is in the enjoyment of this love when he serves his neighbor quite as
parents do their children. This is truly human love, for in it is what is
spiritual, distinguishing it from the natural love of brute animals. Were
man born into this love, he would not be born into the darkness of
ignorance as everyone is now, but into some light of the knowledge and
hence of the intelligence soon to be his. To be sure, he would creep on
all fours at first but come erect on his feet by an implanted striving.
However much he might resemble a quadruped, he would not face down to the
ground but forward to heaven and come erect so that he could look up.

276. When love of the neighbor was turned into self-love, however, and
this love increased, human love was turned into animal love, and man,
from being man, became a beast, with the difference that he could think
about what he sensed physically, could rationally discriminate among
things, be taught, and become a civil and moral person and finally a
spiritual being. For, as was said, man possesses what is spiritual and is
distinguished by it from the brute animal. By it he can know what civil
evil and good are, also what moral evil and good are, and if he so wills,
what spiritual evil and good are also. When love for the neighbor was
turned into self-love, however, man could no longer be born into the
light of knowledge and intelligence but was born into the darkness of
ignorance, being born on the lowest level of life, called
corporeal-sensuous. From this he could be led into the interiors of the
natural mind by instruction, the spiritual always attending on this. Why
one is born on the lowest level of life known as corporeal-sensuous,
therefore into the darkness of ignorance, will be seen in what follows.

[2] Anyone can see that love of the neighbor and self-love are opposites.
Neighborly love wishes well to all from itself, but self-love wishes
everyone to wish it well; neighborly love wants to serve everyone, but