to which he may be
inclined from some love, or to which he may be drawn from some
principle, whereby his mind becomes unsettled and uncertain, and at
length as it were destitute of truth. But he who reads the Word from
doctrine sees all things that confirm it, and many things that are
hidden from the eyes of others, and does not permit himself to be drawn
away into strange things; and thus his mind becomes so settled as to see
with certainty.

Again, unless the Word is read from doctrine it may be drawn away to
confirm heresies, for the reason that the sense of its letter consists
of mere correspondences, and these are in great part appearances of
truth, and in part genuine truths, and unless there be doctrine for a
lamp these cannot be seen and cannot be distinguished from each other.

And yet only from the Word can doctrine be acquired, and it can be
acquired only by those who are in enlightenment from the Lord. Those
are in enlightenment who love truths because they are truths and make
them to be of their life. Moreover, all things of doctrine must be
confirmed by the sense of the letter of the Word, because Divine truth
is in its fullness and in its power in that sense, and through it man is
in conjunction with the Lord and in consociation with the angels. In
brief, he who loves truth because it is truth can inquire of the Lord,
as it were, in doubtful matters of faith, and can receive answers from
Him, but nowhere except in the Word for the reason that the Lord is the
Word. (A.E., n. 1089.)

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SPIRITUAL LIFE AND THE WORD OF GOD***

******* This file should be named 14026.txt or 14026.zip *******

This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/4/0/2/14026

Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
will be renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules,
set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project
Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
charge for the eBooks, unless you receive spe