Page:Swedenborg's Doctrine of Correspondence.djvu/152

146 thought, will say, "I see this and know that it flows in from evil spirits into the inclinations of my self-love, but because it is contrary to the Lord's Word I will not do it," then the evil spirits are compelled to withdraw; the truth adopted as a principle of action is appropriated; the will of good is internally strengthened; and an advance in spiritual life is achieved.

This is in brief the doctrine of life for the New Jerusalem. And it is based upon the doctrine of Redemption, which is, that the Lord took our nature upon Him, with its hereditary evil, or disordered recipient forms, that in it His love and wisdom might be assaulted by evil spirits, and by combats against them subjugate them to the Divine Truth and keep them in subjection to eternity. He did more than take on "all the functions of our externalized human nature," more than to "enter upon our false and terrible dream," whatever the Doctor may mean by these vague expressions. He actually took our nature, all of it, with its hereditary perverted forms, so far as they could be assumed through the mother without a human father; "He was tempted in all points in which we are; yet without sin," for He did not "enter