PROVIDENCE (pt. 5)

The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine
Emanuel Swedenborg
• Doctrinal Series •
PROVIDENCE
(pt. 5)

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The reason why the evil succeed in evils according to their arts is, because it is according to Divine order that everyone should act what he acts from reason, and also from freedom; wherefore, unless man were left to act from freedom according to his reason, and thus unless the arts which are thence derived were to succeed, man could by no means be disposed to receive eternal life, for this is insinuated when man is in freedom, and his reason is enlightened. For -

• no one can be compelled to good because nothing that is compelled inheres with him, for it is not his own:

• that becomes a man's own, which is done from freedom according to his reason

• that is done from freedom which is done from the will or love,

• the will or love is the man himself.

If a man were compelled to that which he does not will, his mind would continually incline to that which he wills; and besides, everyone strives after what is forbidden, and this from a latent cause, because he strives for freedom. Whence it is evident that unless man were kept in freedom, good could not be provided for him.

To leave man from his own freedom also to think, to will, and, so far as the laws do not restrain him, to do evil, is called permitting.

(The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine 271-272)

PROVIDENCE (pt. 4)

The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine
Emanuel Swedenborg
• Doctrinal Series •
PROVIDENCE
(pt. 4)

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Everyone who rightly considers, may know that eminence and opulence in the world are not real divine blessings, notwithstanding man, from his pleasure in them, calls them so; for they pass away, and also seduce many, and turn them away from heaven; but that eternal life, and its happiness, are real blessings, which are from the Divine: this the Lord also teaches in Luke:

Make to yourselves a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where the thief approacheth not, neither the moth corrupteth; for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also (Luke 12:33, 34).

(The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine 270)

PROVIDENCE (pt. 3)

The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine
Emanuel Swedenborg
• Doctrinal Series •
PROVIDENCE
(pt. 3)

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They who think from worldly things concerning the Divine Providence, conclude from them that it is only universal, and that the particulars appertain to man. But they do not know the arcana of heaven, for they form their conclusions only from the loves of self and of the world, and their pleasures; wherefore, when they see the evil exalted to honors, and acquire wealth more than the good, and also succeed in evils according to their arts, they, say in their heart, that it would not be so if the Divine Providence were in each and all things; but they do not consider that the Divine Providence does not regard that which soon passes away, and ends with the life of man in the world, but that it regards that which remains to eternity, thus which has no end.

What has no end, that is; but what has an end, that respectively is not.

Let him who can, think whether a hundred thousand years are anything compared to eternity, and he will perceive that they are not; what then are some years of life in the world?

(The New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine 269)