TEN LAWS OF THE DIVINE PROVIDENCE
Selections from Apocalypse Explained ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
[Interspersed Series Between Numbers 1135 - 1194 From The Apocalypse Explained]
Lesson 4
(4) The fourth law of the Divine providence is, That the understanding and will must not be compelled in the least, since all compulsion by another takes away freedom, but man should compel himself-for to compel oneself is from freedom. Man's freedom belongs to his will, and from the will it is in the
thought of the understanding, and through the thought in the speech of the lips and in the action of the body. For when a man wills anything from freedom he says, I will to think this, I will to speak this, and I will to do this. Moreover, from the freedom of the will man has the ability to think, to speak, and to act; for the will gives this ability,
because it gives freedom. Since freedom belongs to man's will it also belongs to his love, since nothing constitutes freedom in man except the love that is of his will; and for this reason that love is man's life; for man is such as his love is; consequently whatever goes forth from the love of his will goes forth from his life. This makes clear that
freedom belongs to man's will, to his love, and to his life, consequently that it makes one with what is his own [proprium] and with his nature and disposition.
Now because it is the Lord's will that everything that comes from Himself to man should be appropriated to man as if it were his own, since otherwise there would be in man no reciprocal by which conjunction is effected, so it is a law of the Divine providence that man's understanding and will should not
be compelled in the least by another. For who is not able to think and will evil or good, against the laws or with the laws, against the king or with the king, and even against God or with God? Yet man is not allowed to speak and do everything that he thinks and wills. There are fears that compel the externals, but they do not compel the internals; and for
the reason that the externals must be reformed by means of the internals, and not the internals by means of the externals; for what is internal flows into what is external, and not the reverse. Moreover, internals belong to man's spirit, and externals to his body, and as it is the spirit of man that must be reformed the spirit is not compelled.
Nevertheless, there are fears that compel man's internals or his spirit, but they are only such fears as flow in from the spiritual world, and which relate on the one hand to the punishments of hell, and on the other to the loss of favor with God. But fear on account of the punishments of hell is an
external fear of the thought and will, while the fear of the loss of favor with God is an internal fear of the thought and will, and is the holy fear that adds and conjoins itself to the love, with which at length it makes one essence. It is like one who loves another and from love fears to injure him.
There is infernal freedom and there is heavenly freedom. Infernal freedom is that into which man is born from his parents, and heavenly freedom is that into which man is reformed by the Lord. From infernal freedom man has the will of evil, the love of evil, and the life of evil; while from heavenly
freedom he has the will of good, the love of good, and the life of good; for as has been said before, a man's will, love and life, make one with his freedom. These two kinds of freedom are opposites of each other, but the opposition is not evident except so far as man is in one and not in the other. But a man cannot come out of infernal freedom into
heavenly freedom unless he compels himself. To compel oneself is to resist evil and to fight against it as if from oneself, but still to implore the Lord for help. Thus a man fights from the freedom that is inwardly in him from the Lord against the freedom that is outwardly in him from hell. While he is in the combat it seems to him that it is not freedom
from which he fights, but a kind of compulsion, because it is against that freedom into which he was born; and yet it is freedom, since otherwise he would not fight as if of himself.
But this inward freedom from which he fights, which seems like compulsion, is afterwards felt as freedom, for it becomes like what is involuntary, spontaneous, and as it were innate, comparatively like one's compelling his hand to write, to work, to play a musical instrument, or to contend in games, for
after a while the hands and arms do these things as if of themselves or spontaneously; for man is then in good because he is then removed from evil and is led by the Lord. When a man has compelled himself to act in opposition to infernal freedom he sees and perceives that infernal freedom is servitude and that heavenly freedom is freedom itself, because it
is from the Lord. The essence of the matter is this, that so far as a man compels himself by resisting evils, so far the infernal societies with which he acts as one are removed from him, and he is introduced by the Lord into heavenly societies, with which he acts as one. On the other hand, if a man does not compel himself to resist evils he remains in
them. That this is so I have learned through much experience in the spiritual world, and further, that evil does not withdraw in consequence of any compulsion that comes from punishments, or from fear of them afterwards.
It has been said above that it is a law of the Divine providence that man himself should compel himself; but this means that he should compel himself from evil, and does not mean that he should compel himself to good; for it is possible for man to compel himself from evil, but not to compel himself to
good that in itself is good. For when a man compels himself to good and has not compelled himself from evil he does good from himself and not from the Lord, for he compels himself to it for the sake of self, or for the sake of the world, or for the sake of recompense, or from fear; and such good is not in itself good, because the man himself or the world
or recompense is in it as its end, and not the good itself, thus neither the Lord; and it is love and not fear that makes good to be good. For example, to compel oneself to do good to one's neighbor, to give to the poor, to endow churches, to do what is righteous, thus to compel oneself to charity and truth before compelling oneself from evils and thereby
removing them, would be like a palliative treatment by which the disease or ulcer is healed externally; or like an adulterer compelling himself to act chastely, or a proud man to act humbly, or a dishonest man to act honestly in external conduct.
But when a man compels himself from evils he purifies his internal, and when that is purified he does good from freedom without compelling himself to do it; for so far as a man compels himself from evil so far he comes into heavenly freedom, and everything good that is in itself good is from that
freedom, and to such good man does not compel himself. The appearance is that compelling oneself from evil and compelling oneself to good necessarily go together, but they do not. I know from the evidence of experience of many who have compelled themselves to do goods, but not from evils; and when such were explored it was found that evils from within
clung to the goods, and in consequence their goods were like idols or images made of clay or dung; and it was said that such persons believe that God may be gained over by praise and gifts, even from an impure heart. Nevertheless, before the world a man may compel himself to goods without compelling himself from evil, since in the world he is rewarded for
so doing; for in the world the external is regarded and rarely the internal; but before God it is not so.
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