Selection from True Christian Religion ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
The essence of love is to love others outside itself, to desire to be one with them, and to make them happy from itself.There are two things which make the Essence of God, namely, Love and Wisdom, and there are three things which make the essence of His Love, namely, to love others outside of itself, to desire to be one with them, and to make them happy from itself. The same three things also make the essence of His Wisdom ... Love and Wisdom make one in God: while Love wills these things, Wisdom gives effect to them.
• The first essential, to love others outside of itself, is recognized from the Love of God towards the whole human race; and for their sake God loves all things He has created, because they are means; for he who loves the end loves also the means. All persons and all things in the universe are outside of God because they are finite, and God is infinite. Yet the Love of God approaches and extends not only to good persons and good things, but also to evil persons and evil things; consequently not only to persons and things in heaven, but also to those in hell; thus not only to Michael* and Gabriel, but also to the devil and satan, for God is everywhere, and from eternity to eternity the same. He says also:
"He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." Matt. 5:45.The reason, however, why evil persons and things are still evil is in the subjects and objects themselves, because they do not receive the Love of God in its own quality and interior nature, but according to their own nature, just as the thorn and nettle receive the heat of the sun and the rain of heaven.
• The second essential of the Love of God, to desire to be one with them, is perceived from His conjunction with the angelic heaven, with the Church on earth, with every individual there, and with every good and truth which enters into and constitutes man and the Church. Moreover, love viewed in itself is nothing but an endeavor towards conjunction; therefore, in order that this object of the essence of love might be attained, God created man in His own image and likeness by which conjunction might be effected. That the Divine Love is ever directed towards this union is evident from the words of the Lord,
that He desires that they may be one, He in them and they in Him, and that the Love of God may be in them, John 17:2, 22, 23, 26.• The third essential of the Love of God, to make them happy from itself, is recognized from eternal life, or blessedness, happiness and felicity without end, which He gives those who receive His Love. For as God is Love itself so also is He Blessedness itself, since all love breathes out from itself what is delightful, and the Divine Love breathes out blessedness itself, happiness and felicity to eternity. Thus God makes angels happy from Himself, and also men after death, by conjunction with them.
(True Christian Religion 43)
* Michael, the archangel.