December
11

Have a Affirmative Attitude

And Mary said, Behold, the maidservant of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy saying. And the angel departed from her. (Luke 1:38)

There are therefore two principles; one of which leads to all folly and insanity, and the other to all intelligence and wisdom. The former principle is to deny all things, or to say in one’s heart that he cannot believe them until he is convinced by what he can grasp or perceive by the senses. This is the principle that leads to all folly and insanity, and it is to be called the negative principle. The other principle is to affirm the things which are of doctrine from the Word, or to think and believe within oneself that they are true because the Lord has said them. This is the principle that leads to all intelligence and wisdom, and it is to be called the affirmative principle. (Arcana Coelestia 2568:4)

It is from the doctrine of the Word that the first and principal thing of doctrine is love to the Lord and charity toward the neighbor. Those who are in the affirmative in regard to this can enter into whatever things of reason and of memory, and even of sense, they please, everyone according to his gift, his knowledge, and his experience. In fact, the more they enter in, the more they are confirmed, for universal nature is full of confirmation. (Arcana Coelestia 2588:3)

Take, for example, the truth that the Lord is the salvation for the human race…. When this is made an affirmation by the man, [to] all the things he has learned from the Word or in the church concerning the Lord … innumerable things are added, and are filled with the good that flows in. For good continually flows in from the Lord, but where there is no affirmative, it is not received…. An affirmative [attitude] is therefore the first means, and is as it were the first abode of the good that flows in from the Lord. (Arcana Coelestia 3913:5)

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