Page:Beauty for Ashes.djvu/88

82 We might suppose that, if they have been guilty of no actual transgressions, they would be lacking in Christian humility, or that continual sense of dependence on the Lord, which those feel who have experienced His gracious deliverance from the thraldom of sin. We might suppose that they would fall into a state of spiritual pride or self-righteousness, and imagine that they were good in and of themselves alone. This, however, is provided against with infinite wisdom and care. In order to induce in them a becoming humility, and to convince them where and what they are hereditarily—to convince them, that, in and of themselves they are nothing but evil, and that they are every moment dependent on the Lord for whatever good there is in them, they are occasionally remitted into their hereditary evils, and kept in them until they see and acknowledge this great truth. Upon this point Swedenborg says: