200. Now, since the delights of man's affections, springing from inmost things through interiors to exteriors and finally to outermost things in the body, bear him along as the waves and winds bear a ship; and since none of these things is apparent to man except what goes on in the outermost things of the mind and of the body, how can man claim what is Divine for himself from the single circumstance that those few outermost things appear to him to be his own? Still less ought man to claim what is Divine for himself when he knows from the Word that a man can receive nothing of himself unless it be given him from heaven; and from Reason that this appearance has been granted him that he may live as a man, see what is good and evil, choose one or the other and appropriate to himself that which he chooses, that he may be reciprocally conjoined to the Lord, be reformed, regenerated and saved, and that he may live for ever. It has been stated and shown above that this appearance has been granted to man in order that he may act from freedom according to reason, thus as of himself and not let his hands hang down and wait for influx. Hence it follows that the proposition has been confirmed which was set out to be proved under the third heading, III:
The Lord leads the affections of a man's life's love by means of His Divine Providence, and at the same time also the thoughts from which human prudence is derived (n. 192).