4228. When I spoke with them at an early hour they said that I was nothing, because I was impelled to thinking, to speaking, to everything, and therefore that I was nothing of myself, which indeed many spirits evidently perceived, for I have been now for four years in such a state that I have neither thought nor spoken anything from myself; but I still see that when I seem to be, as it were, myself, in thinking or speaking, yet upon inquiry there are others immediately found who have prompted it. When I spoke with them, therefore, in the morning, after they had wondered awhile, it was given to say that this was well, inasmuch as if there is anything evil thought or spoken, it is not mine, but proceeds from evil spirits, wherefore it is not appropriated by me. If I should believe that it was from myself, the evil would be properly appropriated to me, and thus I should add actual evil to actual evil. On the contrary, whatever is good is from the Lord; so that as I do not attribute merit to myself from thinking, speaking, or doing good, so neither do I commit sin therein. He, therefore, who is of such a character as to believe that the fact is as it is, that is, who is in true faith, or in the truth of faith, he is guiltless of then committing sin, and whatever evil he seems to himself to do, believing still the truth of the case to be what it is, that there are evil spirits who have been present and persuaded him to it, the evil is not then appropriated to him. As many of those with whom I conversed were preachers, they said that this was well, wishing the case to be their own in order that they might be free from [the guilt of] sin. But it was given to say to them that they could never be such unless they were in the faith of charity; that it was not sufficient merely to know the truth, but it must be acknowledged and believed; and if they acknowledged it in this life they would receive the ability to acknowledge it still more in the other life, and then they would be bound also to acknowledge that no one can possibly have faith except from the Lord, and also [sincerely] to believe this, and thus that it has no existence except from the Lord, which also they said; for they had preached that faith was from the Lord alone, but still they had not truly acknowledged it. It was farther said that they had so preached as to declare that when anyone did evil he suffered himself to be led by the devil; and as to themselves when they preached well, they said that they were led by the Holy Spirit, and they prayed that the Holy Spirit would guide their thoughts and words. But still although they had said this, they had not believed it; and this they acknowledged, for when they were remitted into the state of their speech, or into the self-love from which they had thus said, they confessed that the fact was so. - 1749, April 21.