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Excerpt from Reply to Rev. Dr. Woods' "Lectures on Swedenborgianism": Delivered in the Theological Seminary, Andover, Mass
But from this dilemma you would obviously extricate your concession by the assumption that follows - and assumption it undoubtedly is, for there is nothing in the recorded biography of Swedenborg to warrant it. We look in vain for the least hint or intimation of such lucid intervals as you suppose between his visionary states during which he gave out his own speculations as distin guished from his extatic disclosures. He claims for all the writings published by himself subsequent to his illumination precisely the same degree of authority, and it is utterly at variance with everything known of the integrity of his charac ter to suppose, that he would have given us no criterion by which to discrim inste between what he thought and wrote from his own mind and what he received from the dictation or in¿ux of angels. In a letter to a friend pub lished by Mr. Hartley, and giving the leading particulars of his life, he says, Whatever of worldly power and advantage may appear to be in the things above-mentioned, I hold them as comparatively matters of little moment, be cause, what is far better, I have been called to a holy office by the Lord himself, who most graciously manifested Himself to me His servant, in the year 1743, and then opened my sight into the -spiritual world and endowed me with the gift of conversing with Spirits and angels, which has been continued to me to this day. From that time I began to print and publish various arcana, that have either been seen by me, or revealed to me; as concerning heaven and hell; the state of men after death; the true worship of God; the spiritual sense of the Word; and many other most important matters tending to salvation and true wisdom; and the only motive which has induced me, at different times, to leave my home and visit foreign countries, was the desire of being useful, and of communicating the cream entrusted to me.
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