(TCR) - True Christian Religion: Containing the Whole Theology of the New Church Predicted by the Lord in Daniel 7:13-14 and Revelation 21:1-2

TCR 38

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38. (2) God is Good itself and Truth itself, because Good is of Love and Truth is of Wisdom. It is universally known that all things have reference to good and truth; which is proof that all things sprang from love and wisdom; for everything that proceeds from love is called good, for this is what is felt, and the delight by which the love becomes manifest is to everyone good; while every thing that proceeds from wisdom is called truth, since wisdom consists solely of truths, and affects its objects with the pleasantness of light; and this pleasantness, when it is perceived, is truth from good. Love is therefore the complex of all varieties of goodness, and wisdom the complex of all varieties of truth; but both the latter and the former are from God, who is love itself and thus good itself, and is wisdom itself and thus truth itself. It is from this that in the church there are two essentials, called charity and faith; and of these each thing and all things of the church consist, and these must be in each and all things of it; and for the reason that every good of the church pertains to charity, and is called charity; and every truth of the church pertains to faith, and is called faith. It is the delights of love, which are also the delights of charity, that cause what is delightful to be called good; and it is the pleasantness of wisdom, which is also the pleasantness of faith, that causes what is true to be called true; for delights and pleasantnesses are what give life to good and truth; and without life from these, goods and truths are like something inanimate, and are also barren.
[2] But the delights of love are of two kinds; so, too, are the pleasantnesses that seem to pertain to wisdom, namely, delights of the love of good and delights of the love of evil, and in consequence, the pleasantnesses of faith in what is true and of faith in what is false. In the subjects in which they exist, both of these kinds of delights, because of the feeling they produce, are called goods, and both of these kinds of pleasantness of faith, because of the perception they cause, are also called good; but as these are in the understanding they are in reality truths. Nevertheless, the two kinds are opposites, the good of one love being good, and the good of the other being evil, and the truth of one faith true, and that of the other false. The love whose delight is essentially good is like the sun's heat in its work of fructifying, vivifying, and operating upon fertile soil, and useful trees and fields of grain; and where it operates the place becomes like a paradise, a garden of Jehovah, and like the land of Canaan; while the pleasantness of the truth of that love is like the sun's light in spring, or like light flowing into a crystalline vase containing beautiful flowers, from which, when opened, a delightful odor goes forth. But the delight of the love of evil is like the sun's heat when it parches and destroys, or when it operates upon barren soil or upon noxious growths, as thorns and brambles; and where it operates the place becomes an Arabian desert where there are water snakes and venomous snakes; and the pleasantness of its falsity is like the sun's light in winter, or like light flowing into a bottle containing worms swimming in vinegar, and reptiles of offensive smell. [3] It must be understood that every kind of good gives itself form by means of truths, and clothes itself about with truths, and thus distinguishes itself from every other good; also that the various kinds of good belonging to the same family bind themselves into bundles, and swathe these about, and thus distinguish themselves from other families. That they are formed in this way is shown in each and all things in the human body; and as there is an invariable correspondence of all things of the mind with all things of the body the human mind is evidently formed in like ways. And from this it follows that the human mind is organized inwardly of spiritual substances, and outwardly of natural substances, and lastly of material substances. The mind whose love's delights are good is formed inwardly of such spiritual substances as exist in heaven; while the mind whose love's delights are evil is formed inwardly of such spiritual substances as exist in hell; and its evils are bound into bundles by falsities, while the goods in the former mind are bound into bundles by truths. Because of such bindings of good and of evil into bundles the Lord says:
That the tares must be gathered together into bundles to be burned, as well as all things that offend (Matt. 13:30, 40-41; John 15:6).

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