CHAPTER ONE.

life, is the life of love from Him; and true joy is the joy of that life. True love cannot be given except as a single thing, thus neither can true life be given except as a single thing, from which come true joys and true happiness, such as that of the angels in the heavens.

34. Love and faith can never be separated, because they constitute one and the same thing. Therefore, when the subject is first the "lights," they are taken as one, and it is said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens." It is permissible to relate wonders concerning this: Celestial angels, because they are in such love from the Lord, are in all the knowledges of faith from love, and from love are in such life and light of intelligence that it can hardly be described. Conversely, however, spirits who are in the knowledge of the doctrines of faith without love are in such a cold life and obscure light that they cannot even approach the first threshold of the court of heaven without fleeing backward. Some say that they have believed in the Lord, but they have not lived as He taught. Regarding them, the Lord says in Matthew: "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name?'" and what follows, VII. 21, 22, etc. From this it is evident that those who are in love are also in faith, and thus in heavenly life, but not those who say they are in faith while not being in the life of love. The life of faith without love is like the light of the sun without heat, as in winter, when nothing grows, but all things and each thing become torpid and die. But faith from love is like the light of the sun in spring, when all things grow and bloom, for the heat of the sun is what produces it. In spiritual and heavenly things it is the same, which are usually represented in the Word by things that are in the world and upon the earth. No faith, or faith without love, is also compared by the Lord to winter, when He predicted the consummation of the age in Mark: "Pray that your flight may not be in winter, for those days will be days of affliction," XIII. 18, 19. "Flight" is the final time, including that of every person when he dies; "winter" is a life of no love; "days of affliction" is his miserable state in the other life.

35. A human being has two faculties: the will and the understanding. When the understanding is governed by the will, they then together constitute one mind, and thus one life, for then what a person wills and does, he also thinks and intends. But when the understanding disagrees with the will—as it does with those who say they have faith but live otherwise—then the one mind is torn into two. One part wishes to take itself to heaven, the other tends toward hell; and because the will does everything, the whole person would rush to hell if the Lord did not have mercy on him.

36. Those who have separated faith from love do not even know what faith is. While they are in the idea of faith, some do not know it as anything other than mere thought; some, that it is thought toward the Lord; a few, that it is the doctrine of faith. But faith is not only the knowledge of all things that the doctrine of faith comprises, and the acknowledgment of them, but it is primarily obedience to all things that it teaches. The primary thing that it teaches, to which they are to be obedient, is the love of the Lord and the love of the neighbor. Whoever is not in this is not in faith. The Lord teaches this so clearly that it can never be doubted, in Mark, as follows: "The primary commandment of all is: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one; therefore you shall love the Lord...