The thoughts of Swedenborg have never to struggle for expression, like those of the half-educated Behmen. The mind of the Swedish seer was of the methodical and scientific cast. His style is calm and clear. He is easily understood in detail. The metaphors of poets are objects of vision with him: every abstraction takes some concrete form: his illustrations are incessant. He describes with the graphic minuteness of Defoe. Nothing is lost in cloud. With a distinct and steady outline he pourtrays, to the smallest circumstance, the habitations, the amusements, the occupations, the penalties, the economy, the marriages of the unseen world. He is never amazed, he never exaggerates. He is unimpassioned, and wholly careless of effect. Those of his followers with whom I have come in contact, partake of their master’s philosophy. They are liberal in spirit, and nowise impatient of unbelief in others. Swedenborg never pants and strives—has none of the tearful vehemence and glowing emotion which choke the utterance of Behmen. He is never familiar in this page, and rhapsodical in that. Always serene, this imperturbable philosopher is the Olympian Jove of mystics. He writes like a man who was sufficient to himself; who could afford to wait. He lived much alone; and strong and deep is the stream of this mysticism which carries no fleck of foam.
Other mystics seem to know times of wavering, when enthusiasm burns low. To Swedenborg sunrise and sunset are not more constant and familiar than the divine mission which he claims. Other mystics are overpowered by manifestations from the unseen world. Horror seizes them, or a dizzy joy, or the vision leaves them faint and trembling. They have their alternations; their lights and shadows are in keeping; they will topple headlong from some sunny pinnacle into an abysmal misery. But Swedenborg is ‘in the spirit’ for near two score years, and in his easy chair, or at his window, or on his walks, holds converse, as a matter of course, with angels and departed great ones, with patriarchs and devils. He can even instruct some of the angels, who have had experience only of their own world, and are guileless accordingly.
CHAPTER II.
We have but faith: we cannot know;
For knowledge is of things we see;
And yet we trust it comes from Thee,
A beam in darkness: let it grow.
Let knowledge grow from more to more,
But more of reverence in us dwell;
That mind and soul, according well,