it lies inwardly
hidden in all that he thinks and does afterwards as of himself. It is
like the prolific force in a seed which remains in it even until new seed
is produced, and like the pleasure in one's appetite for food the
wholesomeness of which one has learned; in a word, like heart and soul in
all he thinks and does.

[8] Fifth: _So divine providence appropriates neither evil nor good to
anyone, but one's own prudence appropriates both._ This follows from all
that has been said. Good is the objective of divine providence; it
purposes good in all its activity, therefore. Accordingly, it does not
appropriate good to anyone, for then this would become self-righteous;
nor does it appropriate evil to anyone, for so it would make him
responsible for evil. But man does both by his proprium, for this is
nothing but evil. The proprium of the will is self-love and that of the
understanding is the pride of self-intelligence, and of these comes man's
own prudence.

XVII. EVERY MAN CAN BE REFORMED, AND THERE IS NO PREDESTINATION [as
commonly understood*]

* See n. 330 - Tr.

322. Sound reason dictates that all are predestined to heaven and none to
hell, for all are born human beings and consequently God's image is in
them. God's image in them consists in their ability to understand truth
and to do good. The ability to understand truth comes from the divine
wisdom, and the ability to do good from the divine love. This ability,
which is God's image, remains in any sane person and is not eradicated.
Hence it is that he can become a civil and moral man, and one who is
civil and moral can also become spiritual, for the civil and moral is a
receptacle of what is spiritual. He is called a civil man who knows and
lives according to the laws of the kingdom of which he is a citizen; he
is called a moral man who makes those laws his ethics and his virtues and
from reason lives by them.

[2] Let me say how civil and moral life is the receptacle of spiritual
life. Live these laws not only as civil and moral laws but also as divine
laws, and you will be a spiritual man. There is hardly a nation so
barbarous that it has not by law prohibited murder, adultery, theft,
false witness and damage to what is another's. The civil and moral man
keeps these laws that he may be, or seem to be, a good citizen. If he
does not consider them divine laws also he is only a civil and moral
natural man, but if he considers them divine also, he becomes a