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176 DOCUMENTS CONCERNING SWEDENBORG.
respondences effect such things when they happen. And
as there are no natural diseases among the spirits in the
spiritual world, there are neither any hospitals ; but,
instead of them there are spiritual mad-houses, in which
are those who theoretically denied God, and in others,
such as practically did the same. Those who in the
world were idiots, at their arrival in the other world are
also foolish and idiots ; but being divested of their ex
ternals, and their internals opened as is the case with
them all, they acquire an understanding agreeable to their
former quality and life, inasmuch as the actual follies
and madnesses dwell in the external natural man, and
not in the internal spiritual.
"With regard to what passed in the earliest part of my
life, about which you wished to be informed : from my
fourth to my tenth year, my thoughts were constantly
engrossed by reflecting upon God, on salvation, and on
the spiritual affections of man. I often revealed things in
my discourse, which filled my parents with astonishment,
and made them declare at times, that certainly the angels
spoke through my mouth.
"From my sixthto my twelfth year, it was my greatest
delight to converse with the clergy concerning faith ; to
whom I often observed, that charity or love was the life
of faith, and that this vivifying charity or love was no
other than the love of one’s neighbour. That God
vouchsafes this faith to every one ; but that it is adopted
by those only who practise that charity.
"I knew of no other faith or belief at that time, than
that God is the Creator and Preserver of Nature. That
He endues man with understanding, good inclinations,
and other gifts thence derived.
" I knew nothing at that time of this systematic or
dogmatic kind of faith, that God the Father imputes the
righteousness or merits of his Son to whomsoever, and at
such times, as he wills, even to the impenitent. And had
I heard of such kind of faith, it would have been then, as
now, perfectly unintelligible to me.—I remain, &c.,
66 EMANUEL SWEDENBORG.
66
Stockholm, Nov. 14, 1769."
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