321. But these need to be explained in the order just given.

(a) If we convince ourselves of the appearance that wisdom and prudence come from ourselves and are therefore within us as our own possessions, it necessarily seems to us that if this were not the case we would not be human at all, only animals or statues; and yet the truth is just the opposite. A law of divine providence says that we are to think in apparent autonomy and act prudently in apparent autonomy but are to recognize that this comes from the Lord. It follows that if we do in fact think and act in apparent autonomy and also recognize that it is coming from the Lord we are human, but that we are not human if we convince ourselves that everything we think and do comes from ourselves. Nor are we human if we simply wait for something to flow in because we know that wisdom and prudence come from God. In this case, we are like statues, while in the former case we are like animals.

Clearly, if we wait for something to flow in, we are like statues. If all we can do is stand or sit motionless, hands hanging down, eyes either closed or open without blinking, neither thinking nor breathing--how much life do we have then?

[2] We can also see that if we believe that everything we think and do comes from ourselves, we are not all that different from animals. After all, we are then thinking solely with our earthly mind, the mind that we have in common with animals, and not with our spiritual rational mind, which is our truly human mind. It is this latter mind that realizes that only God thinks autonomously and that we think from God. Then too, the only difference our earthly mind can see between us and animals is that we talk and animals make noises. It believes that death is the same for both.

[3] Something more needs to be said about people who wait for something to flow in. The only people of this kind who actually receive anything are the few who deeply long for it. They occasionally receive a kind of answer through a vivid impression or a subtle voice in their thinking, but rarely through anything obvious. In any case, what they receive leaves them to think and act the way they want to and the way they can. If they act wisely they become wise, and if they act stupidly they become stupid. They are never told what to believe or what to do; otherwise their human rationality and freedom would be destroyed. That is, things are managed so that they act freely and rationally, and to all appearances, autonomously.

If some inflow tells us what to believe or what to do, it is not the Lord or any angel of heaven who is telling us but some fanatical spirit, perhaps Quaker or Moravian, and we are being led astray. Everything that flows in from the Lord flows in by an enlightenment of our understanding and by a desire for what is true, actually through the desire into the enlightenment.

[4] (b) It seems as though it would be impossible to believe and think in accord with the truth that everything good and true comes from the Lord and everything evil and false from hell, when in fact to do so is truly human and truly angelic. It seems possible to think and believe that everything good and true comes from the Lord as long as we say no more than that. This is because it is in accord with the official faith, and we are not allowed to think to the contrary. However, it seems impossible to think and believe that everything evil and false comes from hell, because if we believed this we would not be able to think at all. Still, we seem to think for ourselves even if it is coming from hell, because the Lord provides that no matter where our thinking is coming from it seems to be happening within us and to be ours. Otherwise, we would not live like humans. We could not be led out of hell and led into heaven--that is, reformed, as I have explained so often already [96, 114, 174, 210].

[5] So too, the Lord provides that we realize and therefore think we are in hell if we are bent on evil and that our thoughts are coming from hell if they come from evil. He also enables us to think of ways that we can get out of hell and not accept thoughts from hell but instead come into heaven and there think from him. He also gives us a freedom to choose. We can therefore see that we can think what is evil and false in apparent autonomy; and we can also think in apparent autonomy that one thing or another is evil and false. We can think that this autonomy is only the way things seem, and that otherwise we would not be human.

It is essentially human and therefore angelic to base our thoughts on the truth; and the truth is that we do not think on our own but that the Lord enables us to think, to all appearances autonomously.

[6] (c) Believing and thinking like this is impossible for people who do not acknowledge the Lord's divine nature and who do not acknowledge that evils are sins; but it is possible for people who acknowledge these two facts. The reason it is impossible for people who do not acknowledge the Lord's divine nature is that it is only the Lord who enables us to think and to intend, and if we do not acknowledge the Lord's divine nature, in isolation from him we believe that we are thinking on our own. The reason it is also impossible for people who do not acknowledge that evils are sins is that their thoughts are coming from hell, and all the people there believe that they are doing their own thinking.

We can tell from the abundance of material presented in 288-294 above that this is possible for people who acknowledge these two facts.

[7] (d) If we make these two acknowledgments, we simply reflect on the evils within ourselves and, to the extent that we abstain and turn from them as sins, throw them back into the hell they came from. Is there anyone who does not know--or who cannot know--that what is evil comes from hell and what is good comes from heaven? Can anyone, then, fail to see that we abstain from hell and turn away from it to the extent that we abstain and turn away from evil? On this basis, can anyone fail to see that we intend and love what is good to the extent that we abstain and turn away from evil, and that in fact the Lord releases us from hell to that same extent and leads us to heaven? All rational people can see this provided they know that hell and heaven exist and know where evil and good come from. If, then, we reflect on the evils in ourselves, which is the same as self-examination, and abstain from them, then we extricate ourselves from hell, turn our backs on it, and make our way into heaven where we see the Lord face to face. We may say that we are doing this, but we are doing it in apparent autonomy, and therefore from the Lord.

When we acknowledge this truth from a good heart and a devout faith, then it is subtly present from then on in everything we seem to ourselves to be thinking and doing, the way fertility is present in a seed at every step until the formation of a new seed, or the way there is pleasure in our appetite for the food that we realize is good for us. In a word, it is like the heart and soul of everything we think and do.

[8] (e) This means that divine providence is not charging anyone with evil or crediting anyone with good. Rather, our own prudence is making each of these claims. This follows from everything that has just been said. The goal of divine providence is goodness. That is what it is aiming at in everything it does; so it does not credit anyone with goodness, because that would make our goodness self-serving; and it does not charge anyone with evil, because that would make us guilty of evil. We make both of these claims out of our own sense of independence, because this sense of ours is nothing but evil. The claim to independence of our volition is self-love, and the claim to independence of our discernment is pride in our own intelligence; and that is where our own prudence comes from.

96. 7. The Lord protects these two abilities untouched within us and as things that are sacred through the whole course of his divine providence. There are several reasons for this. One is that without these two abilities there, we would have no discernment or volition and would therefore not be human. Another is that without these two abilities we could not be united to the Lord and therefore could not be reformed and regenerated. Then too, without these two abilities we would not have immortality or eternal life. We can see this to some extent from the view already given [71-95] of what freedom and rationality are (these are the two abilities). We cannot see this clearly, though, unless the propositions are presented to view as inferences, so I need to shed some light on them.

[2] Without these two abilities there we would have no discernment or volition and would therefore not be human. The only basis of our volition is our ability to intend as though we were doing so ourselves. Intending freely, with this apparent autonomy, comes from the ability the Lord is constantly giving us, the ability called freedom. For another thing, the only basis of our discernment is our ability to discern whether something is reasonable or not, again as though we were doing so ourselves. Discerning whether something is reasonable or not comes from the second ability that the Lord is constantly giving us, the ability called rationality.

These two abilities unite within us the way volition and discernment do, because there is no intent without discernment. Discerning is the mate or match of intending, necessary to its existence; so along with the ability called freedom we are given the ability called rationality.

[3] Then too, if you take away intending from discerning, you will not discern anything at all. You can understand to the extent that you try to, provided you have or have access to the resources called perceptions, since these are like an artisan's tools. When I say that you can discern to the extent that you try, it means to the extent that you love to discern, since volition and love are the same thing.

This may seem like a paradox, but that is only how it seems to people who do not love to discern and therefore do not try to; and people who do not try to discern claim that they cannot. I will, however, be explaining later [98] which people really cannot discern and which ones find it hard.

[4] We need no further support for the statement that if we did not have volition based on the ability called freedom and discernment based on the ability called rationality, we would not be human. Animals do not have these abilities. It may seem as though animals, too, can intend and can discern, but they cannot. There is an earthly desire, basically an impulse, with matching knowledge, that guides and impels them to do what they do. There is a social and moral component to this knowledge, but it does not transcend their knowledge, because animals have no spiritual level that would enable them to perceive what is moral and therefore think about it. They can be taught to do particular things, but this is strictly on the physical level. What they learn is added to their knowledge and to their impulses and is called forth either by sight or by hearing. However, it never becomes something that they think about, let alone something that they reason about. There is more on this subject above (see 74).

[5] Without these two abilities we could not be united to the Lord and therefore could not be reformed and regenerated. This has already been explained [82-86]. The Lord dwells within us in these two abilities whether we are evil or good, and uses them to unite everyone to himself. This is why evil people are as capable of discernment as good people, why potentially they intend what is good and discern what is true. If they do not have these characteristics in act, that is because of their misuse of the abilities.

The reason the Lord dwells in these abilities in each of us is found in the inflow of the Lord's intent, an intent that wants to be accepted by us, to make its dwelling within us, and to give us the happiness of eternal life. This is the Lord's intent because it comes from his divine love. It is this intent of the Lord that makes whatever we think and say and intend and do seem to be our own.

[6] There is ample evidence in the spiritual world that the inflow of the Lord's intent makes this happen. Sometimes the Lord fills an angel with his divine nature so completely that the angel's whole consciousness is of being the Lord. That is how the angels were filled whom Abraham, Hagar, and Gideon saw, angels who therefore called themselves Jehovah, as we read in the Word. In the same way, one spirit can be filled by another to the point of not realizing that she or he is not that other. I have seen this happen often. It is also common knowledge in heaven that the Lord always works through intention and that what happens is what he intends.

We can see from this that it is through these two abilities that the Lord unites himself to us and works things out so that we are united to him in return. I have already explained how we are united mutually through these abilities and how we are therefore reformed and regenerated, and will have much more to say about this below.

[7] Without these two abilities we would not have immortality or eternal life. This follows from what has already been presented, namely, that these abilities are the means to our union with the Lord and to our reformation and regeneration. It is through them that we have immortality and through reformation and regeneration that we have eternal life. Since we are all united to the Lord through these two abilities whether we are evil or good, as just noted, we all have immortality. However, we have eternal life, heaven's life, only if that union is mutual, from the core of our being to its outer limits. This enables us to see why the Lord protects these two abilities untouched within us and as things that are sacred through the whole course of his divine providence.