A Church When It Is Beginning To Recede From Charity -

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

... 
So far as possible the Lord is continually putting evils and falsities to flight, but through conscience. When conscience is relaxed, there is no medium through which the Lord can flow in, for the Lord's influx with man is by means of charity into his conscience. But in place of this charity a new medium succeeds and is formed, which is external, namely, the fear of the law, fear for life, for honors and wealth, and the reputation from these. But these are not of conscience; they are only external bonds which enable a man to live in society with others, and to appear as a friend, whatsoever he may be inwardly.

But this medium, or these bonds, are of no account in the other life, for there externals are removed, and everyone remains as he is internally. There are very many who have lived a moral and a civic life, have injured no one, have performed acts of friendship and civility, nay, have done good to many, but only for the sake of self, with a view to honors, gain, and the like. In the other life these are among the infernals, because they have nothing of good and truth within, but only evil and falsity, nay, hatred, revenge, cruelty, adulteries, which do not appear before man, that is to say insofar as the fears just referred to, which are external bonds, prevail.

(Arcana Coelestia 1835)

What Truths of Faith are from Love

From Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

When men go forth who after their decease come into the other life, and bring with them the truths of faith in the natural or exterior memory only, and not in the spiritual or interior memory, they seem to themselves to wander about among rocks and in forests.

But when men go forth who bring with them the truths of faith in the spiritual memory also, they seem to themselves to walk among cultivated hills, and also in gardens.

The reason is that the truths of faith of the exterior or natural memory (which are memory-knowledges) have no life unless they are at the same time in the interior or spiritual memory; for the things which are in this latter memory have been made of life, because the interior or spiritual memory is man's book of life; and the things which are of life are represented in heaven by gardens, oliveyards, vineyards, and by flower-beds and shrubberies; and the things of charity, by hills where such things are; but those things which are not of life are represented by rocky places and thickets which are bare and rough.

It shall be briefly told what are truths of faith from love. Truths of faith from love are truths which love dictates, thus which derive their being from love. These truths are living, because the things which are from love are living. Consequently the truths of faith from love are those which treat of love to the Lord and charity toward the neighbor, for these are the truths which love dictates. The whole Word is the doctrine of such truths; for in its spiritual sense the Word treats solely of things which belong to the Lord and the neighbor, thus which belong to love to the Lord and toward the neighbor. It is from this that the Word is living. This is meant by the statement that "on these two commandments hang the Law and the Prophets" (Matt. 22:34-40); "the Law and the Prophets" denote the Word in its whole complex.

But truths of faith from love are not bare knowledges of such things with man in the memory, and from this in the understanding; but they are affections of life with him; for the things which a man loves and therefore does, are of his life. There are also truths of faith which do not, like the former, treat of love; but which merely confirm these truths more nearly, or more remotely. These truths of faith are called secondary truths.

For the truths of faith are like families and their generations in succession from one father. The father of these truths is the good of love from the Lord and consequently to Him, thus it is the Lord; for whether we say the Lord, or love from Him and consequently to Him, it is the same thing; because love is spiritual conjunction, and causes Him to be where the love is; for love causes him who is loved to be present in itself.

(Arcana Coelestia 9841)

The Means of Reformation Provided by the Lord

From Doctrine of Life ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

The means of reformation provided by the Lord are these: Man is born in mere ignorance; whilst an infant he is kept in a state of external innocence, soon after in a state of external charity, and then in a state of external friendship; but as he comes to exercise thought from his own understanding, he is kept in a certain freedom of acting according to reason.

While man is in the world, he is in the midst between hell and heaven: beneath is hell, and above is heaven; and he is kept in freedom to turn himself either to hell or to heaven. If he turns himself to hell, he turns away from heaven; but if he turns himself to heaven, he turns away from hell. Or, what is the same, while man is in the world, he stands in the midst between the Lord and the devil, and is kept in freedom to turn himself either to the one or to the other. If he turns himself to the devil, he turns away from the Lord; but if he turns himself to the Lord, he turns away from the devil. Or, what is the same, while man is in the world, he is in the midst between evil and good, and is kept in freedom to turn himself either to the one or to the other. If he turns himself to evil, he turns away from good; but if he turns himself to good, he turns away from evil.

Now as evil and good are two opposites, precisely like hell and heaven, or like the devil and the Lord, it follows that if man shuns an evil as sin, he comes into the good that is an opposite to the evil. ...

Since this good and that evil are opposites, it follows that the latter is removed by the former. Two opposites cannot exist together, as heaven and hell cannot exist together. If they were together there would exist that lukewarm state concerning which it is written in the Revelation:

I know . . . that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot.

So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. Rev. 3:15, 16.

(Doctrine of Life 69-71)