AE 325 - worship & practical piety

AE 325a [2-4]
"Incense" signifies spiritual good,
which is the good of charity towards the neighbor;
and "meal-offering" signifies celestial good,
which is the good of love to the Lord; thus both signifying worship.

Worship does not consist in prayers and in external devotion,
but in a life of charity; prayers are only its externals,
for they proceed from the person through his mouth,
consequently a person's prayers are such
as they themselves are in respect to life.
It matters not that a person bears himself humbly,
that he kneels and sighs when he prays; for these are externals,
and unless externals proceed from internals
they are only gestures and sounds without life.
In each thing that a person utters there is affection . . ..
Spiritual affection is what is called charity towards the neighbor;
to be in that affection is true worship;
praying is what proceeds.
From this it can be seen that the essential of worship is the life of charity,
and that its instrumental is gesture and praying;
or that the primary of worship is a life of charity,
and its secondary is praying.
From this it is clear that those who place all Divine worship in oral piety,
and not in practical piety, err greatly.

Practical piety is to act in every work and in every duty
from sincerity and right, and from justice and equity,
and this because it is commanded by the Lord in the Word;
for thus a person in his every work looks to heaven and to the Lord,
and thus is conjoined with Him.
But to act sincerely and rightly, justly and equitably,
solely from fear of the law, of the loss of fame or of honor and gain,
and to think nothing of the Divine law,
of the commandments of the Word, and of the Lord,
and yet to pray devoutly in the churches, is external piety;
however holy this may appear,
it is not piety, but it is either hypocrisy,
or something put on derived from habit,
or a kind of persuasion from a false belief
that Divine worship consists merely in this;
for such a person does not look
to heaven and to the Lord with the heart, but only with the eyes;
the heart looking to self and to the world,
and the mouth speaking from the habit of the body only and its memory;
by this a person is conjoined to the world and not to heaven, and to self
and not to the Lord.