993. And they repented not of their works. That this signifies that they were not willing to live according to the Lord's precepts, is evident from the signification of repenting, as denoting to live a different life, and from the signification of their works, as denoting evils from falsities. For those who separate faith from works by saying that works, being man's, are not good, and that they are merit-seeking, thus not to be conjoined with faith, which is spiritual and justifying, do evils from falsities. For from a false principle a man cannot do anything good, and where good is not there is evil. It is different when man lives according to the Lord's precepts, which are, that evils must be abstained from, and that goods must be done. Therefore by not repenting of their works, is signified that they were not willing to live according to the Lord's precepts.
Continuation concerning the Sixth Precept:-
[2] That love truly conjugial contains in itself so many ineffable delights as to exceed all number and expression is evident from this, that it is the fundamental of all loves celestial and spiritual, because by it a man becomes love; for from it one conjugial partner loves another, as good loves truth, and truth loves good, or, representatively, as the Lord loves heaven and the church. Such love cannot exist except by a marriage, in which the man is truth, and the wife is good. When a man has become such a love by marriage, then also he is in love to the Lord, and in love towards the neighbour, consequently, in the love of all good, and in the love of all truth; for from a man as love there cannot go forth anything but loves of every kind. This is why conjugial love is the fundamental love of all the loves of heaven. And because it is the fundamental love of all the loves of heaven, it is also a fundamental of all the delights and joys of heaven, for every delight and joy is from love. From these things it follows, that heavenly joys, in their order and degrees, derive their origin and cause from conjugial love.
[3] From the felicities of marriages it may be inferred in regard to the infelicities of adulteries, that the love of adultery is the fundamental of all infernal loves, which are intrinsically not loves, but hatreds; consequently, that from the love of adultery flow hatreds of every kind, both against God and the neighbour, in general, against every good and truth of heaven and the church; therefore every kind of infelicity is associated with it. For, as before said, from adulteries a man becomes a form of hell, and from the love thereof he becomes an image of the devil. That from marriages, in which there is love truly conjugial, all delights and felicities increase even to the delights and felicities of the inmost heaven; and that all undelights and infelicities in marriage, in which there is the love of adultery, increase in direfulness; even to the lowest hell, may be seen in the work concerning Heaven and Hell (n. 386).
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