(Continuation respecting the Fifth Commandment)

[2] So far then as the various kinds and species of thefts are removed, and the more they are removed, so far the kinds and species of good to which they by opposition correspond enter and occupy their place; and these have reference in general to what is sincere, right and just. For when a man shuns and turns away from unlawful gains through fraud and craft he so far wills what is sincere, right, and just, and at length begins to love what is sincere because it is sincere, what is right because it is right, and what is just because it is just. He begins to love these things because they are from the Lord, and the love of the Lord is in them. For to love the Lord is not to love the Person, but to love the things that proceed from the Lord, for these are the Lord with man; thus it is to love sincerity itself, right itself, and justice itself. And as these are the Lord, so far as a man loves these, and thus acts from them, so far he acts from the Lord and so far the Lord removes insincerity and injustice as to the very intentions and volitions in which they have their roots, and always with less resistance and struggle, and therefore with less effort than in the first attempts. Thus it is that man thinks from conscience and acts from integrity, not indeed the man of himself but as if of himself; for he then acknowledges from faith and also from perception. It indeed appears as if he thought and did these things from himself, and yet he does them not from himself but from the Lord.