Page:Arcana Coelestia (Potts) vol 1.djvu/31

N. 32] love the Lord from the heart, but yet know, declare, and perceive, that all love, and consequently all life which is of love alone—and thus all happiness, come solely from the Lord, and that they have not the least of love, of life, or of happiness, from themselves. That it is the Lord from whom all love comes, was also represented by the great luminary or "sun," at His transfiguration, for it is written:—

Inmost things are signified by the face, and the things that proceed from them, by the raiment. Thus the Lord's Divine was signified by the "sun," or love; and His Human by the "light," or wisdom proceeding from love.

. It is in every one's power very well to know that no life is possible without some love, and that no joy is possible except that which flows from love. Such however as is the love, such is the life, and such the joy: if you were to remove loves, or what is the same thing, desires—for these are of love—thought would instantly cease, and you would become like a dead person, as has been shown me to the life. The loves of self and of the world have in them some resemblance to life and to joy, but as they are altogether contrary to true love, which consists in a man's loving the Lord above all things, and his neighbor as himself, it must be evident that they are not loves, but hatreds, for in proportion as any one loves himself and the world, in the same proportion he hates his neighbor, and thereby the Lord. Wherefore true love is love to the Lord, and true life is the life of love from Him, and true joy is the joy of that life. There can be but one true love, and therefore but one true life, whence flow true joys and true felicities, such as are those of the angels in the heavens.

. Love and faith admit of no separation, because they constitute one and the same thing; and therefore when mention is first made of "luminaries" they are regarded as one, and it is said, "let there be (sit) luminaries in the expanse of the heavens." Concerning this circumstance it is permitted me to relate the following wonderful particulars. The celestial angels, by virtue of the celestial love in which they are from the