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4 . IRREGULAR ORDINATIONS. 5. SWEDENBORG. 333
Lund, who wished his dean to ordain for him on account
of his old age, in a royal letter of 3ist August, 1792, "as
both the Church law and the dignity of such a ceremony
demands that it ought to be performed by a bishop.
"
None of the persons so irregularly ordained became
bishops.
I must now turn from these details to draw a picture
however slight of a single person, whose career and char
acter exhibit something of the same restless and audacious
genius in exploring the mysteries of the unseen world, as
that of St. Birgitta in the mediaeval period I mean, of
course, Emanuel Swedenborg.
5. EMANUEL SWEDENBORG (1688 1;72).
24
His EARLY
LIFE. FRIENDSHIP WITH CHARLES XII. His
DISAPPOINTMENT IN MARRIAGE. TWO GREAT
WORKS ON INANIMATE AND ANIMATE NATURE.
ANTICIPATIONS OF MODERN THEORIES. TRANSI
TION TO THEOSOPHY. MUGGLETON. DlPPEL.
STRANGE CONDUCT IN 1743 1744. His GNOSTIC
AND SABELLIAN THEOLOGY. THE LAST JUDGMENT
IN 1757. THE "NEW CHURCH." His CREDEN
TIALS. CRITICISM.
One of the most striking figures in the whole history of
Sweden, and particularly in the religious history of that
country in the eighteenth century, is that of Emanuel
24
There is a good and popular biography of Swedenborg by
James John Garth Wilkinson, M.D. (1812 1899), a surgeon
and physician, a homoeopathist and anti-vaccinationist, himself
a mystic and a disciple of Swedenborg, an admirer of Blake, and
a friend of R. W. Emerson isted. 1849, 2nd ed. 1886. Wilkin
son translated as many as eleven works of Swedenborg into
English ; for the list see D. N. B., s.n. /. /. G. Wilkinson. His
presentation of Swedenborg won the praise of Emerson. Less
sympathetic and somewhat vulgar, but much fuller and more
critical, is the life by William White : Emanuel Swedenborg :
his Life and Writings, 2 vols., London, 1867, i vol., ed. 1868.
Cp. the review of it in the Christian Remembrancer, Vol. 54,
pp. 305-25, 1867, and Wilkinson, ed. 2, p. viii. E. Paxton
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