[3] By being appropriated to man is meant entering his life and becoming part of it, consequently becoming his own. It will be seen in what follows that there is nothing, however, which is man's very own; it only seems to him as if it were. Only this now: all the good a man does in freedom according to reason is appropriated to him as if it were his because it seems to be his in that he thinks, wills, speaks and does it. Good is not man's, however, but the Lord's with man (above, n. 76). How evil is appropriated to man will appear in a section of its own. 79. We said that what a man does in freedom in accord with his thought also remains. For nothing that a man has appropriated to himself can be eradicated; it has been made part of his love and at the same time of his reason, or of his will and at the same time of his understanding, and so of his life. It can be put aside indeed, but not cast out; put aside, it is borne from center to periphery, where it stays; this is what we mean by its remaining. [2] If, for example, in boyhood or youth, a man appropriated an evil to himself by doing it with enjoyment from love of it--a fraud, blasphemy, revenge, or fornication--having done it freely with the assent of thought, he made it his; but if later he repents, shuns it and considers it a sin to be averse from, and so desists from it freely according to reason, then the opposite good is appropriated to him. Good then takes the center and removes evil to the periphery, farther according to his aversion and abhorrence for it. Still the evil cannot be so thrust out that one can say it is extirpated; it may indeed in that removal seem extirpated. What occurs is that the man is withheld from the evil by the Lord and held in good. This can happen with all inherited evil and all a man's actual evil. [3] I have seen this verified by the experience of some in heaven who thought they were without evil, being held in good as they were by the Lord. Lest they should believe that the good in which they were was their own, they were let down from heaven and let into their evils until they acknowledged that of themselves they were in evil, and in good only from the Lord. Upon this acknowledgment they were returned to heaven. [4] Be it known, therefore, that goods are appropriated to man only in that they are constantly with him from the Lord, and that as a man acknowledges this the Lord grants that good shall seem to be the man's, that is, that it shall seem to him that he loves the neighbor or has charity, believes or has faith, does good and understands truth, thus is wise, of himself. From this an enlightened person may see the nature and the strength of the appearance in which the Lord wills man to be. The Lord wills it for salvation's sake, for without that appearance no one can be saved. Also see what was shown above on the subject (nn. 42-45).