This is indispensable; for how is it possible to receive the Lord into the inner sanctuary, the heart, in love, when He is not even admitted into the outer court, the understanding, in thought and belief? Thus acknowledgment, belief, is the first requisite. It is this which constitutes the great distinction between true religion and a mere outward morality. A man may live a good moral life, so far as outward actions go: he may not kill, nor steal, nor commit adultery. Nevertheless, his heart may be possessed with interior evil and selfishness, and a thousand sinful inclinations. He may be possessed by a spirit of deep pride and self-conceit; which alone is sufficient to exclude him from heaven, because such a spirit is just the opposite of heaven, where all are in humility towards their Lord and Heavenly Father, and in tender love to each other. A proud man, therefore, not having the spirit of heaven in him, cannot come into heaven after death: because, as often before shown, heaven is within, not without; it is not merely a place, but a state of the mind. "Him that hath a high look and a proud heart," says the Scripture," "will not I suffer.—"Though the Lord be high, yet hath he respect unto the lowly, but the proud he knoweth afar off."[1] Now if the Lord will "not suffer" the proud, and if they are "afar off" from Him, plainly they cannot be in heaven; for heaven is nigh to Him, and all there are not only suffered, but loved and cherished by Him. Moreover, good actions, all good outward conduct, must proceed from one of two sources, either from the Lord or from self. If done from self, they have in them the nature of their source, and have reference to some
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