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ANECDOTES COLLECTED BY D. P. AB INDAGINE. 111
to require this of you ; you have the queen, and the
king, as well, for witnesses ; and they, no doubt, will not
refuse to give their testimony."
"
’*
The Swedish Documents, p. 104, give extracts from
letters written by this respectable man at Amsterdam,
who was acquainted with Swedenborg, and contain certain
things which he communicates to an intimate friend at
Hamburg. In his first letter, dated Jan. 26, 1771 , he
says, amongst other things,—
66
You ask me what this venerable old man (Sweden
borg) is now doing ? This I can tell you ; he eats and
drinks very moderately, but keeps his chamber rather long,
and thirteen hours appear to be not too much for him.†
When I informed him, that his work On the Earths in
the Universe, had been translated and published, he was
much delighted, and his eyes which are always smiling,
became still more brilliant. He is now indefatigably at
work ; yea, I must say, that he labours in a most
astonishing and superhuman manner at his new work.
Only think ! for every printed sheet (4to. ) he has to
prepare four sheets of manuscript ; he now prints two
sheets every week, and corrects them himself, and con
* Such testimonies have been given; and the queen herself
testified several times to the truth of this occurrence. But
Swedenborg’s doctrine, which contains the development of spiri
tual truths, could not be demonstrated by miraculous phenomena;
nor does it stand in need of stupefying miracles, which, for the
time their influence continues, deprives a man of the use of his
freedom and rationality. It rests upon interior grounds,-upon
Scripture and reason ; and the miraculous experience which
Swedenborg and others may have had, only serves as a confir
mation. Those extraordinary occurrences could, indeed, demon
strate that he was in a condition to experience things in the other
world ; but, as they could by no means prove his doctrine, he
consequently refused to record them, and to appeal to them as
proofs of his doctrine : and this he no doubt told D. P. âb
Indagine ; for we find, that he afterwards conversed much with
him when at Amsterdam.-Tafel.
+ It must be observed, that his time was not all consumed in
sleep, but a great portion of it in meditation and spiritual inter
course, when he would, of course, prefer being secluded from the
world.-Tafel.
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