33. It will now be stated briefly how a man can be more nearly conjoined to the Lord, and then how the conjunction appears more and more near. A man is more and more nearly conjoined to the Lord, not by knowledge alone, nor by intelligence alone, nor even by wisdom alone, but by a life conjoined to these. Man's life is his love, and love is manifold. In general, there is the love of evil and the love of good. The love of evil is the love of committing adultery, taking revenge, defrauding, blaspheming, and depriving others of their goods. The love of evil has a sense of pleasure and delight in thinking about these things and in doing them; and the desires, or the affections which spring from this love, are as numerous as the evils in which it has found expression; and the perceptions and thoughts of this love are as numerous as the falsities which favour these evils and confirm them. These falsities make one with the evils, as the understanding makes one with the will; they are not separated from each other, because one is of the other. [2] Now because the Lord flows into the life's love of everyone, and through its affections into his perceptions and thoughts, and not the reverse, as was said above, it follows that the Lord can conjoin Himself more nearly only so far as the love of evil with its affections, which are lusts, has been removed. As these reside in the natural man, and as whatever a man does from the natural man he feels as if he does from himself, therefore he ought, as if from himself, to remove the evils of that love; and as far as he does this the Lord draws nearer, and conjoins Himself to him. Anyone can see from reason that lusts with their delights obstruct and close the door before the Lord, and that these cannot be cast out by the Lord so long as man himself holds the door closed and, pressing from without, prevents it from being opened. That man himself ought to open the door is clear from the Lord's words in Revelation:
Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. Rev. 111. 20. [3] Hence it is evident that, so far as one shuns evils as of the devil and as obstacles to the Lord's entrance, he is more and more nearly conjoined to the Lord, and that he is the most nearly conjoined who abominates them as so many dusky and fiery devils; for evil and the devil are one, and the falsity of evil and satan are one. Since the influx of the Lord is into the love of good and into its affections, and through these into the perceptions and thoughts, which all derive the fact that they are truths from the good in which the man is, so the influx of the devil, that is, of hell, is into the love of evil and into its affections which are lusts, and through these into the perceptions and thoughts, which all derive the fact that they are falsities from the evil in which the man is. [4] How this conjunction appears nearer and nearer. The more fully evils in the natural man are removed by shunning and turning away from them, the more nearly is the man conjoined to the Lord. Moreover, as love and wisdom, which are the Lord Himself, are not in space, since affection which belongs to love and thought which belongs to wisdom have nothing in common with space, so the Lord appears to be nearer according to the conjunction through His Love and Wisdom; and on the other hand, more remote according to the rejection of His Love and Wisdom. There is no space in the spiritual world; but there distance and presence are appearances in accordance with similarities and dissimilarities of affections; for as has been said before, affections which belong to love, and thoughts which belong to wisdom, being in themselves spiritual, are not in space. On this subject see what has been stated in the treatise THE DIVINE LOVE AND WISDOM (n. 7-10, 69-72), and elsewhere. The conjunction of the Lord with a man in whom evils have been put away, is meant by these words of the Lord:
The pure in heart (A.V. they) shall see God. Matt. v. 8. and by these words, He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them. . . .I will make my abode with him. John xiv. 21, 23. To have the commandments is to know, and to keep the commandments is to love; for it is also said in the same passage:
He that keepeth my commandments, he it is that loveth me.
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