“There is a spiritual idea of which few have any knowledge, which enters by influx into the minds of those who are in the affection of truth, and dictates interiorly whether the thing which they are hearing or reading is true or not. In this idea are those who read the Word in illumination from the Lord. To be in illumination is to be in perception. Those who are in this illumination are said to be taught of Jehovah, and of them it is said in Jeremiah: ‘Behold, the days come that I will make a new covenant:—this shall be the covenant,—I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know ye the Lord; for they shall all know me.’ xxxi. 31, 33, 34. “From these considerations it is plain that faith and truth are one. This also is the reason that the ancients, who were more accustomed to think of truth from affection than the moderns, instead of faith used the word truth: and for the same reason, in the Hebrew language, truth and faith are expressed by one and the same word, amuna, or amen. “If any one thinks with himself, or says to another, ‘Who can have that internal acknowledgment of truth which is faith? I can not.’ I will tell him how he may. Shun evils as sins, and apply to the Lord; then you will have as much as you desire.” Such then is the New Church doctrine of faith. Faith is the perception and acknowledgment of truth from a right understanding of it. True faith is something that grows. It is not the gift of a moment. It is attained by leading a good life, and through obedience to the truth so far as we know it. In the course of time we find that a pure life is clearing our spiritual vision, and extending its range. Spiritual truths which we had laid up in our memories, and perhaps fancied that we had believed, are brought forth, are seen in new and striking light, are elevated into the understanding, and are in reality believed. Thus a living faith is attained. This doctrine finds a Divine seal in these words of the Lord: “If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God.” John vii. 17. The remainder of this little treatise is taken up with an exposure of the fallacies involved in the common doctrines of faith prevailing in the Protestant and Roman Catholic churches. Faith separated from charity, is proved to have no existence, because evil can by no possibility love truth. Spiritual and Divine Truth may, it is true, be reasoned upon, defended, and expounded, by wicked men, for the promotion of their own selfish ends; but internally they are in deep hatred and denial of them, and in the other life their detestation of them causes them to cast them forth even from the memory. Thus the wicked have no faith and no truth.