and has since been conceded to him by succeeding anatomists: hence it goes by the denomination of the Foramen of Monro. Dr. Monro read a paper before the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh, on this subject, Dec. 13th. 1764; but in his work entitled, "Observations on the Structure and Junctions of the Nervous System," he says that he demonstrated this Foramen to his pupils so early as the year 1753.

He allows that a communication was known and asserted to exist between those ventricles and the third, long prior to his time; but he shows, that it was never delineated after such a manner, nor in any way that could convey a precise idea respecting it: much less was implied the existence of the Foramen he describes.

The channel of communication seemed to be referred, chiefly, to the posterior part of the lateral ventricles, whilst the Foramen of Monro, is situated at their anterior part.

Now in the Regnum Animale, p. 207, note (r) the following striking observation occurs: "The communicating Foramina in the Cerebrum are called Anus and Vulva, BESIDES the passage or emissary canal of the lymph; by these, the lateral ventricles communicate with each other, and with the third ventricle."*

This work was printed in the year 1744-5; but written, as we have reason to think, two or three years before its publication: hence the foramen here spoken of must have been described by Swedenborg from ten to twelve years prior to the earliest notice taken of it by Dr. Monro.

Again. Blumenbach, in a work, entitled "The Institutions of Physiology," treating of the brain, says, "that after birth it undergoes a constant and gentle motion correspondent with respiration; so that when the lungs shrink in expiration, the brain rises a little, but when the chest expands, it again subsides." In the note he adds, that Daniel Schlichting first accurately described this phenomenon in 1744: now it does so happen that Swedenborg had fully demonstrated, and accurately described, this correspondent action, in that chapter of the Economia Regni Animalis which treats of the coincidence of motion between the brain and lungs. In another part of the same Institutions of Physiology, when speaking of the causes for the motion of the blood, Blumenbach has the following remark: "When the blood is expelled from the contracted cavities, a vacuum takes place, into which, according to the common laws of derivation, the neighbouring blood must rush, being prevented, by means of the valves, from regurgitating.' In the notes, this discovery is attributed to Dr. Wilson,

* Foramina communicantia in cerebro vocantur Anus and Vulva, PRÆTER meatum sen emissarium lymphæ, quibus ventriculi laterales inter se, et cum tertio, communicant.

the author of An Inquiry into the moving Powers employed in the Circulation of the Blood. But it appears that the same principle was known long before to Swedenborg; and is applied by him to account for the motion of the blood, in the Economia Regni Animalis. For in the section on the circulation of the blood in the

fœtus, and on the foramen ovale, he says, "Let us now revert to the mode by which the cerebrum attracts its blood, or, according to the theorem, subtracts that quantity which the ratio of its state requires. If now these arteries, veins, and sinus are dilated by reason of the animation of the cerebrum, it follows, that there must necessarily flow into them thus expanded, a portion of fresh blood, and that indeed by continuity from the carotid artery, and its tortuous duct in the cavernous receptacles, and into this by continuity from the antecedent expanded and circumflexed cavities of the same artery; consequently from the external (or common) carotid, and thence from the aorta and the heart; nearly similar to a bladder or syphon full of water, one end of which is immersed in the fluid; if its sides be dilated, or its surface stretched out, and more especially if its length be shortened, an entirely fresh portion of the fluid flows into the space thus emptied by the enlargement; and this, experience can demonstrate to ocular satisfaction. Now this is the beneficial result of a natural equation, by which nature, in order to avoid a vacuum, in which state she would perish, or be annihilated, is in the constant tendency towards an equilibrium, according to laws purely physical. This mode of action of the brains, and their arterial impletion, may justly be called physical attraction; not that it is attraction in the proper signification of the term, but that it is a filling of the vessels from a dilation or shortening of the coats, or a species of suction such as exists in pumps and syringes. A like mode of physical attraction obtains in every part of the body; as in the muscles, which having forcibly expelled their blood, instantly require a re-impletion of their vessels." In another part, 458, he says, "There exists a great similitude between the vessels of the heart, and the vessels of the brains, so much so, that the latter cannot be more appropriately compared with any other.-4. The vessels of the cerebrum perform their diastole, when the cerebrum is in its constriction, and vice versa; so also the vessels of the heart. 5. In the vessels of the cerebrum there is a species of physical attraction or suction, such as that of water in a syringe; and this too is the case with the vessels of the heart, for in these, by being expanded and at the same time shortened, the blood necessarily flows, and that into the space thus enlarged." Swedenborg says also, that it is this constant endeavour to establish a general equilibrium throughout the body, which determines its various fluids to every part, whether viscus or member, and which being produced

by exhaustion, the effect is such a determination of the blood, or other fluid, as the peculiar state of the part requires.*

These are by no means the only instances, in which his claims to new discoveries have been transferred to others. But Swedenborg's object was not to astonish the world by discoveries in natural science: hence no pains were taken to give circulation to his discoveries. His great object in investigating the organization of the human system, was to attain to a knowledge of the nature, form, and constitution of the human mind. He ascertained that there were, in the composition of the blood, three distinct degrees; that the arteries, veins &c. were also divided into three distinct degrees: "The red blood is a substance of a lower degree, to which corresponds the purer or colourless blood, and to this again the animal spirit, which holds a common and universal sway through the lower gradations. So in the means of carrying on the threefold circulation, the arteries are of the lowest degree, to which correspond in a higher degree the vessels for the purer blood, and in the highest, the medullary fibre, or simple nerve. The muscles have their several corresponding degrees in the carneous moving fibre, the white moving fibre, and the highest, the nervous moving fibre." Hence he rationally concluded that there were three degrees in the human mind, answering to, and corresponding with, the three degrees in the human body. The first or lowest degree of the mind he termed sensual; the second degree, moral and intellectual; the third degree, spiritual; to the first he ascribed the province of the natural sciences, and the enjoyment of sensual delights; to the second, rational wisdom, and the enjoyment of social order; to the third, spiritual truths relating to heavenly life. He made the salvation and happiness of man to consist in the due subordination of the several parts,-the lower being always subject to the higher degrees.

We have extended our remarks on the works before us farther than we intended, but we trust they will be acceptable to those who are interested in knowing something of the life of Swedenborg, of the gradual preparation of his mind for that great and wonderful use which he was called upon to perform. One work more, written before his illumination, and published afterwards, is all we have to notice, which we shall do very briefly.

The Treatise on the Worship and Love of God, De Cultu et Amore Dei, London, 1744-5, in two parts, in 4to. The first part treats of the Origin of the Earth, of Paradise, of the Birth, Infancy, and Love of the First Man, or Adam: The second part treats of the Marriage of the First Man, of the Soul, of the Intellectual Spirit, of the State of Integrity, and of the Image of

* See Intellectual Repository, 1819.

God. The creation of the earth is, doubtless, the most interesting part of the work. He describes here, as in the Principia, the creation of seven planets belonging to our system; and this work was published about thirty-five years before the discovery of the seventh planet by Dr. Herschel. On this subject, however, we have nothing to say we cannot claim for him the discovery of a new planet, as he has given no description of its location, &c. But we will introduce what he says relative to it, and every one may put what construction upon it he pleases :

"Thus seven planets were emitted at once from the sun, as from the womb, every one of which being poised on its sphere, in a ratio of its bulk and weight, revolved quicker or slower, receding from its native centre." "Some of them also received into their own orbits those lesser globes, which accompanied them as attendants from their fostering parent; being admitted to revolve in orbs within their orbits, some more and some less. Our earth had only one as an attendant handmaid, called the moon." We quote thus far to show that the moon was not the body which he referred to. We have now noticed the principal works which Swedenborg wrote before he commenced his theological works. At this time, 1743, at the age of 54 years, Swedenborg was called to the performance of a use, of which no member of the New Jerusalem Church is ignorant, that is, to unfold the spiritual sense of the Word. Of the particular time and of the circumstances connected with this call, we have no information on which we can rely. There is an account given, and attached to some of his writings, of his first illumination, said to have taken place at an inn, in London. But as a distinguished clergyman of the New Church, in London, has doubted the accuracy of that account, we shall not introduce it, but will refer to Swedenborg's own words as the best account that can be given. In the True Christian Religion, in the chapter on the Consummation of the Age, is the following paragraph:

"Sec. VIII. That this second coming of the Lord is effected by the instrumentality of a man, before whom he has manifested himself in person, and whom he has filled with his spirit, to teach from him the doctrines of the New Church by means of the Word.

"Since the Lord cannot manifest himself in person (to the world,) which has just been shown to be impossible, and yet he has foretold that he would come and establish a New Church, which is the New Jerusalem, it follows that he will effect this by the instrumentality of a man, who is able not only to receive the doctrines of that church in his understanding, but also to make them known by the press. That the Lord manifested himself before me his servant, that he sent me on this office, and afterwards opened the sight of my spirit, and so let me into the spiritual world,

permitting me to see the heavens and the hells, and also to converse with angels and spirits, and this now continually for many years, I attest in truth; and further, that from the first day of my call to this office, I have never received any thing appertaining to the doctrines of that church from any angel, but from the Lord alone, whilst I was reading the Word. To the end that the Lord might be constantly present, he revealed to me the spiritual sense of his Word, in which sense divine truth is in its light, and in this light he is continually present." In a letter to Prince William, of Hesse, which we shall hereafter insert entire, will be found a similar statement of the use which he was called upon to perform.

The character of Swedenborg's illumination cannot, perhaps, in the present state of the church, be fully understood. He acknowledges himself to have been but a mere servant of the Lord in all that he wrote. But in all that he has written his rational principle was operative and instrumental in giving form to the truths which were revealed through him: whereas the prophets, according to his account, wrote as they were dictated, received and conveyed truths to the world, without understanding their import; what they communicated passed not through their internal but through their external minds. Hence their writings did not belong to them-made no part of them-but proceeded immediately from the Lord, and were infinitely holy. But to the writers themselves no holiness is to be attached.

It is difficult, for those who do not reflect deeply, to separate in their minds the sanctity of the Word from the persons named in it, and from the persons who, by dictation, wrote it; but this is easily done when the spiritual and divine sense of the Word is received and understood. From this view of the subject it may appear, that Swedenborg's writings bear no comparison with the Word or Sacred Scriptures, as the former are finite and the latter infinite: also, that Swedenborg can in nowise be compared with the prophets, as the former received revealed truths into his rational principle and communicated them to the world, having an understanding of their meaning and quality; while the latter received and communicated divine truth, of the quality and import of which they were almost entirely ignorant. Spiritual truths appeared to the latter miraculous, to the former, as above miracles. But concerning the difference of illumination between Swedenborg and the prophets, evangelists, &c. but more particularly the men of the most ancient church, a better idea may be had in an extract from his diary on the subject of miracles:

"Instead of miracles there has taken place at the present day an open manifestation of the Lord himself, an intromission into the spiritual world, and with it illumination by immediate light from the Lord in whatever relates to the interior things of the church,