Doc. of Faith (Dick) n. 30

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30. There are, moreover, many who do not have an internal acknowledgment of truth, and yet have the faith of charity. They are those who have looked to the Lord in their life, and who from religious principles have avoided evils. But they have been kept from thinking about truths by cares and business in the world, and also by a want of truth on the part of their teachers. Nevertheless, however, they are interiorly, that is, in their spirit, in the acknowledgment of truth, because they are in the affection of it. Therefore, after death, when they become spirits and are instructed by angels, they acknowledge truths and receive them with joy. But it is otherwise with those who in their life have not looked to the Lord, and who have not avoided evils from religious principles. These interiorly, or in their spirit, are not in any affection of truth, and consequently are not in any acknowledgment of it. Therefore, after death, when they become spirits and are instructed by angels, they are unwilling to acknowledge truths and consequently they do not receive them. For evil of life interiorly hates truths, but good of life interiorly loves them.


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