Selection from Divine Providence ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven. (John 3:27)By means of His Divine providence the Lord leads the affections of a man's life's love, and at the same time leads his thoughts, from which human prudence is derived.
The affections of a man's life's love are known to the Lord alone.
Man knows his thoughts and consequent intentions, because he sees them in himself; and as all prudence is from these, he also sees that in himself. If, then, his life's love is love of self, he comes into the pride of his own intelligence and ascribes prudence to himself, and collects arguments in its favor, and thus recedes from the acknowledgment of the Divine providence. It is the same when his life's love is love of the world; although in this case he does not recede in the same degree. This shows that these two loves ascribe every thing to man and his prudence, and, when interiorly examined, ascribe nothing to God and His providence. Consequently, when such men happen to hear that the truth is that human prudence is nothing, but that it is the Divine providence alone that governs all things, if they are complete atheists they laugh at it; but if they retain in their memory something of religion, and it is said to them that all wisdom is from God, at the first hearing they assent, although inwardly in their spirit they deny it. Such, especially, are those priests who love themselves more than God, and the world more than heaven; or what is the same, who worship God for the sake of honor and gain, and yet have preached that charity and faith, every good and truth, also all wisdom and even prudence, are from God, and nothing from man.
HUMAN PRUDENCE, WHETHER IT IS FROM GOD OR FROM MAN
In the spiritual world I once heard two priests disputing with a certain royal ambassador about human prudence, whether it is from God or from man. The dispute grew warm. In heart the three believed alike, namely, that human prudence does all things, and the Divine providence nothing; but the priests, who were then in theological zeal, asserted that nothing of wisdom or prudence is from man; and when the ambassador retorted that then there is nothing of thought from man, they assented to this. And the angels perceiving that the three believed alike, the ambassador was told to put on priestly robes and to believe himself to be a priest, and then to speak. He put them on and believed, and then loudly declared that there could not possibly be anything of wisdom or prudence in man except from God; and with his accustomed eloquence, full of rational arguments, he defended this. Afterwards the two priests were told to lay aside their vestments and to put on the robes of officers of state, and to believe themselves to be such. This they did, and at once thought from their interior self, and spoke from arguments they had inwardly cherished before, in favor of human prudence and against Divine providence. After this the three, since they held the same belief, became cordial friends, and entered together upon the way of one's own prudence, which leads to hell.
NO THOUGHT IS POSSIBLE TO MAN EXCEPT FROM SOME AFFECTION OF HIS LIFE'S LOVE
Thought is nothing but the form of affection. Since, then, man sees his thought, but cannot see his affection, for that he feels, it follows that it is from sight, which is in the appearance, and not from affection, which comes into feeling and not into sight, that man concludes that his own prudence does all things. For affection is evident only through a certain delight in thought and satisfaction in reasoning about it; and this satisfaction and delight then make one with the thought in those who from self-love or love of the world believe in their own prudence; and thought floats on in its delight like a ship in the current of a stream, to which the master pays no attention, regarding only the sail he spreads.
Nevertheless, a man may reflect upon a delight of his external affection while that delight is acting as one with the delight of some bodily sensation. Nevertheless, he does not reflect upon the fact that this delight is from a delight of his affection in his thought. For example:
when a fornicator sees a lewd woman his eye glows with the fire of lasciviousness, and from that fire he feels a delight in the body. And yet in his thought he feels no delight of his affection or lust except a certain longing connected with the body. So a robber in a forest when he sees travelers; or a pirate on the sea when he sees vessels; and so on. Evidently it is these delights that rule the man's thoughts and the thoughts are nothing apart from them; yet they seem to him to be nothing but thoughts; when in fact, thoughts are nothing but affections so composed into forms by his life's love as to be presented in light; for all affection is in heat, and thought is in light.Such are the external affections of thought, which manifest themselves in bodily sensation, but rarely in the thought of the mind.
But the internal affections of thought, from which the external affections have their existence, never manifest themselves before man. Of these man knows no more than one sleeping in a carriage knows of the road, or than one feels the revolution of the earth.Considering, then, that man knows nothing of the things that are going on in the interiors of his mind, which are too limitless to be numbered, and yet those few externals that do come within the view of his thought are produced from the interiors, and the interiors are governed by the Lord alone by His Divine providence, and only those few externals by the Lord and man together, how can any one say that his own prudence does all things? If you were to see but one idea of thought laid open you would see wonderful things, more in number than tongue can express.
IN THE INTERIORS OF MAN'S MIND THERE ARE THINGS TOO LIMITLESS TO BE NUMBERED
That in the interiors of man's mind there are things too limitless to be numbered is clear from the infinite things in the body, from which nothing comes to sight or feeling except action only in much simplicity; and yet in this thousands of motor or muscular fibers concur, thousands of nerve fibers, thousands of blood-vessels, thousands of lung cells, all of which must co-operate in every action, thousands of cells in the brains and spinal cord, and many more yet in the spiritual man, which is the human mind, in which all things are forms of affections and of their perceptions and thoughts. Does not the soul, which directs the interiors, direct also the actions from them?
Man's soul is nothing else than the love of his will and the love therefrom of his understanding. The quality of that love is the quality of the whole man; and that is determined by the way in which the externals are disposed, in which man and the Lord co-operate.Consequently, if man attributes all things to himself and to nature the love of self becomes the soul; but if he attributes all things to the Lord, love to the Lord becomes the soul; and this love is heavenly, while the other is infernal.
Since, then, the delights of man's affections, from inmosts through interiors to exteriors, and finally to the outermosts which are in the body, bear man along as a current or breeze bears a ship, and nothing of these is evident to man except what goes on in the outermosts of the mind and of the body, how can man claim as his own what is Divine merely because these few outermosts appear to him to be his? Still less ought he to claim what is Divine as his own, when he knows from the Word that a man can of himself "receive nothing except it have been given him from heaven;" and from reason, that this appearance has been granted him in order that —
• he may live as a man,
• may see what is good and what is evil,
• may choose one or the other,
• may appropriate to himself that which he chooses,
• may thus be conjoined reciprocally with the Lord, be reformed, regenerated, saved, and may live for ever.
That this appearance has been granted to man in order that he may act from freedom in accordance with reason, thus as if from himself, and may not let his hands hang down and wait for influx.
Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees; and make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed.
Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled; lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. (Hebrews 12:12-17)
(from Divine Providence 197-200)