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608 NOTES TO VOLUME I.
year 1742 he was appointed Archbishop of Upsal, but died in 1743
before entering upon the duties of the office. He was one of the
founders of the Scientific Society of Upsal, and was a member of
the Royal Society of Stockholm , of which he was president in
1743. He was one of the most learned men in Sweden, and kept up
a very extensive correspondence with men of learning abroad. His
correspondence fills eighteen folio volumes, and is preserved in the
Cathedral-Library of Linköping. This collection also contains the
letters he had received from his brother -in -law, Emanuel Swedenborg,
with whom he was on terms of great intimacy, and for whom he
entertained sentiments of the greatest respect and esteem. Sweden
borg himself looked up to Ericus Benzelius as to his second father.
In 1710 he wrote to him, "I not only love you more than my own
brothers, but I even love and revere you as my father,” (see
Document 39.) The nature of the affection and respect which his
brother-in -law felt for Swedenborg appears best, however, from the
fact, that he preserved no less than fifty of the letters he received
from Swedenborg between 1709 and 1726. These letters are among
the most valuable documents that have been preserved to us respecting
Swedenborg’s earlier years, and his admirers owe a large debt of
gratitude to the Archbishop for having saved them from destruction .
Of his departed kinsman Swedenborg gives us in the "Spiritual
Diary," No. 4749, the following account: "Erficus] Benz[elius] was
outwardly proud, yet inwardly he was good. In the world he had
preferred himself to others, and despised them in comparison, with
the exception of one who excelled him in memory, in which he
placed all learning and wisdom. His ecclesiastical learning was of
the memory, nothing being from himself, and because this was the
case, he was not allowed to contaminate his internal therewith . At
first he suffered severely in the other life. Around his brain there
appeared as it were a bony callosity, which was sometimes broken ,
causing great pain, and he was by this means brought into his
interior state which was good; he was then like a child, and was
instructed by the angels in a manner accommodated to him .” See
also Nos. 4787, 5702, 6016.
There is another Ericus Benzelius mentioned in the “ Diary,"
who was interiorly wicked ; this appears to be Ericus Benzelius the
elder, or the father of the foregoing; to him apply Nos. 4552, 4757,
4851, 5074, 5148, 5722, 5751 , 5885, 6034, 6036.
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