Emanuel Swedenborg; A Biography (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: PART II. Throughout his life, as we have hitherto detailed it, we have seen in Swedenborg a continual tendency from the natural to the spiritual, a steady ascension from the sciences towards natural theology, and an acceptance throughout of biblical revelation. We have now to contemplate him after he had attained the goal of his endeavors, and when, on looking back to his previous life, he tells us that he saw its purpose, that " he had been introduced by the Lord first into the natural sciences, and prepared from 1710 till 1744, when heaven was opened to him: the reason why he, a philosopher, had been chosen for this office, being, that spiritual knowledge, which is revealed at this da)-, might be reasonably learned, and naturally understood; because spiritual truths answer to natural ones, which originate, flow from, and serve as a foundation for them." Although, however, as we have observed, this opening of the spiritual was Swedenborg's tendency from the first, yet plainly he never anticipated either the manner or the extent of it. It would seem that he expected the kingdom of God to come upon him in the shape of clear principles deduced from all human knowledge; a scientific religion resting upon nature and revelation, interpreted by analysis and synthesis, from the ground of a pure habit and a holy life. His expectations were fulfilled, not simply, but marvellously. He was himself astonished at his condition, ) and often expressed as much. " I never thought,"" saidhe, "I should have come into the spiritual state in which I am, but the Lord had prepared me for it in order to reveal the spiritual sense of the Word, which He had promised in the Prophets and the Revelations." What he thenceforth claimed to have received and to be in possession of, was spiritual sight, spir...