sdom, is
from God; and that a man cannot otherwise be conceived, born, and
generated of the Lord, and become an image and likeness of him; for he
becomes an image of the Lord by acknowledging and believing, that he has
received and does receive from the Lord all the good of love and
charity, and all the truth of wisdom and faith, and not the least
portion thereof from himself; and he becomes a likeness of the Lord by
his being sensible of those principles in himself, as if they were from
himself. This he is sensible of, because he is not born into knowledges,
but receives them; and what he receives, appears to him as if it was
from himself. This sensation is given him by the Lord, to the end that
he may be a man and not a beast; since by willing, thinking, loving,
knowing, understanding, and growing wise, as from himself, he receives
knowledges, and exalts them into intelligence, and by the use thereof
into wisdom; thus the Lord conjoins man to himself, and man conjoins
himself to the Lord. This could not have been the case, unless it had
been provided by the Lord, that man should be born in total ignorance."
When they had finished speaking, it was the desire of all present, that
a conclusion should be formed from the sentiments which had been
expressed; and they agreed upon the following: "That a man is born into
no knowledge, to the end that he may come into all knowledge, and may
advance into intelligence, and thereby into wisdom, and that he is born
into no love, to the intent that he may come into all love, by
application of the knowledges from intelligence, and into love to the
Lord by love towards his neighbour, and may thereby be conjoined to the
Lord, and by such conjunction be made a man, and live for ever."

135. After this they took the paper, and read the third subject of
investigation, which was, WHAT IS DIGNIFIED BY THE TREE OF LIFE, WHAT BY
THE TREE OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL, AND WHAT BY EATING THEREOF?
and all the others intreated as a favor, that those who were from the
east would unfold this arcanum, because it required a more than ordinary
depth of understanding, and because those who were from the east are in
flaming light, that is, in the wisdom of love, this wisdom being
understood by the garden of Eden, in which those two trees were placed.
They said, "We will declare our sentiments; but as man does not take any
thing from himself, but from the Lord, therefore we will speak from him;
but