Page:Heaven Revealed.djvu/337

 except it be doing from love and with it; and doing is use. Therefore use is to do good from love by means of wisdom. Use is good itself."—C. L. n. 183.

Uses, therefore, or love and wisdom ultimated and fixed in deeds, are the essential things in God's kingdom. The angelic heaven is a kingdom of uses, and every angel is a form of some particular use. Use, moreover, is the containant of all true heavenly life, and every angel is happy according to the nature of his use, and to the affection and earnestness with which he devotes himself to it.

Such is Swedenborg's uniform teaching on this subject. Is it true? is the next and vital question to be considered.

It is generally canceded that God is the one infinite Source of life. He alone is Life Itself. And life is forever active. Life and inaction are incompatible ideas. The two cannot coexist. One forbids or dissipates the other, as surely as light disperses the darkness. God is Life, and Life is inseparable from action. Therefore He never has ceased and never can cease to work. He not only did create, but is forever creating. He not only did make, but is now and forever making men in his own image and likeness; yes, and making worlds, and fitting them for the abode and sustenance of human beings. He is everywhere and always working—always creating and preserving; for it is not in the nature of Life to cease from action. This is a central truth. As saith the incarnate Word: "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work."

Now, as He from whom creation sprang is forever