Page:CONJUGIAL LOVE.djvu/93

Rh I said, "By these words of the Lord, "' [sic]This is the will of the Father, that every one that should have eternal life, John vi. 40.' 'God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that every one that should not perish, but should have eternal life,' John iii. 15, 16., hath eternal life; but he that believeth not the Son will not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him,' John iii. 36." He afterwards said, "Demonstrate also the third, and the next two doctrines:" I replied, "What need is there to demonstrate 'that evils ought to be shunned, because they are of the devil and from the devil; and 'that goods ought to be done, because they are of God and from God;' also 'that the latter are to be done by a man as from himself; but that he ought to believe that they are from the Lord with him and by him?" That these three doctrines are true, is confirmed by the whole Sacred Scripture from beginning to end; for what else is therein principally insisted on, but to shun evils and do goods, and believe on the Lord God? Moreover, without these three doctrines there can be no religion: for does not religion relate to life? and what is life but to shun evils and do goods? and how can a man do the latter and shun the former but as from himself? Therefore if you remove these doctrines from the church, you remove from it the Sacred Scripture, and also religion; and these being removed, the church is no longer a church." The man on hearing this retired, and mused on what he had heard; but still he departed in indignation.

83. are both internal and external origins of conjugial love, and several of each; nevertheless there is but one inmost or universal origin of all. That this origin is the marriage of good and truth, shall be demonstrated in what now follows. The reason why no one heretofore has deduced the origin of that love from this ground, is, because it has never yet been discovered that there is any union between good and truth; and the reason why this discovery has not been made, is, because good does not appear in the light of the understanding, as truth does, and hence the knowledge of it conceals itself and evades every inquiry: and as from this circumstance good is as it were unknown, it was impossible for any one to conjecture that any marriage subsisted between it and truth: yea, before the rational natural sight, good appears so different from truth, that no conjunction between them can be supposed. That this is the case, may be seen from Rh