truth, and love for our neighbor come from nowhere else. Love for our
neighbor, then, has a heavenly origin.
It is the same thing whether you say “goodness” or “usefulness.”
Therefore doing good things is doing useful things. The amount and
quality of usefulness that a given good thing has determines the amount
and quality of its goodness.Goodwill and Good Actions Are Two Distinct Things:
Wishing People Well and Treating Them Well420 All people have an inner level and an outer level. Their inner level is
called the inner self and their outer level is called the outer self. Neverthe-
less, someone who does not know what the inner and outer selves are
could believe that our inner self is the source of our thinking and willing
and our outer self is the source of our speaking and action. These are
indeed inner and outer aspects of us, but they do not constitute the
essence of our inner and outer selves. The human mind is indeed com-
monly held to be the inner self, but in actuality the mind is divided into
two regions. One of the regions is spiritual; it is higher and farther
within. The other is earthly; it is lower and farther outside. Our spiritual
mind focuses principally on the spiritual world. It deals with the things
in that world, whether they are the kind that exist in heaven or the kind
that exist in hell. (Both kinds are in the spiritual world.) The earthly
mind, on the other hand, focuses principally on the earthly realm. It
deals with the things in this world, whether good or evil.
All our action and speaking emanates from the lower region of our
mind through a direct route. Ultimately, however, it comes from the
higher region of our mind, although the route is indirect because the lower
region is closer to the senses in our body, while the higher region is farther
away from them. This division within our mind exists because we have
been created to be spiritual and earthly at the same time, and therefore to
be human, not animal.
These points make it clear that people who focus primarily on them-
selves and worldly things are external people. They are earthly not only in
body but also in mind. People who focus primarily on things that relate
to heaven and the church are internal people. They are spiritual in both
mind and body. They are spiritual in body as well because their actions