The Nature of the Love of Self - An Infernalism so Absolute

From Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

The church is of such a nature that when charity toward the neighbor departs, and the love of self succeeds in its place, the doctrine of faith is of no account except insofar as it can be turned into the worship of self; and nothing whatever is accounted holy in worship unless it is for the sake of self, and thus unless it is self-worship.  All love of self is attended with this; for he who loves himself more than others, not only hates all who are not subservient to him, and shows them no favor except when they have become subservient, but also, insofar as he is not under restraint, he rushes on even until he exalts himself above God. That this is the nature of the love of self when the reins are given to it....

The love of self and every derivative cupidity is of all things the most filthy and the most profane, and is the veriest infernalism; and from this anyone may conclude what the quality of that worship must be which contains within it an infernalism so absolute.

(Arcana Coelestia 1304)

Two Beginnings of Falsities - One from ignorance of truth, the other from cupidities

From Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Falsity from ignorance of truth is not so pernicious as falsity from cupidities. For the falsity of ignorance arises either from one's having been so instructed from childhood, or from having been diverted by various occupations so that one has not examined whether what professes to be true is really so, or from not having had much faculty of judging concerning what is true and what is false. The falsities from these sources do not inflict much harm, provided the man has not much confirmed and thus persuaded himself, being incited thereto by some cupidity so as to defend the falsities; for by doing this he would make the cloud of ignorance dense, and turn it into darkness so that he could not see the truth.

But the falsity of cupidities exists when the origin of the falsity is the cupidity or love of self and of the world; as when one seizes upon some point of doctrine and professes it in order to captivate minds and lead them, and explains or perverts the doctrine in favor of self, and confirms it both by reasonings from memory-knowledges, and by the literal sense of the Word. The worship derived from this is profane, however holy it may outwardly appear; for inwardly it is not the worship of the Lord, but the worship of self. Nor does such a man acknowledge anything as true except insofar as he can explain it so as to favor himself. Such worship is that which is signified by "Babel."

But the case is different with those who have been born and brought up in such worship, and who do not know that it is false, and who live in charity. In their ignorance there is innocence, and in their worship there is good from charity.

The profanity in worship is not predicated so much from the worship itself, as from the quality of the man who is in the worship.

(Arcana Coelestia 1295)

True Love

From the Posthumous Theological Works of Emanuel Swedenborg

Canons of the New Church

1. Love is spiritual conjunction.

2. True love cannot be quiescent in itself, and be restrained within its own limits, but it wills to go forth and embrace others with love.

3. True love wills to be conjoined to others, and to communicate with them, and to give of its own.

4. True love wills to dwell in others, and in itself from others.

5. The Divine Love, which is Love itself, and God Himself, wills that it may be in a subject which is His image and likeness; consequently He wills to be in man, and man to be in Him.

6. In order that this may be effected, it follows from the very essence of Love, which is in God, and hence from an urgent cause, that the universe must needs be created by God, in which are earths, and upon them men, and in the men minds and souls, with which the Divine Love can be conjoined.

7. Therefore all things which are created regard man as the end.

8. Since the angelic heaven is formed from men, from their spirits and souls, all things which are created regard the angelic heaven as the end.

9. The angelic heaven is the habitation itself of God with men, and of men with God.

10. Eternal beatitudes, felicities, and delights together, are the ends of creation, because they are of love.

11. This end is the inmost; thus as it were, the life and soul, and as force and endeavor in each and all created things.

12. That end is God in them.

13. This end implanted in created things, in general and in particular, causes the universe to be preserved in the created state, in so far as the ends of an opposite love do not obstruct and destroy.

14. God from His Divine Omnipotence, Omnipresence, and Omniscience, continually provides lest opposite ends from opposite loves should prevail, and the work of creation be ruined even to destruction.

15. Preservation is perpetual creation, as subsistence is perpetual existence.

(Canons Chp 7:11)