solution 2nd. That this Meeting views with delight, the efforts that are now making, to improve the character and condition of man, as being a preparatory step to the exercise of higher principles of mind, in the pursuit of that Spiritual Religion which is so fully presented in the doctrines of the New Church. Mov. ed by Rev. Wm. Bruce, Edinburgh, and seconded by Mr. Thomson, of Alloa. Resolution 3rd. That the Heavenly Doctrines of the New Jerusalem in their inmost state of reception, have the blessed tendency to promote the life of holiness and virtue, more for the sake of others, than for the sake of self. This was moved by Mr. Allan Drysdale, of Alloa, and seconded by Mr. Wm. Boyd, of Glasgow. Perhaps no meeting previously held in Scotland, was so well attended, or conducted in so harmonious and spirited a manner; upwards of one hundred sat down to tea. The various speeches, in moving and seconding the resolutions, were of the most animating and enlightening description, making a deep and solemn impression on the minds of the hearers; and many, if not all, felt, that they might with the utmost propriety, use the words of the disciples, "It is good for us to be here." The Meeting was concluded by singing the dismission hymn, and the offering up of a most solemn and affecting prayer by the Rev. D. G. Goyder. Next morning a public breakfast was held in the same place, when about fifty of the friends sat down to a most substantial repast; the Rev. W. Bruce, of Edinburgh, in the chair. After breakfast, a very interesting conversation took place in reference to the necessity and uses of Union, when a Committee was appointed to communicate with the different Societies in Scotland, and also with the London Missionary and Tract Society, in reference to a junction with them. This was also a very happy meeting, and well calculated to aid the advancement of the truth, and give stability as well as encouragement to every one present; although this meeting was not so numerously attended as that of the previous evening, we trust its results will not be less felt, and that its fruits will be found many days hence. A. M. F. OBITUARY. DIED, at Kersley, Lancashire, April 18, 1844, in his fifty-second year, Mr. JAMES CROMPTON. He was for many years a sincere receiver of the doctrines of the New Church, and liberally supported its institutions. His conduct was distinguished by a uniform kind. ness that endeared him to a large circle of friends, many of them not connected with the New Church, by whom his memory will be long cherished. The same spirit of kindness characterized him in his illness, and his regard to the comfort of others, and unwillingness to give trouble to those who attended him, continued to the last. W. At Edinburgh, on the 24th of June, in the twenty-second year of her age, BARBARA, wife of Mr. John Low, jun. She had been brought up in the faith of the New Church, of which her parents were members, and her life afforded evidence of the advantages of a New Church education, especially in that not least important of its objects, the suppression of all evil tempers and selfish dispositions, which, when left unsubdued, render every form of of active piety and virtue lifeless, and make the religious character one of inconsistency. Mrs. Low died in childbed; and in the prospect of her so early removal from her husband and child, and from a mother, whose widowhood she had cheered by her affectionate and dutiful conduct, she manifested entire resignation to the Lord's will, and looked forward to the Lord's kingdom with joy, tempered, but not disturbed, by a sense of her unworthiness for so pure and happy an abode. EARTHQUAKES IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD, OR GREAT CHANGES IN THE STATE OF THE CHURCH. (Concluded from page 370.) Ir theological truth is to be resuscitated, the inquiry should be well considered,-By what means it is to be effected? Is it to be the results of genius and learning, of intellectual labors, and the efforts of selfderived intelligence? Is it to be confined to one mind, or the united skill of the many? Are the intellectual powers, individually or collectively, alone sufficient for the recovery and reproduction of theological truth? Does the experience of past ages warrant any such conclusions? Neither the diversities of human opinion, nor the experience of the past, teach us to expect any thing like unity or certainty from such a basis as this. They may produce separation, multiplication, and division, but no unity. Science, which is ever ready to explore, is insufficient for the task; as the handmaid of revelation, her uses are valuable and important; her duty is to be led, and not to lead,—to be directed, and not to supersede the order* in the constitution of the divine "From these particulars, it is evident, what is meant by these words of the Lord, viz., that they denote the first state of the Church's perversion, which comes to pass when men begin no longer to know what is good and what is true, but dispute with each other on such subjects, whence come falsities. Inasmuch as this is the first state, it is said that the end is not yet, and that these things are the beginning of sorrows, and this state is called earthquakes in divers places, by which is signified in the internal sense, a change in the state of the Church in part, or at first."A.C. 3354. "Sign of the end of the Church.-Forasmuch now as the churches throughout Christendom have distinguished themselves solely by such things as relate to faith, and yet no faith can exist where there is no charity, therefore I would here premise something concerning the doctrine of charity amongst the ancients, before I proceed to deliver the doctrine of the New Jerusalem. It is said the CHURCHES IN CHRISTENDOM; and by them is understood the reformed or evangelical churches, but not the Popish or Roman Catholic Church; because wherever the Church is, there the Lord is worshiped, and the Word is read; whereas, amongst the Roman Catholics, they worship themselves instead of the Lord, forbid the Word to be read by the people, and affirm the Pope's decree to be equal, yea, superior to it."—New Jerusalem, 8. In this premise of our author, there are two points of distinct importance, which are sometimes neglected or overlooked from their simple brevity, but which should never be forgotten by those who critically study the Theology of Swedenborg. 1st, 3 E N.S. NO. 59.-VOL. v. economy: she is not to usurp the precedence and supersede the authority and influence of divine revelation. However great the advancement of science, and extended its operation, it is not her province to discover spiritual truths; and whenever she does attempt to discover them, without the aid of superior light, it is like "the blind leading the blind:" she may confirm and illustrate, but cannot discover.+ The light of nature and reason must first be illuminated from a divine source, and in its lower sphere; it can then impart its reflective beams, and natural theology (so called) can give her assistance to the light of revelation. We perceive the progress of the physical sciences, in harmony with the process of the reasoning powers, in the orderly The total exclusion of the Roman Catholic Church from the pale of the True Church; and 2dly, The proper definition of a True Church, under all its varying and outward forms-the worship of the Lord, and the reading of His Word. * "Science is of such a nature and quality, that it desires nothing more than to insert itself into things celestial, and to explore them; but this is contrary to order, for it would violate things which are celestial. Essential order requires that the celestial principle, by means of the spiritual, should insert itself into the rational, and thereby into the scientific, and thus adapt each to itself; and unless this order be observed, it is impossible to acquire wisdom.”—A.C. 1475. "Whenever man attains the knowledge of supernatural objects and truths, it is always by instruction; reason is never the discoverer, but only the faculty that perceives the certainty and reasoning of them. When an idea is consentaneous to the object, it is true; yet the mind which receives it, is neither the idea nor object, but the discerner of the agreement between them. When we deduce propositions from evident principles, reason is neither the principle nor conclusion, but the discursive operation of the intellect, which, by viewing the connexion and necessary dependence they have on each other, perceives the certainty of the inference. So when divine truths are propounded, the office of reason is to satisfy the understanding, that they are good, and from God, therefore perfective of our nature, and most fit to be believed and obeyed; yet is neither the propounder, nor obeyer of them; the first is from the will of God-the other, a determination of the will of man."-Ellis's Knowledge of Divine things from Revelation, not from Reason or Nature, p. 243.—See also Whately's Elements of Logic on the Discovery of Truth, book iv. ch. 2. "The existence and character of the Deity, is, in every view, the most interesting of all human speculations. In none, however, is it more so than as it facilitates the belief of the fundamental articles of Revelation. It is a step to have it proved, that there must be something in the world more than what we see. It is a farther step to know, that amongst the invisible things of nature, there must be an intelligent mind concerned in its production, order, and support. These points being assured to us by Natural Theology, we may well leave to Revelation the disclosure of many particulars, which our researches cannot reach, respecting either the nature of this Being as the original cause of all things, or his character and designs as a moral governor; and not only so, but the more full confirmation of other particulars, of which, they do not lie altogether beyond our reasonings and our probabilities, the certainty is by no means equal to the importance. The true theist will be the first to listen to any credible communication of Divine Knowledge. Nothing which he has learnt from Natural Theology, will diminish his desire of farther instruction, or his disposition to receive it with humility and thankfulness. He wishes for light: he rejoices in light. His inward veneration of this great Being, will incline him to attend with the utmost seriousness, not only to all that can be discovered concerning him by researches into nature, but to all that is taught by a revelation, which gives reasonable proof of having proceeded from him."-Paley's Natural Theology, ch. 27. arrangement of material causes, and in connexion with their ultimate effects. Here it can descend into the lowest series; but when it attempts a higher flight, to ascend above and beyond the lower spheres,-to lift up the veil which conceals the causes which are separate and discrete, it then loses its elevation, becomes giddy, and falls by its own weight. To accomplish this elevated state of the mental powers, requires superior degrees of divine illumination; for we give powers to reason, which she does not possess: the process of reasoning and its active energies are confounded with some innate principle, which, after all, is to be gradually formed and developed in the cultivated mind; and its nourishment and growth are secured by the successive changes of state of which it is the subject.* In the theology of Swedenborg, we are instructed upon all these points with accuracy and precision: he shews the insufficiency of natural religion, unless directed in its course by revelation.† And in this * "Reason is said to be a power given to man for his protection and safety. Let us not be deceived by words. If this were the particular design, it should be found in equal perfection in every condition of the mind, for all are in equal need of such a power. It is the office of the eye to discern the objects of nature; and it may protect the body from any impending injury; and the understanding may be useful in a similar way to the spiritual man. Reason is partly a natural and partly an acquired power. The understanding is the eye, with simply the power of discerning the light; but reason is the eye whose powers have been enlarged by exercise and experience, which measures the distance of objects, compares their magnitudes, discerns their colours, and selects and arranges them according to the relation they bear to each other. In this progress of moral improvement no power of the mind, or rather no mode of exercising the understanding, undergoes a more thorough and decisive change than this. It is like the change from chaos to creation; since it requires a similar exercise of the understanding in man to comprehend creation, to what it does in God to produce it; and every approach to Him, by bringing us nearer to the origin of things, enables us to discover analogies in what was before chaotic. This is a change which it is the grand design of revelation to accomplish; reason should therefore come to revelation in the spirit of prayer, and not in that of judgment. Nothing can be more intimately, and necessarily connected with the moral character of an individual, than his rational powers, since it is his moral character which is the grand cause of that peculiar classification and arrangement which characterizes his mind; hence revelation in changing the former, must change the latter also."-Reed's Growth of the Mind, p. 41. "It is believed in the world, that man from the light of nature, thus without revelation, can know several things which relate to religion, as that there is a God, that he is to be worshiped, and that he is to be loved; likewise that man is to live after death, with several truths besides, which depend on these; and yet they are such as are derived from self-intelligence; but I have been instructed from much experience, that man of himself knows nothing at all concerning divine things, and concerning those things which relate to celestial and spiritual life, without revelation; for man is born into the evils of the love of self and of the world, which are such as preclude influx from the heavens, and open influx from the hells-which make man blind and incline him to deny the existence of the Divinity and of the life after death. Two considerations have occurred, which place the mind in doubt on this subject; first, that the ancients, who were Gentiles, were acquainted with the existence of the Deity, the importance of Divine worship, and of the soul's immortality; and, secondly, that these things are known to several nations at this day, with whom there respect his testimony is confirmed by many distinguished writers who have given the subject their deepest consideration.* Internal proofs are also discoverable in the aptitude of our author's mind, as a suitable preparation for the reception of that divine illumination of which he was made the subject. Let his universal theology be examined only on the ground of its rationality and harmony with the truths of revelation, and its superiority will appear evident to all who are in the search after truth for the sake of truth. Let this test be candidly and fairly tried, in relation only to his profound and extended view of the divine attributes, and compared with any other writer on systematic theology, and we do not fear the result.+ It is from comparisons of this kind that we can perceive the evidence and certainty of our author's mission as the accredited herald of the new dispensation, bringing with it the proper credentials of a divine authority, by certain infallible proofs of a distinct illumination, not from external signs or outward manifestations to the senses, but by interior realities of clear and indubitable perceptions of the divine truth of the Word, by which evidence its plenary inspiration is completely set at rest. The writings of Swedenborg carry within them those internal proofs of a divine origin which cannot be shaken or removed. These proofs are demonstrative to those who are willing to examine, and who are duly qualified to make the experiment. So peculiar and striking is no revelation. Concerning the ancients, it should, however, be observed, that they did not know these things from the light of nature, but from revelation flowing down to them from the Church in ancient times-from the land of Canaan to the Greeks, and from them to the Italians or Romans."-A. C. 8944. See also T. C. R. 273-276. "There has been no such thing as mere natural religion, abstractedly from all divine revelation, professed in any age, or in any nation of the world. Lord Bolingbroke, in his inquiries this way, is forced to have recourse to China, and to the fabulous ages of their history, answering pretty much to the golden age of the poets, when he supposes they were governed by mere natural religion. But of this he produces no proofs. And if the ages there referred to relate, as they probably do, to the early patriarchal times, the original revelation might have been preserved in some degree of purity, though in process of time it became greatly corrupted there, as well as in other nations."-Leland's View of Deistical Writers, vol. ii. p. 64. "But of the MORAL perfections of God, and the laws which belong to this department of his empire, we can have no certain knowledge, unless he be pleased to communicate it. Yet such knowledge is what we need; knowledge which shall have the character of certainty, so that our anxious minds may rest upon it with confidence; and that we may attain, not a vague and precarious presumption, which may be no better than an illusion of selfishness, but a rational assurance of escaping the just penalties of our offences against the eternal law of morals, and of rising to an immortal perfection of all that is holy, happy, and glorious. Nothing short of a positive communication from the Great Being himself, to whom our fears and our desires point, can be satisfactory; and we cannot conceive of any method, by which such a communication could be attested as genuine, except a miraculous intervention, a sensible proof that the God of the universe is addressing us."”— Dr. J. Pye Smith's Lectures on Scripture and Geological Science, p. 90. |