Wholly from Good

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Good is the source of truths, and truths from good are the source of memory-knowledges. So is the one derived and produced from the other. Nevertheless good is everything in its products and derivatives, because these are from good. The case herein is like that with end, cause, and effect.

The end is everything of the cause, and the cause is everything of the effect; whence it follows that the end is everything of the effect, insomuch that if the end or final cause is withdrawn, there is no efficient cause and no effect of it.

In like manner do the celestial, the spiritual, and the natural succeed each other; from the celestial is all the spiritual, and from the spiritual is all the natural, that is, from the celestial through the spiritual.

With man all is called "celestial" that is of the good of love, all "spiritual" that is of the truth of faith thence derived, and all "natural" that is of memory-knowledge. That memory-knowledge is natural, is because this knowledge is truth appearing in the light of the world; whereas the truth of faith, insofar as it is of faith with man, is in the light of heaven.

From all this it can now be seen how one thing is produced and derived from another, and that the first is everything in the products and derivatives, insomuch that if the first is withdrawn, the things which follow from it perish.

Everyone capable of perception can know that the Divine is the first of all things, and therefore is the all in all of the order of things, thus in all things of good and truth which make heaven, and which make the life of heaven, with man. Consequently good from the Divine is in all the truths of faith, and if good is not everything in them, and if the Divine of the Lord is not everything in good, the man has in him nothing of heaven, thus nothing of the church.

But the Divine of the Lord is in all things of good with a man, and from this in all things of truth with him, when he wills from love, and believes from the consequent faith, that all good and all truth, thus everything of love and everything of faith, are from the Lord, and absolutely nothing from himself; and also that he possesses the truth of faith in the exact proportion of his reception of good from the Lord; for, as before said, good is the all in all things of truth, and truth without good is truth without life.

(from Arcana Coelestia 9568)

The Lord's Presence

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

The Lord is indeed present with everyone; for life is from no other source, and He governs the most minute things of it, even with the worst of men, and in hell itself, but in various ways according to the reception of life.

With those who receive the life of the love of His good and truth in a wrong manner, and pervert it into loves of evil and falsity, the Lord is present, and overrules their ends as far as possible for good, but His presence with them is called absence, and indeed in the same degree in which evil is distant from good, and falsity from truth. BUT with those who receive the life of the love of the Lord's good and truth, He is said to be present, and indeed according to the degree of reception. It is with the Lord's presence as with that of the sun, which is present with its heat and light in the vegetation of the world also according to the reception.

(from Arcana Coelestia 2706)

How Life is Received

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

The life of everyone, both of man, of spirit, and also of angel, flows in solely from the Lord, who is life itself; and diffuses itself through the whole heaven and also through hell, thus into everyone; and this in an order and series incomprehensible: but the life which flows in is received by each one according to his disposition.

Good and truth are received as good and truth by the good; but good and truth are received as evil and falsity by the evil, and are also turned into evil and falsity in them.

The case with this is comparatively like the light of the sun, which diffuses itself into all the objects of the earth, but is received according to the quality of each object, and becomes of a beautiful color in beautiful forms, and of a disagreeable color in disagreeable forms. In the world this is an arcanum, but nothing is better known in the other life.

(from Arcana Coelestia 2888)