Page:A Compendium of the Theological Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg.djvu/141

Rh is the form of good, or when truth is good in a form which the understanding can apprehend. It may also be said of the understanding that it goes forth or proceeds from the will, when the understanding is the will formed, or when it is the will in a form apperceivable to the internal sight. In like manner of thought which is of the understanding, it may be said to go forth or proceed when it becomes speech; and of the will, when it becomes action. Thought clothes itself in another form when it becomes speech, but it is still the thought which so goes forth or proceeds, for the words and sounds which are put on are nothing but adjuncts, which by accommodation cause the thought to be apperceived. So the will assumes another form when it becomes action, but it is still the will which is presented in such form; the gestures and motions that are put on are nothing but adjuncts, which by accommodation make the will appear and affect the external man. Also it may be said that it goes forth or proceeds from the internal, yea, substantially, because the external man is nothing else than the internal so formed that it may act suitably in the world wherein it is. From all this it may be seen what, to go forth, or proceed, is in the spiritual sense; namely, when predicated of the Lord, that it is the Divine formed as Man, thus accommodated to the perception of the believing; yet both are one. (A. C. n. 5337.)

One may be surprised that it is said there was hereditary evil from the mother with the Lord; but as it is here (Gen. xiii. 7) so manifestly declared, and the internal sense is concerning the Lord, it cannot be doubted that it was so. It is quite impossible for any man to be born of a human parent and not thence derive evil. But there is a difference between hereditary evil which is derived from the father, and that which is derived from the mother. Hereditary evil from the father is more interior, and remains to eternity, for it can never be eradicated. The Lord had no such evil, since He was born of Jehovah as His Father, and thus as to internals was Divine, or Jehovah. But hereditary evil from the mother pertains to the external man: this was with the Lord. Thus the Lord was born as another man, and had infirmities as another man. That He derived: hereditary evil from the mother evidently appears from the fact that He suffered temptations; for it is impossible that any one should be tempted who has no evil, evil being that in man which tempts and by which he is tempted. That the Lord was tempted, and that He suffered temptations a thousand times more grievous