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INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. xix.
And this was a just observation. Had the Divine
Wisdom seen that any specific information respecting
the nature of heaven and hell, and man’s state after death
in general, would have been conducive to the welfare of
mankind under the Christian dispensation, in that form
of it founded by the Apostles, the Apostle Paul would
doubtless have been permitted to communicate the know
ledge which had been imparted to himself. But this
objection does not lie against the knowledge of the sub
ject communicated in the writings of Swedenborg, if to
him it was really granted, as we have seen there is so
much reason for concluding, to be the organ of im
parting the knowledge necessary for the Christian Church
under the new dispensation of it predicted by the symbol
of a New Jerusalem. It would be strange indeed, if,
amid the beams of light which are promised under this
dispensation, not a ray should be afforded to chase away
the dreary gloom which everywhere prevails, beyond its
precincts, in regard to the state of man after death,-if,
in the glorious state under which it is generally believed
that Christianity should at length appear on earth, no
specific knowledge should even then be afforded respecting
the nature of heaven and hell. It is, then, in strict con
formity with the most reasonable expectations, that Swe
denborg should have been enabled to clear up this matter
also ; and to reject the information communicated through
him, because it was not communicated to the Apostles,
would be just as reasonable, as to reject the knowledge
imparted through the Apostles because it was not as
plainly revealed through Moses and the prophets.
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