10203. 'Incense shall be continual before Jehovah' means in all worship springing from love received from the Lord. This is clear from the meaning of 'incense' as worship springing from love, dealt with in 9475; from the meaning of 'continual' as all and within all, dealt with in 10133; and from the meaning of 'before Jehovah' as from the Lord, dealt with in 10146. The expression 'worship springing from love received from the Lord' is used because both faith and love, the essential elements of worship, come from the Lord, and also the raising up to the Lord of everything of worship is done by Him. The person who has no knowledge of the arcana of heaven supposes that worship comes from himself since he thinks about and pays homage to the Lord. But worship which comes from a person himself is not worship; only that which comes from the Lord with a person is such. For love and faith compose worship, and since love and faith come from the Lord worship too comes from Him. Nor is a person able to raise anything from himself up to heaven; it is the Lord who raises it. Within the person there is solely the capacity for this to happen, which he is endowed with when being regenerated, 6148; but all the motive force and energy of that capacity come from the Lord.

Life itself comes from the Lord, and men and angels are recipient forms, see 1954, 2021, 2536, 2706, 3001, 3318, 3484, 3741-3743, 4151, 4249, 4318-4320, 4417, 4523, 4524, 4882, 5847, 5986, 6325, 6467, 6468, 6470, 6472, 6479, 9338.

2886. With regard to man's affections and to his thoughts, the position is that no one at all, whether man, spirit, or angel, is able to will or to think from himself, but does so from others. Nor are those others themselves the source of anything they will or think, but others again, and so on with these. Thus each individual wills and thinks from the First Source of life, who is the Lord. Anything that is not connected to a prior source cannot occur. Evils and falsities have a connection with the hells, and so the hells are the source of the thinking and willing of people immersed in evils and falsities, and also the source of their love, affection, and delight, and consequently of their freedom. But goods and truths have a connection with heaven, and so heaven is the source of the thinking and willing of people with whom goods and truths are present, and also the source of their love, affection, and delight, and consequently of their freedom. From this it becomes clear where the first type of freedom originates and where the second. The truth of this is very well known in the next life, but it is totally unknown at the present time in the world.