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DE THOME’S REMARKS ON MAGNETISM. 249
many remonstrances ; and I shall here make one, and,
as I think, the most just of any, in favour of an illustrious
man of learning, some years since deceased. Three folio
volumes were printed at Dresden and Leipzic, in 1734,
under the following title: Emanuelis Swedenborgii Opera
Philosophica et Mineralia. The first of these volumes
is entirely devoted to a sublime theory of the formation
of the world, founded on that of the magnetic element ;
the existence, form, and mechanism of which, are de
monstrated by the author from experience, geometry, and
the most solid reasoning founded on these two bases.
The subject of the other volumes, being foreign to that
of this letter, I shall content myself with saying, that in
the whole of the work, there is such an abundance of
new truths, and of physical, mathematical, astronomical,
mechanical, chemical, and mineralogical knowledge, as
would be more than sufficient to establish the reputation
of several different writers. Accordingly, he acquired so
much fame by its publication, that the Academy of
Stockholm hastened to invite him to become one of its
members. This production of the Swedish philosopher
has continued to maintain the same degree of esteem in
all Europe, and the most celebrated men have not dis
dained to draw materials from it to assist them in their
labours ; some, too, have had the weakness to dress them
selves in the feathers of the peacock without acknow
ledging where they obtained them. On reading the
paragraph in the first volume, page 387, entitled De Chao
Universali Solis et Planetarum, deque separatione ejus
in Planetas et Satellites ; and that at page 438, De Pro
gressione Telluris a sole ad Orbitam, it will be seen
observe, that the Marquis de Thomé, writing to a journal of a
merely philosophical nature, the editors of which would have re
fused admission to an essay that appeared immediately to relate
to theological subjects, has dwelt chiefly on the highly gifted
Swedenborg’s attainments as a man of science, by which he has
prepared the way for a favourable reception of the testimony
which he afterwards so elegantly and energetically gives in favour
of his character as a divinely-commissioned teacher. A letter
from the same writer, declaring his reception of the New Church
writings, is printed in the New Jerusalem Magazine, 1790, p. 86.
M 2
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