151. But something should be said here on how the internal man is reformed and by it the external. The internal man is not reformed solely by knowing, understanding and being wise, consequently not by thinking only; but by willing what these teach. When a person knows, understands and has the wisdom to see that heaven and hell exist and that all evil is from hell and all good from heaven, and if he then does not will evil because it is from hell but good because it is from heaven, he has taken the first step in reformation and is on the threshold from hell to heaven. When he advances farther and resolves to desist from evils, he is at the second step in reformation and is out of hell but not yet in heaven; this he beholds above him. There must be this internal for man to be reformed, but he is not reformed unless the external is reformed as well as the internal. The external is reformed by the internal when the external desists from the evils which the internal sets its will against because they are infernal, and still further reformed when the external shuns and fights against the evils. Thus the internal provides the will, the external the deed. For unless a man does the deed he wills, inwardly he does not will it, and finally he wills not to do it.
[2] One can see from these few considerations how the external man is reformed by the internal. This is also meant by the Lord's words to Peter:
Jesus said, If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me. Peter said to Him, not my feet only but my hands and head. Jesus said to him, he who has been washed has no need except to have his feet washed, and is entirely clean (Jn 13:8-10).
By "washing" spiritual washing is meant, which is purification from evils; by "washing head and hands" purifying the internal man is meant, and by "washing the feet" purifying the external. That when the internal man has been purified, the external must be, is meant by this: "He who has been washed has no need except to have his feet washed." That all purification from evils is the Lord's doing, is meant by this, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me." We have shown in many places in Arcana Caelestia that with the Jews washing represented purification from evils, that this is signified by "washing" in the Word, and that purification of the natural or external man is signified by the "washing of feet."
152. Since man has an internal and an external and each must be reformed for the man to be reformed, and since no one can be reformed unless he examines himself, sees and admits his evils, and then quits them, not only the external is to be examined, but the internal as well. If a man examines only the external he sees only what he has committed to deed, and that he has not murdered or committed adultery or stolen or borne false witness, and so on. He examines bodily evils and not those in his spirit; yet evils of the spirit are to be examined if one is to be capable of reformation. Man lives as a spirit after death and all the evils in his spirit persist. The spirit is examined only when a man attends to his thoughts, above all to his intentions, for these are thoughts from the will. There the evils exist at their source and roots, that is, in their lusts and enjoyments. Unless they are seen and acknowledged, a man is still in evils though he may not have committed them outwardly. That to think with intention is to will and do, is plain from the Lord's words:
If any one has looked on another's woman to lust after her, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart (Mt 5:28).*
* See footnote at n. 111.
Such self-examination is of the internal man, and from it the external man is truly examined.
153. I have often marveled that although all Christendom knows that evils must be shunned as sins and otherwise are not forgiven, and that if they are not forgiven there is no salvation, yet scarcely one person among thousands understands this. Inquiry was made about this in the spiritual world, and it was found to be so. Anyone in Christendom knows it from the exhortations, read out to those who attend the Holy Supper, in which it is publicly stated; and yet when asked whether they know it, they reply that they do not know it and have not known it. The reason is that they have paid no attention to it, and most say they have thought only about faith and salvation by faith alone. I have also marveled that "faith alone" has closed their eyes so that those who have confirmed themselves in it do not see anything in the Word when they read it about love, charity and works. It is as though they spread "faith" all over the Word, as red lead is spread over writing so that nothing underneath shows; if anything does show, it is absorbed by faith and declared to be faith.