Page:The Swedenborg Library Vol 3.djvu/151

dom] who have lived well and acknowledged God should after death be instructed by angels; and then they who in the world were principled in those two essentials of religion, accept the truths of the church such as are in the Word, and acknowledge the Lord as the God of heaven and the church; and this they receive more readily than Christians who have brought with them from the world an idea of the Lord's Humanity separated from his Divinity.

It is also provided by the Lord that all who die in infancy should be saved, wherever they may be born. There is also given to every man after death the opportunity to amend his life, if possible; they are instructed and led by the Lord through angels; and as they then know that they live after death, and that there is a heaven and a hell, they at first receive truths. But they who in the world have not acknowledged God and shunned evils as sins, soon grow weary of truths and recede from them. And they who acknowledge God with the lips but not with the heart, are like the foolish virgins who had lamps but no oil, and asked oil of the others, and moreover went away and bought it, and yet were not admitted to the marriage. Lamps signify the truths of faith, and oil the goods of charity. From this it may be evident that the purpose of the Divine Providence is, that every man be saved, and that man himself is to blame if he is not saved. (D. P. 328.)