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590 SWEDENBORG AS A MAN OF SCIENCE. [Doc. 203.
cloth, so that no dust may fall upon it. The work itself
can be taught better by practice than by any description ;
for after trying a few times the excavation can be accomplished
very easily ; though care must be taken that the edges re
main clean and exact. The laying in of the coloured com
positions also is not so difficult, provided the proper order
is observed in which they are to succeed one another; for
it does not matter so much if it is spread a little over the
sides, as this is all removed by the polishing. I have such a
table37 in my possession, and I was present all the time it was
being made ; it was finished in five weeks, of four hours daily
work, and hence altogether in 120 hours.
DOCUMENT 203.
THE REPRINT OF SWEDENBORG’S "METHOD
OF FINDING THE LONGITUDE ," IN 1766.
This method, which Swedenborg originated as early as
1712 (see Document 44 ), and which had been printed by
him in Swedish in 1718, and in Latin at Amsterdam in 1721,
he reprinted at the latter place, in 1766. In the introduction
to this reprint — which is exceedingly scarce — he says: “I have
heard that it was thought by astronomers that the longitude
of places on land and sea could be determined for certain
only by means of the moon, and I have heard likewise that
a method is now being instituted by which this result is to
be attained. As in my youth I applied my mind for some
time to the science of astronomy, and for that purpose
studied Ricciolus, where I saw that the methods of several
learned men for finding the longitude by means of the moon
had been examined, but condemned on account of the diffi
culty presented by the parallaxes, or by the reduction of the
moon as it was observed, or seen apparently, to its true
position ; I therefore exerted myself to find some method
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