Forms of goodness related to the commandment on stealing:

• Be honest in your dealings with others.

• Love honesty for the sake of honesty.

• Exercise justice in your dealings with others.

• Make only lawful gains.

• Love justice for the sake of justice.

• Do what is honest and just from the Lord.

• Be in honesty and morally correct behavior (rectitude, righteousness).

• Let the various kinds of good enter and occupy the place that various kinds of thefts once occupied.

• Note: These kinds of good relate in general to what is honest, right (morally good), and just.

• In other words, be in what is honest, right, and just.

• Want (and will) what is honest, right, and just.

• At length, love what is honest because it is honest, what is right because it is right, and what is just because it is just.

• Love these things because they are from the Lord, and because love of the Lord is in them.

• Love the things that come from the Lord.

• Thus, love honesty itself, rightness (moral goodness) itself, and justice itself.

• Note: These things are the Lord with you.

• Note: Since these things are the Lord, to the extent that people love them and act from them,…

• To the same extent they act from the Lord,

• To the same extent the Lord removes dishonesty and injustice, including the very intentions and efforts of will in which they have their roots,

• And always with less resistance and struggle, and therefore with less effort, than in the first attempts.

• Acknowledge from faith, and also from intuition, that you do these things not from yourself but from the Lord.

• Be taught and led by the Lord.

• Be receptive of the Lord.

• Receive the things that come from the Lord.

• Let your spiritual mind, and thus heaven, be opened to you.

• Let the Lord flow in and equip you to see from the light of heaven.

• Note: When heaven is opened to people, they come into another light in regard to all things of the church, heaven, and eternal life.

• Be an image of heaven as to your spiritual mind.

• Look to the Lord for help in shunning what is evil.

• Note: It is the Lord who causes a person to shun what is evil.

• Look to the Lord’s divine good and divine truth for help in shunning what is evil.

• Note: It is the Lord, who is divine good and divine truth, who causes a person to shun what is evil.

• Shun what is evil as if from yourself.

• Note: Every removal of evil in people happens as if from themselves.

• Note: People’s thinking to shun evil and do good as if of themselves is done by the Lord, not by them.

• Think from conscience and act from integrity, not from yourself but as if from yourself.

• When the love of evil allures and incites, think within yourself that evils must not be done because they are sins against God and because they are infernal.

• Shun evils and at length turn away from them as sins, not from yourself but from the Lord, that is, from a love of truth and good that come to you from the Lord.

• Note: A love of truth and good is what puts evil to flight.

• Think as if from yourself about good and evil, that is,…

• That good must be loved and done because it is divine and remains to eternity,

• And that evil must be hated and not done because it is devilish and remains to eternity.

• Do good because it is good, and shun evil because it is evil.

• Shun what is evil from religion and for the sake of eternal life.

• Give your consent to the Lord’s covenant.

• Note: As part of this covenant, the Lord makes proposals and a person consents and accepts.

• Note: Consenting to this covenant means thinking, willing, and doing as if from yourself.

• Do good works from the Lord.

• Do good works.

• Do them in the Lord.

• Do them from the Lord.

• Do works that are good, not only outwardly, but also inwardly.

• Do works that are living.

• Do goods with judgment and justice.

• Notes:

• By good works are meant everything that a person does after evils have been removed as sins.

• The works that are done after evils are removed are done by the person only as if from him- or herself; for in actuality they are done from the Lord.

• And all works done from the Lord are good, and they are called the goods of life, the goods of goodwill, and good works.

• What a person does before he or she shuns and turns away from evils as sins are works done by the person him- or herself.

• The works that a person does after he or she shuns and turns away from evils as sins are works from the Lord.

• The Lord and heaven are in these works, therefore they are good works.

• After a person shuns and turns away from evils as sins, his or her works are good not only outwardly but also internally;

• And the more internal they are, the better they are,

• For the more internal they are, the nearer they are to the Lord.

• They are like fruits that have a fine-flavored pulp, in the center of which are repositories with many seeds, from which new trees, even whole gardens, may be produced.

• When a person shuns and turns away from evils as sins the works that he or she does are living, because everything that comes from the Lord is living.

• To the extent that people shun and turn away from evils as sins, to the same extent they do what it good,

• And the goods that they do are the good works that are referred to in the Word of God.

• The reason for this is that the works that they do are then done in the Lord.

• These works are good to the extent that a person turns away from the evils that are opposed to them.

• The reason is that to the same extent they are done from the Lord and not from the person.

• People who turn away from evils as sins wish to know truths, because truths teach useful service.

• To the extent, therefore, that such people learn what is true from a desire for truth, to the same extent they do what is good more wisely and fully.

• As an example of the above, judges are charged to do the following:

• Make justice their goal or end in view.

• Venerate, cherish, and love justice because it is divine.

• See God in justice.

• Note: Everything just is from God.

• Let justice be fair and fairness just.

• Note: Justice must be fair in order to be justice, and fairness must be just in order to be fair.

• Love justice for the sake of the public good, which is…

• That justice may reign among their fellow citizens,

• And that those who live according to the law may live securely.

• Consult the good of their country by ensuring that justice and judgment reign there as in heaven.

• In this way, consult the peace of all innocent citizens and protect them from the violence of evildoers.

• As an example of the above, people who manage the goods of others are charged to do the following:

• Have religion.

• Have conscience.

• Act from honesty for the sake of honesty.

• Act from justice for the sake of justice.

• Be content with what is theirs.

• Be cheerful in mind and glad in heart any time they have abstained from fraud.

• As an example of the above, traders (merchants) are charged to do the following:

• Regard riches as a means of performing useful services.

• Serve their country and fellow citizens through trading.

• Perform useful services by means of their riches, according to a desire for good.

• Wish to know what is true.

• Give all credit to the Lord.

• Final note:

• When people shun evils as sins, they daily learn what a good work is, and a desire for doing what is good grows with them, also a desire for knowing what is true for the sake of what is good;

• For to the extent that they know what is true, to the same extent they can perform works more fully and wisely, thus their works become more truly good.

• Cease, therefore, from asking in yourself, “What are the good works that I must do, or what good must I do to receive eternal life?” Only cease from evils as sins and look to the Lord, and the Lord will teach and lead you.