Page:The Doctrines of the New Church Briefly Explained.djvu/92

86 is effected solelv by living according to the precepts of the Lord." (A. C. 10, 659.)

"Instantaneous reformation and consequent salvation would be comparatively like the instantaneous conversion of an owl into a dove and of a serpent into a sheep. . . . It is evident that all who think of salvation from life, think of no instantaneous salvation by immediate mercy, but of the means of salvation in which and through which the Lord operates according to the laws of his Divine Providence; that is, through which man is led by the Lord out of pure mercy. . . . Instantaneous salvation out of immediate mercy, is the fiery flying serpent in the church." (D. P. 338, '40.)

"Salvation comes from the life which a man has procured for himself in the world by the knowledges of faith. This life remains; whereas all thought which does not agree with a man's life, perishes and becomes as if it had never existed. Heavenly consociations are formed according to the kinds of life, and by no means according to the kinds of thought which are not in agreement with the life." (A. C. n. 2228.)

By most Christians—by all, indeed, who have assumed the title of "evangelical"—the doctrine of the Cross is esteemed the most precious and vital of all the doctrines of Christianity. There is no other doctrine so much dwelt upon by the