think it an excellent antidote. For the sake of those who may have occasion to employ it as such, we give some extracts. It would be much more agreeable to quote from what is said so well on the subject of marriage itself; but it being the principal purpose of the tract to show what is the real teaching of the author on deviations from marriage, our extracts must be from the part of the tract which relates to this subject. After briefly treating of pure love, the writer proceeds by quotations from his writings to show that Swedenborg condemns all deviations from marriage as forcibly as he sets forth the excellence of pure marriage itself. Of these quotations we give two ;

"Moral wisdom shuns evil and false principles as leprosies, especially the evils of lasciviousness." (C. L. 102.)

"Adultery ruins the soul, defiles the reason, pollutes the morals, and infects the body with disease; for adultery is not human, but bestial; not rational, but brutish; and thus not in respect Christian, but barbarous." (C. L. 105.)

But the question is asked, " Is there nothing upon which those who have given so contrary a descript on of Swedenborg's teaching find to support their account of the matter?" The writer of the tract then proceeds to shew that any appearance of truth which there is in such a charge arises from perverting the author's statements, by making it appear that he approves as good what he only permits as a necessary evil; that is, as a less evil to prevent a greater. But "Swedenborg guards himself against being misunderstood, or being thought to recommend any evil at all as a good and proper thing in itself, or as allowable to a religious man. The mildest forms of unchaste evils, according to him, ALL belong to the natural man, thus as not all as for the spiritual man. And THE NATURAL MAN, considered in himself as to his nature, differs not at all from the nature of beasts; indeed, with regard to his will, to all intents and purposes he is a wild beast; so that, unless he were transformed into a sheep by regeneration, what would he be but a devil, amongst devils in hell.'" "How, then, can any one pretend, when Swedenborg says that the lightest forms of unchastity belong to the natural man, that he is recommending, sanctioning, or excusing it ?" To the charge sometimes made

6

that the author of " Conjugial Love" allows men to put away their wives on slight pretexts, the writer answers—

66

Nothing of the kind. On Swedenborg's principles of marriage, which is the result of true conjugial love, there would be no separations at all. But in surveying the present state of society, Swedenborg does admit, and all sensible persons must admit, that there are cases where people find they are so utterly unsuitable for each other that they had better separate. Swedenborg mentions cases in which either of the parties becomes furiously wild, of idiots, of thieves, or of persons infected with some direful disease not known to the other at the time of marriage, and which will not pass away. The causes he names are precisely those our courts act upon in decreeing separations. Neither the courts nor Swedenborg sanction divorce for any cause but one [adultery]. Some men have felt it conscientiously impossible to live with their wives, on account of entire disharmony of character, for causes much lighter than any Swedenborg mentions; but no doubt it would be a most painful thing to them, and with such sorrows of the heart a stranger intermeddles not. Wesley, the founder of Methodism, did not live with his wife, simply because she had a bad temper, and was opposed to his being so often away from home.*

"But does Swedenborg allow a man, in such cases, to live with another woman as with a concubine ?

"He allows nothing of the kind, as a matter of which he would approve; but, as a legislator, he would permit it in the case of a man who, if not suffered to have this deviation from right, would plunge into far more serious guilt. But this concubinage is, according to him, altogether of the NATURAL MAN ("Conjugial Love," 475), and not the act of a

spiritually-minded person. Luther and Melancthon, the great leaders of the Reformation, went much further than Swedenborg, when they gave permission to Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, to have a concubine along with his wife, which under no circumstances would Swedenborg's views have tolerated. But these excellent men did not approve of such a thing in itself. They

She appears to have left him, in the first instance, and afterwards he refused to take her again without a change in her temper.-See Moore and Coke's "Life of Wesley," pp. 306, 307.

tolerated a less evil to avoid the greater crimes which would be committed by a man of great lust and great power, in a case where both could not be put down. This has always been the rule with enlarged and practical minds. The attempt to decry Swedenborg because of his discrimination on these subjects, and his preferring the least evil, where all evil cannot be put down, is a mere clap-trap appeal of prejudiced persons to those ignorant minds who have not taken the whole of the subject duly into consideration. In Aristotle's "Ethics," book v., he writes:-The less evil in respect of the greater is to be accounted a good, because the less evil is rather to be chosen than the greater; and what is in any sense eligible, is in some sense a good, and that which is more eligible is the greater good.' Bishop Jeremy Taylor-one of the greatest ornaments the Church of England ever bad-in an edition of his works, edited by the excellent Reginald Heber, afterwards Bishop of Calcutta, has the following, which is precisely the principle of Swedenborg, and indeed we may say of all thoughtful men :- No SIN IS TO BE CHOSEN WHEN BOTH CAN BE AVOIDED; but when they cannot, the least is to be suffered. But when this comes to be another man's case, that he will not avoid both, though he sins in choosing any, yet he that advises him rather to take the less, does not sin. He that chooses the less, sins less, but yet sins, because he should choose none at all;

BUT HE THAT ADVISES HIM TO CHOOSE

THE LESS, SINS NOT AT ALL, because he hinders all sin as much as he can.' Surely, this doctrine, taught by the great philosopher of the antients, and by two bishops of the Church of England, as well as taught and acted upon by the great leaders of the Reformation, ought also to be regarded as worthy of approval in Swedenborg."

The importance and excellence of this tract must be our apology for the length of our extracts.

COMMUNICATIONS.

To the Editor.

Dear Sir, I am desirous to inform you of an event,-a publication now in the press, which promises to make Swedenborg more widely known in our country than he has hitherto been, and to lead to a juster appreciation of his claim to the attention of thinking men.

During our last pleasing stay amongst our New Church brethren in London, I had occasion, in conversation, to communicate some preliminary information on the fact, which now appears to be progressing favourably. Some months ago, a writer of established reputation, M. J. Matter, Honorary Counsellor of the French Université, formerly Professor of Philosophy in the Str sburg Academy, the author of esteemed works on Religious Philosophy, on Gnosticism, on the Alexandrian School, &c., published a remark. able volume on "Saint-Martin, the Philosophe inconnu, his Life and Writings," &c., from unpublished documents. To us particularly this publication was interesting, on account of the sympathy shewn for the celebrated French Theosophist, who in his life-time (1743-1803) was acquainted with the French translations of some of Swedenborg's works, for example:-" Des Merveilles du Ciel et de l'Infer," by Pernetz, 1782; "Du Commerce de l'Ame et du Corps," by P * * *, 1785; and the "Abrégé des Ouvrages d' Em. Swedenborg," published in Strasburg, 1788, during the visit there (as appears from M. Matter's work) of a nephew of Swedenborg, Kuight Silfverhielm,-Saint-Martin being at that time present in the same city, where he met with some of his mystic friends; these books also he read, and professed for them a high admiration,-so high, as we know by another testimony (that of one of his relatives,-see "La Nouvelle Jérusalem,” Revue, vol. i., p. 315; vol. ii., p. 213), that he proposed the opening of a subscription for printing the whole of the then manuscript translations by Moët, of Versailles, which were afterwards published at the expense of your countryman, Mr. Augustus Tulk. We must, however, note that SaintMartin was not in the most desirable condition of mind for a right understanding of Swedenborg, having been a yet more enthusiastic admirer of the Mystic Jacob Boehm, some of whose writings he translated and published, being himself quite a mystic, that is, a somewhat nebulous and obscure writer.

On a page of M. Matter's volume were announced as in preparation by the same author, two other works:-1st, "The Mystics and Theosophists from Fenelon to Saint-Martin;"-2nd, "The Mystics and Theosophists from Saint-Martin to the Present Time;"-Saint-Martin being also his central figure in the whole history.

Such was the state of things, of which I was informed by a friend in Paris, when

soon after, and shortly before our departure for the London Conference, a letter came to St. Amand, from M. Matter's publisher, inquiring the terms on which he might procure the Arcana and Apocalypse Explained, for a writer, M. Matter, who was preparing a work on Swedenborg.

Passing through Paris, M. Le Boys and I visited this publishing bookseller, M. Didier, with whom he readily agreed as to the desired facilities, and whom we found to be an ardent and enthusiastic admirer of spiritual phenomena, which had been the motive of his requiring, as he said, of M. Matter to write a volume on Swedenborg.

We expressed in that visit the wish that we might meet with M. Matter, and confer with him on the subject of Swedenborg, if he had occasion to come from Strasburg, where he resided, to Paris. The occasion presented itself a few weeks ago. I was highly pleased at receiving an unexpected visit of that distinguished man, whose countenance was not unknown to me, as I had formerly seen him presiding over a general assembly of the Society for Promoting Primary Instruction among French Protestants. As an Alsatian, M. Matter belongs to the Lutheran Church. He confessed he had till now known so little of Swedenborg, that he first intended to devote to him only one chapter in his volume on the Mystics before Saint-Martin. It was M. Didier, who, requiring him to write a special work on our author, informed him that the inverse proportion, that is, a chapter for Saint-Martin and a volume for Swedenborg, would have been the more appropriate one. Great was the astonishment of the learned writer, on nearer inquiry, at discovering his new subject to be a man so different from the so-called Mystics he had till now encountered in his studies.

So pleased was I with M. Matter, that in order to help him to his work, I confided to his hands not only every biographical document in my possession which he did not know, but also a manuscript biography commenced by me and brought up to the year 1763.

He wished to meet also with M. Le Boys, and, according to his wish, M. Le Boys came to meet him, and we had together some useful conferences, in the last of which M. Matter read to us the first proofsheet of his commenced octavo volume, entitled, "Swedenborg: his Life and Writings," with the style of which we were highly satisfied.

The tone of the writer is not that of a disciple, but of a sympathetic admirer of the extraordinary man he treats of; the narrative, animated and pleasant, is well adapted to interest common readers, to excite curiosity, and bring a number to further inquiry; therefore, we would not leave you and our other English friends in ignorance of so hopeful an event.

Please accept our thanks, on your own behalf and on that of the writer of the friendly review on our Esaias," in your last number.

We are now engaged on the book of Psalms, in Latin and in French. Believe me, dear Sir, truly yours, AUG. HARLÉ,

Paris, Nov. 13th, 1862.

To the Editor.

Sir, In the course of some recent reading the following beautiful passage, taken from Dr. Bayley's "Divine Word Opened-An Invitation to the Waters," pp. 572, 573, struck me as being peculiarly applicable to the present advanced state of intelligence, as displayed by many of the exquisite productions of our operatives in the late Exhibition; and I send it to you in the hope that the sentiments therein illustrated may be brought, with some advantage, under the notice of such of your readers as are unacquainted with the work above alluded to:

"The operative too is invited. There is a rich store for him. He has the grand faculties which constitute a man, as fully as any other class. To do his daily work from a spirit of justice and judgment is to live for heaven, and the rich stores of heavenly wisdom which are at hand for him, will be a full compensation for the lack of many things which are prized by the wealthy as contributing to the adornment of life, but add very little to its substantial bliss. They who possess heavenly wealth, and interior splendours, will, in the other life, possess the corresponding eternal, full of glory and beauty. But the angels think little of the outward things there, except as the shadows of the internal blessings of goodness and truth. The true workman, in the upright performance of the uses of his employment, is of far higher value, and preparing for a far happier life in eternity, than the poor soul trifler who has no generous sympathies with his kind, no wish to arrive at brilliant thoughts, no desire to promote the active uses of the world; but because his personal wants are provided for, by

the accumulations of his fathers, is content to live a useless idler, and die simply to end a life without result, and appear in the other world miserable, and poor, blind, and naked. Let the nobler workman lift up his head, and feel that he is enriching the earth, and cultivating his mind. Let him, with love to the Lord, and charity to all mankind, diligently perform his labours, making his work genuine and good; thus doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with his God, and, as he walks, "Let him take of the water of life freely."

To the Editor.

Derby, October, 1862.

Dear Sir, It may not be uninteresting to your readers to hear that the "Junior Members' Society," established here about two years since, continues to progress very satisfactorily, indeed, the results have been so encouraging as to induce me to send you the following short paragraph, which appeared in the "Derby Reporter," of the 10th instant:

"New Church Junior Members' Society, Babbington-lane.-This society commenced its meetings for the winter season last Friday evening, by a musical entertainment in the school-room under the chapel, which was well attended by a highly respectable company, the room being quite full. The performers were lady and gentlemen amateurs, assisted by Miss Ford, Messrs. J. Adlington, R. Harrison, and Theodore Drew, who contributed very greatly to the evening's entertainment, which altogether passed off very delightfully, and much to the enjoyment of those present. This little society is in a flourishing condition, and holds a meeting every Friday evening, at a quarter-past eight, when essays and elocutionary entertainments are given by the members, with occasional lectures and discussions on theological subjects, and a 'musical entertainment' once in three months. The meetings are open to the public free, and any person may address the meeting upon the subject of the evening by permission of the chairman. The arrangements for the current quarter are of an interesting nature, a programme of which may be had on application to the president, the Rev. John Hyde, or the secretary, Mr. J. K. Morley, 12, Forester-street."

I may further add that we now number, including associates, over 70 members. Our meetings are kept up without any [Enl. Series.-No. 108, vol. ix.]

perceptible diminution; indeed, the interest felt in them by the junior members themselves is much increased. The musical entertainments are a great success, and very cheering in their results, as a great number of highly respectable strangers attend, principally young people, who are thus made to feel that, after all, the Sweborgians are a sociable people; and we are sensible that we thus remove an amount of prejudice which otherwise we could not reach.

I strongly recommend all societies that have not yet established a society of this kind to commence at once, as its influence upon the feelings of the young people of the church in uniting them together cannot be over-estimated; it finds something for all to do, and only in proportion as this is kept up will they feel interested in the welfare of the church at large. We at Derby have discovered this to be the grand secret, and are all endeavouring to act upon it with earnestness.

I shall be very glad to furnish any information respecting the manner in which it has been established and conducted, to any person.-I am, dear Sir, yours truly, J. KNIGHT MORLEY, Sec.

DISTRESS IN LANCASHIRE. HEYWOOD.

To the Editor.

My dear Sir,-If still in time for the next number of the Magazine, I shall be happy for the space to urge on the attention of our brethren the hint contained in your Appendix to the letter on "Distress in Blackburn." The state of things described in this communication must excite the liveliest sympathy of the benevolent.

The distress complained of, however, is not confined to Blackburn, but extends throughout this part of the country. In most towns there are Relief Committees which, with or without the assistance of the Guardians of the Poor, provide the necessaries of life, by the distribution of food. Now, however, that the cold weather is approaching, other wants are being severely felt. In a society like the one with which I am connected at Heywood, where our schools are large, many children are without suitable clothing to enable them to attend the Sunday school, or to keep them warm at home. The Relief Committee, on which I have taken an active part since its commencement, is doing all it pos38

sibly can to provide clothing, but its utmost will be far short of the wants of the people. The efforts of the committee are being supplemented by the active charity of all sections of the religious community, through their church committees and Sunday-schools; and I would urge on the societies of the church at a distance, the value of contributions in clothing, which might be judiciously distributed by the committees of our several societies. There are few of our friends in Lancashire who are not painfully affected by the prevalent distress, while the demands upon our wealthier members are pressing and incessant. The support of the church must also, for some time, devolve almost entirely upon them, the working population being deprived of all means of aid. It is pleasant, in the midst of so general an anxiety for worldly things, to witness the calm and content of the people, and their thoughtful and devout attendance on the public worship of the Lord; nor is it less encouraging to witness the earnest benevolence of the general public. Surely the unseen influences of a higher world are beaming upon us in the midst of our distress, and preparing the way through its severe discipline for a richer outbreak of mercy and truth to the church. Let not the members of the New Church, who have a doctrine of charity, and who live in clearer light, be behind in this great work of Christian benevolence and love! Let us shew by our actions how sincerely we sympathise in this distress of our fellow-creatures, and let us cheerfully deny ourselves some of our usual comforts that we may minister to the wants of others.

I am, my dear Sir, very sincerely yours, Heywood. R. STORRY.

ASHTON-UNDER-LYNE.

To the Members of the New Church. Dear Brethren, The members of the New Church meeting at Ashton-underLyne wish to address you on a subject of great importance. You are well aware that, in consequence of the American war, nearly the whole of the population of Lancashire depending upon the Cotton trade, are thrown out of employment.

As the whole of our members are dependent upon that branch of trade, you will see that our sufferings are extremely great, and the external condition of our society very much injured.

In other respects there never was a time when the society was more prosperous and satisfactory. God forbid, then, that this prosperity should be blighted by circumstances over which we have no control! We know it will be difficult for you to appreciate our condition; but reflect for a moment, when we tell you that almost every family in connection with us is totally out of employment, and the difficulty will vanish.

We ask you, then, Can nothing be done? Cannot those who are not affected by this cotton famine give a helping hand? Surely those who worship the Divine Humanity are not without humanity themselves! Come forward, then, to rescue from starvation those persons you well know are deserving of your sympathy. Charity should begin at home, if it ought not to end there. The duties of the generous and the benevolent in the New Church will be to find out the distress which exists in the various societies, and do all they possibly can to relieve it: and if, after having done this, their means are not exhausted, others,strangers, may be sought for, and easily found.

We appeal to you, therefore, for assistance, and not for ourselves alone, but for all those societies who are in similar circumstances. We appeal to you (and we are not ashamed), first, for cast-off clothing for members' children, Sunday-scholars, and for the children of all those persons who are in connection with us; and, secondly, for a fund to supplement the aid members are already receiving, as well as pay the current expenses of our society, or any other not able to help themselves. We would recommend also that a committee be formed immediately, to consist of minis. ters and others, who have the work at heart, to receive and distribute all that the generous and benevolent are disposed to give.

We cannot, as sincere Christians, view the distress that exists in our own society, and not try to do all that lies in our power to alleviate it. We cannot alleviate it ourselves; but we can appeal to those who have it in their power do it for us. May we not appeal in vain!

to

We doubt not but a committee, as suggested above, will be formed, but in the meantime we are happy to say that