shable flowers, put
around the evil lest it appear in its nakedness. That all who lead an
evil life, inwardly acknowledge nature and human prudence alone is not
known because of this general covering hiding it from view. The source
and cause of their acknowledgment, however, may make clear that they
acknowledge nature and one's own prudence. We shall say, therefore,
whence man's own prudence is and what it is; then whence divine
providence is and what it is; next who they are respectively, and of what
character, who acknowledge divine providence and who acknowledge man's
own prudence; and lastly show that those who acknowledge divine
providence are in heaven and that those who acknowledge man's own
prudence are in hell.

206. _Whence man's own prudence is and what it is._ It is from man's
proprium, which is his nature and is called his soul from his parent.
This proprium is self-love and the accompanying love of the world, or it
is love of the world and the accompanying self-love. Self-love by nature
regards self only and others as cheap or of no account. If it regards any
it does so as long as they honor and do it homage. Inmostly in that love,
like the endeavor in seed to fructify and propagate, there lies hidden
the desire to become great and if possible a king and then possibly a
god. A devil is such, for he is self-love itself; he adores himself and
favors no one unless he also adores him; another devil like himself he
hates, because he in turn wants alone to be adored. Since no love is
possible without its consort and the consort of love or of the will in
man is called the understanding, when self-love breathes itself into its
consort, the understanding, it becomes pride there, which is the pride of
self-intelligence, and from this comes man's own prudence.

[2] Inasmuch as self-love wants to be the one lord of the world and thus
a god, the lusts of evil which are derived from it have their life from
it, so have the perceptions of the lusts, which are schemes; likewise
the enjoyments of the lusts, which are evils, and the thoughts of the
lusts, which are falsities. All these are like slaves and ministers of
their lord, responding to his every nod, unaware that they do not act
but are acted upon; they are actuated by self-love through the pride of
self-intelligence. Hence man's own prudence because of its origin lies
concealed in every evil.

[3] The acknowledgment of nature alone is also hidden in it, for
self-