" Their understanding makes the
acknowledgment, but if the will does not at the same time, they still do
not acknowledge. For the love of the will inspires in the understanding
what it wills (it is not the other way about); indeed, it destroys
everything in the understanding which is not from itself.

210. _All this can be effected only as it appears to man that he thinks
from himself and disposes by himself._ In what precedes we have shown
fully that unless it seemed to man that he lives of himself and thus
thinks and wills, speaks and acts of himself, he would not be man.
Consequently, unless he could in his own prudence make the disposition of
all pertaining to his function and life, he could not be led and guided
by divine providence. He would be like one with his hands hanging limp,
his mouth open, his eyes shut, holding his breath in expectation of
influx. He would divest himself of the human which he has from the
perception and sensation that he thinks, wills, speaks and acts as it
were of himself. At the same time he would divest himself of the two
faculties, liberty and rationality, distinguishing him from the beasts.
Above in this treatise and in the treatise _Divine Love and Wisdom_ it
was shown that without this appearance a man would not have the power to
receive or reciprocate nor have immortality then.

[2] If then you desire to be led by divine providence, use prudence as a
servant and minister that faithfully dispenses his master's goods. This
prudence is the talent given to the servants to trade with, of which they
were to give account (Lu 19:13-28; Mt 25:14-31). It seems to man to be
his own, and he believes it is his own as long as he holds shut up within
him the bitterest enemy God and divine providence have, the love of self.
This dwells in the interiors of every man by birth; if you do not
recognize it (and it wishes not to be recognized), it dwells securely and
guards the door lest man open the door and the Lord cast it out. The door
is opened by man through shunning evils as sins as if of himself with the
acknowledgment that he does so from the Lord. With this prudence divine
providence acts as one.

211. Divine providence operates so secretly that scarcely anyone is aware
it exists in order that man may not perish. For man's proprium, which is
his will, never acts at one with divine providence, against which it has
an inborn enmity. The proprium is the serpent which seduced the race's
parents