Selection from Apocalypse Explained ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
Religion with man consists in a life according to the Divine commandments, which are contained in a summary in the Decalogue. He that does not live according to these can have no religion, since he does not fear God, still less does he love God; nor does he fear man, still less does he love him. Can one who steals, commits adultery, kills, bears false witness, fear God or man? Nevertheless everyone is able to live according to these commandments; and he who is wise does so live as a civil man, as a moral man, and as a natural man. And yet he who does not live according to them as a spiritual man cannot he saved; since to live according to them as a spiritual man means to so live for the sake of the Divine that is in them, while to live according to them as a civil man means for the sake of justice and to escape punishments in the world; and to live according to them as a moral man means for the sake of honesty, and to escape the loss of reputation and honor; while to live according to them as a natural man means for the sake of what is human, and to escape the repute of having an unsound mind.All laws, civil, moral, and natural, prescribe that one must not steal, must not commit adultery, must not kill, must not bear false witness; and yet a man is not saved by shunning these evils from these laws alone, unless he also shuns them from spiritual law, thus unless he shuns them as sins. For with such a man there is religion, and a belief that there is a God, a heaven and a hell, and a life after death; with such a man there is a civil life, a moral life, and a natural life; a civil life because there is justice, a moral life because there is honesty, and a natural life because there is manhood. But he who does not live according to these commandments as a spiritual man is neither a civil man, nor a moral man, nor a natural man; for he is destitute of justice, of honesty, and even of manhood, since the Divine is not in these. For there can be nothing good in and from itself, but only from God; so there can be nothing just, nothing truly honest or truly human in itself and from itself, but only from God, and only when the Divine is in it.
Consider whether anyone that has hell in him, or who is a devil, can do what is just from justice or for the sake of justice; in like manner what is honest, or what is truly human. The truly human is what is from order and according to order, and what is from sound reason; and God is order, and sound reason is from God. In a word, he who does not shun evils as sins is not a man. Everyone who makes these commandments the principles of his religion becomes a citizen and an inhabitant of heaven; but he who does not make them the principles of his religion, although in externals he may live according to them from natural, moral, and civil law, becomes a citizen and an inhabitant of the world, but not of heaven.
Most nations know these commandments, and make them the principles of their religion, and live according to them because God so wills and has commanded. Through this they have communication with heaven and conjunction with God, consequently they also are saved. But most in the Christian world at this day do not make them the principles of their religion, but only of their civil and moral life; and they do this that they may not appear in external form to act fraudulently and make unlawful gains, commit adulteries, manifestly pursue others from deadly hatred and revenge, and bear false witness, and do not refrain from these things because they are sins and against God, but because they have fears for their life, their reputation, their office, their business, their possessions, their honor and gain, and their pleasure; consequently if they were not restrained by these bonds they would do these things. Because, therefore, such form for themselves no communication with heaven or conjunction with the Lord, but only with the world and with self, they cannot be saved.
Consider in respect to yourself, when these external bonds have been taken away, as is done with every man after death, if there are no internal bonds, which are from fear and love of God, thus from religion, to restrain and hold you back, whether you would not rush, like a devil, into thefts, adulteries, murders, false witnesses, and lusts of every kind, from a love of these thus from a delight in them. That this is the case I have both seen and heard.
(Apocalypse Explained 948:4,5)