, explores it somewhat in himself,
and does not will it.
[6] Man's third state, which is one of regeneration, sets in and
continues from the former. It begins when a man desists from evils as
sins, progresses as he shuns them, and is perfected as he battles against
them. Then as he conquers from the Lord he is regenerated. The order of
his life is changed; from natural he becomes spiritual; the natural
separated from the spiritual is in disorder and the spiritual is in
order. The regenerated man acts from charity and makes what is of his
faith a part of his charity. But he becomes spiritual only in the measure
in which he is in truths. Everyone is regenerated by means of truths and
of a life in accord with them; by truths he knows life and by his life he
does the truths. So he unites good and truth, which is the spiritual
marriage in which heaven is.
85.* Man is reformed and regenerated by means of the two faculties called
rationality and liberty, and cannot be reformed or regenerated without
them, because it is by means of rationality that he can understand and
know what is evil and what is good, and hence what is false and true, and
by means of liberty that he can will what he understands and knows. But
while the enjoyment of an evil love rules him he cannot will good and
truth freely or make them a matter of his reason, and therefore cannot
appropriate them to him. For, as was shown above, what a man does in
freedom from reason is appropriated to him as his, and unless it is so
appropriated, he is not reformed and regenerated. He acts from the
enjoyment of a love of good and truth for the first time when the
enjoyment of love for the evil and false has been removed. Two opposite
kinds of enjoyments of love at one and the same time are impossible. To
act from the enjoyment of love is to act freely and is also to act
according to reason, inasmuch as the reason favors the love.
* This number must be kept though there is no number 84; long established
references to Swedenborg's books make it necessary to keep the numbering
in the Latin original.
86. Because an evil man as well as a good man has rationality and
liberty, the evil man as well as the good can understand truth and do
good. The evil man cannot do this in freedom according to reason, while a
good man can; for the evil man is in the enjoyment of a love of evil, the
good man in the enjoyment of a love of good. The truth which an evil man
understands and the good he does are therefore not appropriated to him,
as they are to the good man, and aside from appropriation there is no
reformation or regeneration. With the evil man evils with their falsities
occupy the center, as it were, and goods with their truths the
circumference, but goods with their truths the center with the good man
and evils with their falsities the periphery. In each case what is at the
center is diffused to the circumference, as heat is from a fiery center
and cold from an icy one. Thus with the wicked the good at the
circumference is defiled by evils at the center, and with the good evils
at the circumference grow mild from the good at the center. For this
reason evils do not condemn a regenerating man, nor do goods save the
unregenerate.
87. (v) _A man can be reformed and regenerated by means of the two
faculties so far as he can be led by them to acknowledge that all truth
and good which he thinks and does are from the Lord and not from
himself._ What reformation and regeneration are has been told just above,
likewise that man is reformed and regenerated by means of the two
faculties of rationality and liberty. Because it is done by those
faculties, something more is to be said of them. From rationality a man
can understand and from liberty he can will, doing each as of himself.
Yet he does not have the ability to will good in freedom and to do it in
accord with reason unless he is regenerated. An evil man can will only
evil in freedom and do it according to his thinking, which by
confirmations he has made to be his reasoning. For evil can be confirmed
as well as good, but is confirmed by fallacies and appearances which then
become falsities; evil so confirmed seems to accord with reason.
88. Anyone thinking from interior understanding can see that the power to
will and the power to understand are not from man, but from Him who has
power itself, that is, power in its essence. Only think whence power is.
Is it not from Him who has it in its full might, that is, who possesses
it in and from Himself? Power in itself, therefore, is divine. All power
must have a supply on which to draw and direction from an interior or
higher self. Of itself the eye cannot see, nor the ear hear, nor the
mouth speak, nor the hand do; there must be supply and direction from the
mind. Nor can the mind of itself think or will this or that unless
something more interior or higher determines the mind to it. The same is
true of the power to understand and the power to will. These are possible
only from Him who has in Himself the power of willing and understanding.
[2] It is plain, then, that the two faculties called rationality and
liberty are from the Lord and not from man. Man can therefore will or
understand something only as if of himself, and not of himself. Anyone
can confirm the truth of this for himself who knows and believes that the
will to good and the understanding of truth are wholly from the Lord, and
not from man. The Word teaches that man can take nothing of himself and
do nothing of himself (Jn 3:27; 15:5).
89. As all willing is from love and all understanding is from wisdom, the
ability to will is from divine love, and the ability to understand is
from divine wisdom; thus both are from the Lord who is divine love itself
and divine wisdom itself. Hence to act in freedom according to reason has
no other source. Everyone acts in freedom because, like love, freedom
cannot be separated from willing. But there is interior and exterior
willing, and a man can act upon the exterior without acting at the same
time on the interior willing; so hypocrite and flatterer act. Exterior
willing, however, is still from freedom, being from a love of appearing
other than one is, or from love of an evil which the person intends in
the love of his inner will. An evil man, however, as has been said,
cannot in freedom according to reason do anything but evil; he cannot do
good in freedom according to reason; he can do good, to be sure, but not
in the inner freedom which is his own, from which the outer freedom has
its character of not being good.
90. A person can be reformed and regenerated, we have said, in the
measure in which he is led by the two faculties to acknowledge that all
good and truth which he thinks and does are from the Lord and not from
himself. A man can make this acknowledgment only by means of the two
faculties, because they are from the Lord and are the Lord's in him, as
is plain from what has been said. Man can make this acknowledgment,
therefore, only from the Lord and not from himself; he can make it as if
of himself; this the Lord gives everyone to do. He may believe that it is
of himself, but when wiser acknowledge that it is not of himself.
Otherwise the truth he thinks and the good he does are not in themselves
truth and good, for the man and not the Lord is in them. Good in which
the man is and which is done by him for salvation's sake is
self-righteous, but not that in which the Lord is.
91. Few can grasp with understanding that acknowledgment of the Lord, and
acknowledgment that all good and truth are from Him, cause one to be
reformed and regenerated. For a person may think, "What does the
acknowledgment effect when the Lord is omnipotent and wills the salvation
of all? This He wills and can accomplish if only He is moved to mercy."
One is not thinking then from the Lord, nor from the interior sight of
the understanding, that is, from enlightenment. Let me say briefly what
the acknowledgment accomplishes.
[2] In the spiritual world where space is appearance only, wisdom brings
about presence and love union, or the contrary happens. One can
acknowledge the Lord from wisdom, and one can acknowledge Him from love.
The acknowledgment of Him from wisdom (viewed in itself this is only
knowledge) is made by doctrine; acknowledgment from love is made in a
life according to doctrine. This effects union, the other, presence.
Those, therefore, who reject instruction about the Lord remove themselves
from Him, and as they also refuse life they part from Him. Those who do
not reject instruction, but do refuse life, are present but still
separated--like friends who converse but do not love each other, or like
two one of whom speaks as a friend with the other, although as his enemy
he hates him.
[3] The truth of this is commonly recognized in the idea that one who
teaches and lives well is saved but not one who teaches well but lives
wickedly, and in the idea that one who does not acknowledge God cannot be
saved. This makes plain what kind of religion it is only to think about
the Lord from faith, so called, and not to do something from charity.
Therefore the Lord says,
Why do you call Me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I say? Everyone who
comes to Me and hears my words and does them .. . is like a house-builder
who has placed the foundation on a rock, but the man who hears and does
not do, is like a man building a house on the ground without a foundation
(Lu 6:46-49).
92. (vi) _The conjunction of the Lord with man and man's reciprocal
conjunction with the Lord is effected by these two faculties._
Conjunction with the Lord and regeneration are one and the same thing,
for a man is regenerated in the measure that he is conjoined with the
Lord. All that we have said above about regeneration can be said
therefore of the conjunction, and all we said about conjunction can be
said about regeneration. The Lord Himself teaches in John that there is a
conjunction of the Lord with man and a reciprocal conjunction of man with
the Lord.
Abide in Me, and I in you. . . . He that abides in Me and I in him,
brings forth much fruit (15:4, 5).
In that day you will know that you are in Me and I in you (14:20).
[2] From reason alone anyone can see that there is no conjunction of
minds unless it is reciprocal, and that what is reciprocal conjoins. If
one loves another without being loved in return, then as he approaches,
the other withdraws; but if he is loved in return, as he approaches, the
other does also, and there is conjunction. Love also wills to be loved;
this is implanted in it; and so far as it is loved in return it is in
itself and in its delight. Thence it is plain that if the Lord loves man
and is not in turn loved by man, the Lord advances but man withdraws;
thus the Lord would be constantly willing to meet with man and enter him,
but man would be turning back and departing. So it is with those in hell,
but with those in heaven there is mutual conjunction.