ood takes its place. The love of evil recedes solely through a
life according to the commandments of the Decalogue, that is, through
refraining from evils there enumerated because they are sins, and
finally shunning them as infernal.

In a word, so long as man does not refrain from evils because they are
sins the spiritual mind is shut; but as soon as he refrains from evils
because they are sins the spiritual mind is opened, and with that mind
heaven also. And when heaven is opened man comes into another light in
respect to all things of the church, heaven, and eternal life; although
so long as man lives in this world the difference between this and the
former light is scarcely noticeable, and for the reason that in the
world man thinks naturally even about spiritual things, and until he
passes from the natural into the spiritual world spiritual things are
enclosed in natural ideas; but in the spiritual world spiritual things
are disclosed, perceived, and made evident. (A.E., n. 970.)

So far as man refrains from evils and shuns and turns away from them as
sins, good flows in from the Lord. The good that flows in is an
affection for knowing and understanding truths, and an affection for
willing and doing goods. But man cannot refrain from evils by shunning
and turning away from them of himself, for he himself is in evils from
his birth, and thus from nature; and evils cannot of themselves shun
evils, for this would be like a man's shunning his own nature, which is
impossible; consequently it must be the Lord, who is Divine good and
Divine truth, who causes man to shun them.

Nevertheless, man ought to shun evils as if of himself, for what a man
does as if of himself becomes his and is appropriated to him as his own;
while what he does not as if of himself in no wise becomes his or is
appropriated to him. What comes from the Lord to man must be received by
man; and it cannot be received unless he is conscious of it that is, as
if of himself. This reciprocation is a necessity to reformation.

This is why the ten commandments were given, and why it is commanded in
them that man shall not worship other gods, shall not profane the name
of God, shall not steal, shall not commit adultery, shall not kill,
shall not covet the house, wife, or servants of another, thus that man
shall refrain from doing these things by thinking, when the love of evil
allures and incites, that they must not be done because they are sins
again