Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 3.djvu/112
alone that the sun is at this day darkened, the moon deprived of her light, and the stars are fallen from heaven [in the spiritual sense], that is, have perished. (B. E. 79, 80, 81.)
The doctrine of the churches in the Christian world at this day insist that faith alone saves, and that the life of love is of no account; also, that when a man receives faith he is justified, and that when he is thus justified no evil can be afterwards imputed to him; consequently that every man is saved, even a wicked man, if he only has faith, although it may be in the last hour of his life.
They, therefore, who think and live from such doctrine, omit good works, because they do not believe that good works affect man, or that they are at all efficacious to salvation. They also have no concern about the evils of their thought and will, whether these evils consist in contempt of others in comparison with themselves, or whether they consist in enmity, hatred, revenge, craft, deceit, and other similar evils, because they believe that such things are not imputed to those who are justified by faith; saying in their hearts that they are not under the yoke of the law, because the Lord has fulfilled the law for them; nor under the curse, because the Lord took it upon himself.
Hence it is that they who think, believe and live from the doctrine of faith alone, and justification thereby, have no respect to God in their lives, but only to