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Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings

This list of Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings was originally compiled by W. C. Henderson in 1960 but has since been updated.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Revealed #386

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386. To this I will append the following account:

When I once looked about in the spiritual world, I heard what sounded like the gnashing of teeth, and like a thumping, too, intermixed with a harsh noise. So I asked what I was hearing, and the angels who were with me said, "There are clubs, which we call taverns, where people argue with each other. This is the way their debates sound at a distance, but close by they sound only like arguments.

I went over and saw cottages constructed of interwoven rushes, with clay for mortar. I wanted to look through a window, but there wasn't one. I looked for a window because I was not permitted to enter through the door, as light from heaven would then flow in and befuddle the people.

Suddenly, however, a window materialized on the right side, and I heard the people complain then that everything had gone dark. But shortly a window materialized on the left side, with the window on the right side closing, and then the darkness was by degrees dispelled, and they saw each other in a state of light. After that I was allowed to enter through the door and listen.

There was a table in the middle of the room, with benches surrounding it, yet the people all seemed to me to be standing on the benches, and to be arguing sharply with each other about faith and charity, the people on one side saying that faith was the principal tenet of the church, and on the other side that charity was.

Those who made faith the principal tenet said, "Do we not deal with God as regards faith, and with people as regards charity? Is not faith therefore something heavenly, and charity something earthly? Are we not saved by what is heavenly, and not by anything earthly?

"Furthermore, cannot God confer faith from heaven, because it is something heavenly, and must not a person confer on himself charity, because it is something earthly? What a person confers on himself is unrelated to the church and is therefore not saving. Can works that are called works of charity justify anyone in that case before God?

"Believe us when we say that by faith alone we are not only justified but also sanctified, provided our faith is not contaminated by hopes for merit that spring up from works of charity."

And so on.

[2] In reply, the people who made charity the principal tenet of the church sharply refuted them, saying that charity is saving, and not faith. "Does not God hold all people dear and will good to all? How can God do this except through the agency of people? Does God enable people to speak with one another only about matters having to do with faith, and not enable them to do things for one another that are matters of charity?

"Do you not see how absurdly you spoke about charity, saying that it is something earthly? Charity is something heavenly, and because you do not do the good pertaining to charity, your faith is earthly. How do you receive faith other than as a log or rock? You say that it is simply by hearing the Word, but how can the Word do anything simply by being heard, and how can it have any effect on a log or rock? Perhaps you are animated without being aware of it. However, what is that animation except to enable you to say that faith alone is saving? Yet what that faith is, and what saving faith is, you do not know."

[3] But one among them then arose, whom an angel speaking with me called a syncretist. 1 He took the cap from his head and placed it on the table, but quickly replaced it, as he was bald. He said, "Listen, you are all wrong. The truth is that faith is spiritual, and charity moral; but still they are conjoined, and they are conjoined by the Word, by the Holy Spirit, and by the effect these have, without the person's knowing. Indeed, the person may be said to be a compliant form, but one in which the person has no part.

"I have thought to myself a long time about this, and I eventually found that God can enable a person to receive a faith that is spiritual, but cannot move him to a charity that is spiritual without his being like a pillar of salt."

[4] When he said this, the people caught up in faith alone applauded, while those espousing charity booed. And the latter said with annoyance, "Listen, my friend, you do not know that a moral life can be spiritual, and that it can be merely natural - being a moral life that is spiritual in the case of people who do good from the Lord, though doing it as if of themselves, and being a moral life that is merely natural in the case of people who do good from hell, though doing it as if of themselves."

[5] I said before that the arguing sounded like the gnashing of teeth, and like a thumping, too, intermixed with a harsh noise. The particular arguing that sounded like the gnashing of teeth came from those who were espousing faith alone; the arguing that sounded like a thumping came from those who were espousing charity alone; and the intermixed harsh noise came from the syncretist. I heard their voices at a distance thus because they had all argued in the world, but did not refrain from any evil and so did not do any moral good that was spiritual. Moreover, they also did not know at all that the totality of faith is truth, and that the totality of charity is goodness, and that truth without goodness is not truth in spirit, and that goodness without truth is not goodness in spirit; thus that one must form the other.

The reason everything became dark when a window materialized on the right side is that light flowing in from heaven on that side affects the will. And a state of light returned when the window on the right side closed and a window materialized on the left side, because light flowing in from heaven on the left side affects the intellect, and everyone can be in the light of heaven as regards his intellect, provided his will is closed as regards the evil in him.

Footnotes:

1. An espouser of syncretism, a system of belief that attempts to reconcile differing religious and philosophic positions. The term was applied especially to the views of George Calixtus, a Lutheran theologian in the 17th century, and to his followers.

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #665

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665. After this a voice was heard from heaven coming from the angels who were immediately above us. 'Come up here,' it said, 'and we will question one of you, who is still as to the body in the natural world, what people know about conscience.'

We went up and, after we were admitted, some wise men came to meet us. They asked me what was known about conscience in my world.

'Please let us go down,' I replied, 'and summon a number of both laity and clergy who are believed to be wise. We will stand vertically beneath you and question them, so you will hear with your own ears what answers they give.'

This was done, and one of the elect took a trumpet and sounded it to the south, the north, the east and the west. Then after a little while such a crowd gathered that they nearly filled the space of a furlong. But the angels overhead arranged them all into four groups; one of them consisted of politicians, the second of scholars, the third of medical men, the fourth of clergy.

When they were so arranged, we said to them: 'Forgive us for summoning you. The reason is that the angels who are exactly above us are most anxious to know what you thought when you were in your previous world about conscience; and so what you still think about it, since you retain your previous ideas on such matters. It has been reported to the angels that knowledge about conscience is one of the subjects the knowledge of which has been lost in the world.'

[2] After this we began by turning first to the group consisting of politicians. We asked them to say, if they would, what they had thought in their hearts and so continued to think about conscience. They replied to this one after the other. The gist of their replies collectively was that all they knew of conscience was that it was knowing in oneself, and so being conscious of what one intended, thought, did and said.

But we told them: We did not ask about the etymology of the word "conscience," but what conscience is.'

'What is conscience,' was their reply, 'but anxiety arising from fear of future danger to rank or wealth, and to one's reputation as the result of their loss? That anxiety is dispelled by feasts and a few glasses of fine wine, and by conversations about the sports of Venus and her son 1 .'

[3] 'You are joking,' we said. 'Please tell us whether any of you has experienced any anxiety from other sources.'

'Where else could it be from?' they replied. 'Isn't the whole world like a stage on which each plays his own scene, as comic actors do on their stage? We baffle and get the better of anyone who comes along by means of his own longings, some by making fools of them, some by flattery, some by trickery, some by the pretence of friendship, some by a front of sincerity, and some by our skill as politicians in dangling inducements before them. This gives us no mental anxiety, but on the contrary joviality and gladness, which we fill our lungs with and breathe out silently but to the full. We have indeed heard from some of our colleagues that they are from time to time subject to anxiety and distress, as if affecting the heart and chest, thereby occasioning a sort of cramping of the mind. But on consulting the apothecaries about these, they were told that they are caused by a melancholy humour arising from undigested food in the stomach or from a morbid condition of the spleen. But in some of these cases we have heard of them being restored to their previous joviality by the use of medicines.'

[4] After hearing this we turned to the group composed of scholars, which included a number of experts on physics. We addressed them and said: 'You have studied the sciences and consequently have been thought to be oracles of wisdom; please tell us what conscience is.'

'What sort of a question is this?' they replied. 'We have indeed heard that some people suffer from sadness, grief and anxiety, which affect not only the gastric regions of the body, but also the seat of the mind. For we believe that the two brains are its seat. Since these are composed of adjacent fibres, there is an acrid humour which plucks, bites and gnaws at those fibres, and so contracts the sphere of thoughts in the mind that it is unable to relax to enjoy any of the diversions that come from variety. So it comes about that the person concentrates on only one topic, and this destroys the tensile properties and elasticity of the fibres, thus causing them to become resistant and rigid. This leads to the irregular movement of the animal spirits, known to the medical profession as ataxy, and also to the failure of function which is called loss of consciousness. In short, the mind then lies as if beset by hostile squadrons, and can no more turn one way or the other than a wheel fastened on with nails or a ship stuck fast on a sand-bank. Such distress of mind and consequently constriction of the chest afflicts those whose ruling love suffers loss. If this love is attacked, the fibres of the brain contract, and this contraction prevents the mind from moving freely and seeking its pleasures in various forms. When these people suffer this crisis, each depending upon his temperament, they are subject to delusions of various kinds, dementia and delirium, and some suffer from religious brainstorms, which they call the pangs of conscience.'

[5] After this we turned to the third group composed of medical men, including surgeons and apothecaries. 'Perhaps you,' we said, 'know what conscience is. Is it not a savage pain which grips the head and the substance of the heart, and so the subjacent epigastric and hypogastric regions; or is it something else?'

'Conscience,' they replied, 'is nothing but a pain of that sort. We are better placed than others to know its origins, for there are accidental diseases which attack the organic substances of the body, and of the head too, consequently also the mind, since the mind sits amid the organs of the brain like a spider in the centre of the threads composing its web, and it runs out and back in similar fashion along these. We call these diseases organic, and the ones which recur time and again chronic. But pain of this sort, described to us by invalids as the pain of conscience, is nothing but a hypochondriac disease, which robs primarily the spleen and secondarily the pancreas and the mesentery of their proper functions. From this arise diseases of the stomach, which result in unhealthiness of the humours; for compression occurs around the orifice of the stomach, which is called heartburn. From this arise humours saturated with black, yellow or green bile, which cause blockage of the smallest blood vessels, what are called the capillaries. This leads to cachexy, atrophy and symphysis, as well as false pneumonia due to sluggish catarrh, and ichorous lymph causing corrosion through the whole mass of blood. Similar results ensue from the emission of pus into the blood and its serum as the result of empyemas, abscesses and apostems in the body. When this blood rises through the carotid arteries into the head, it abrades, corrodes and gnaws the medullary, cortical and meningeal substances of the brain, so provoking the pains which are called those of conscience. 2

[6] On hearing this we told them: 'You speak the language of Hippocrates and Galen 3 . This is Greek to us, we don't understand. We did not ask about these diseases, but about conscience, a purely mental matter.'

'The diseases of the mind,' they said, 'and those of the head are the same; and those of the head rise up from the body. For they hang together like two floors of one house connected by a staircase permitting one to go up or down. We know therefore that mental states are indissolubly dependent upon the state of the body. But we have cured those heavinesses or headaches, which we grasp are what you mean by conscience, in some cases by plasters or blistering ointments, in some cases by infusions or emulsions, in some cases by herbal remedies and by anodynes.

[7] So when we heard more of the same from them we turned away and addressed the clergy. 'You,' we said, 'know what conscience is. So tell us and instruct the audience.'

'What conscience is,' they answered, 'is something we know and do not know. We have believed that it is contrition, which precedes election, that is, the moment at which a person is endowed with faith, by means of which he gets a new heart and a new spirit and is regenerated. But we have noticed that few people achieve that contrition; in some cases there is only fear and so anxiety about hell-fire, and hardly anyone worries about his sins and the wrath of God he deserves as a result. But we as confessors have cured them by the Gospel, telling them that Christ by suffering crucifixion removed the sentence of damnation, and so put out hell-fire, opening heaven to all blessed with faith, to which the imputation of the merit of the Son of God is attached. In addition there are people with consciences who belong to various religions, true as well as erroneous, who are scrupulous in matters relating to salvation, not only in essentials, but also in matters of form or of no consequence. Thus, as we said before, we know that conscience exists, but what it is and what true conscience, a wholly spiritual matter, is like, we do not know.'

Footnotes:

1. i.e. Cupid.

2. This passage is full of technical jargon in the original Latin.

3. The leading ancient Greek writers on medical subjects.

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.

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