TEACHINGS ABOUT CHARITY AND FAITH

Without revelation from God no one can know anything at all about eternal life, nor indeed anything about God, let alone about love to Him and faith in Him. For at birth a person knows nothing whatever and must subsequently learn everything from things in the world, and in that way develop his power of understanding. At birth he also has by heredity all the evil of self-love and love of the world within him. Delights created by these reign all the time in him and suggest things such as are diametrically opposed to that which is of God. This then is why a person left to his own ideas knows nothing at all about eternal life; of necessity therefore revelation must exist from which he may gain that knowledge.