645. The Word from beginning to end is full of things that bear witness to and reinforce the idea that the basis upon which we are all assigned spiritual credit or blame [after death] is whether our actions were good or evil. Christian theologians must be blocking their ears with a kind of wax and smearing their eyes with a kind of ointment to prevent themselves from ever hearing or seeing anything but the idea that their faith is the basis of salvation.

Their faith is exactly like an eye disease; it is called "transparent blockage," and it deserves to be called that, because it is a total blindness caused by an obstruction in the optic nerve, and yet the eye appears fully able to see. In a similar way, those who are devoted to that concept of faith walk around with their eyes wide open, seeming as though they can see perfectly well, and yet they cannot see a thing. They say we know nothing about that faith when it enters us, for we are like a log at the time. When we have received it we supposedly have no idea whether that faith is in us, and whether it contains anything or not. Again, they claim to see clearly that that faith then conceives and gives birth to the noble offspring of being justified: namely, having sins forgiven, being brought to life, being renewed, being regenerated, and being sanctified - and yet they say they do not see, and would not be able to see, a single sign of any of those results.