On reformation and regeneration
True Christian Religion 571. CHAPTER 1. REFORMATION AND REGENERATION. After treating of Repentance, Reformation and Regeneration come next in order, because they follow repentance, and by means of it advance step by step. There are two states that man must enter upon and pass through, when from being natural he is becoming spiritual. The first state is called Reformation, and the second Regeneration. In the first man looks from his natural to his spiritual state and longs for that state; in the second state he becomes spiritual-natural. The first state is formed by means of truths, which must be truths of faith, and through these he looks to charity; the second state is formed by means of the goods of charity, and by these he enters into the truths of faith. Or what is the same, the first is a state of thought from the understanding, and the second a state of love from the will. When this latter state begins and is progressing, a change takes place in the mind; the mind undergoes a reversal, the love of the will then flowing into the understanding, acting upon it and leading it to think in accord and agreement with its love; and in consequence so far as the good of love comes to act the first part and the truths of faith the second, man is spiritual and is a new creature; and he then acts from charity and speaks from faith; he feels the good of charity and perceives the truth of faith; and he is then in the Lord, and in peace, and thus regenerate. The man who while in the world has entered upon the first state, after death can be introduced into the second; but he who has not entered into the first state while in the world, cannot after death be introduced into the second, thus cannot be regenerated. These two states may be compared to the progression of light and heat during the days of spring; the first to the dawn or cock-crowing, the second to the morning or sunrise; and the progress of this second state may be compared to the advance of the day to noon, and thus into light and heat. There may also be a comparison with a field of grain, which is at first in the blade, then grows into the ear or head, in which the grain is afterward formed; also with a tree, which first grows out of the ground from a seed, then it becomes a stem from which branches go out, and these are adorned with leaves; at length it blossoms, and from the inmost of the blossoms the fruit begins to form, and this, as it matures, produces new seeds, like a new generation. The first state, which is that of reformation, may also be compared to the state of a silk-worm, when it draws out and evolves from itself filaments of silk, and after finishing its industrious labor, flies forth into the air, nourishing itself, not by leaves as before, but by the juices of flowers.
 

Divine Providence 263. But when the spiritual mind is open the state of the natural mind is wholly different. Then the natural mind is arranged in compliance with the spiritual mind, and is subordinated to it. For the spiritual mind acts upon the natural mind from above or within, and removes the things therein that react, and adapts to itself those that act in harmony with itself, whereby the excessive reaction is gradually taken away. It is to be noted, that in things greatest and least of the universe, both living and dead, there is action and reaction, from which comes an equilibrium of all things; this is destroyed when action overcomes reaction, or the reverse. It is the same with the natural and with the spiritual mind. When the natural mind acts from the enjoyments of its love and the pleasures of its thought, which are in themselves evils and falsities, the reaction of the natural mind removes those things which are of the spiritual mind and blocks the doors lest they enter, and it makes action to come from such things as agree with its reaction. The result is an action and reaction of the natural mind opposite to the action and reaction of t...

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