r, they were
shown that their persuasion which they called faith was merely like
the light of winter, in which light, because it has no heat in it,
all things on the earth are bound up in frost, become torpid, and lie
buried under the snow. As soon, therefore, as the light of persuasive
faith in them is touched by the rays of the light of heaven it is not
only extinguished but is turned into a dense darkness, in which no
one can see himself; and at the same time their interiors are so
obscured that they can understand nothing at all, and at length
become insane from falsities. Consequently with such, all the truths
that they have known from the Word and from the doctrine of the
church, and have called the truths of their faith, are taken away;
and they imbibe in their place every falsity that is in accord with
the evil of their life. For they are all let down into their loves
and into the falsities agreeing with them; and they then hate and
abhor and therefore reject truths, because they are repugnant to the
falsities of evil in which they are. From all my experience in what
pertains to heaven and hell I can bear witness that all those who
from their doctrine have professed faith alone, and whose life has
been evil, are in hell. I have seen many thousands of them cast down
to hell. (Respecting these see the treatise on The Last Judgment and
the Destruction of Babylon.)

483. (v) Love in act, that is, the life of man, is what endures. This
follows as a conclusion from what has just been shown from
experience, and from what has been said about deeds and works. Love
in act is work and deed.

484. It must be understood that all works and deeds pertain to moral
and civil life, and therefore have regard to what is honest and
right, and what is just and equitable, what is honest and right
pertaining to moral life, and what is just and equitable to civil
life. The love from which deeds are done is either heavenly or
infernal. Works and deeds of moral and civil life, when they are done
from heavenly love, are heavenly; for what is done from heavenly love
is done from the Lord, and everything done from the Lord is good. But
the deeds and works of moral and civil life when done from infernal
love are infernal; for what is done from this love, which is the love
of self and of the world, is done from man himself, and everything
that is done from man himself is in itself evil; for man regarded in
himself, that is, in regard to