too long from their destined use. -How gracious is that GOD, who thus made all things ultimately for the good of Man! See St. PIERRE's Studies of Nature, vol. i. p. 311.

1149. [Matt. vi. 19.] In Japan there is a species of auts, in shape, bigness, and other particulars, like our common ones, but white as snow: they will in a very little time pierce through any thing but stone or ore, doing, wherever they come, very great mischief; and no other way has yet been found of keeping them from merchandizes, and things of value, but by strewing some salt under and over such articles. Modern Univer. Hist. vol. ix. p. 97.

1153. [Matt. vi. 19.] At Pondicherry, says Bartolomeo, I met with an incident, which excited my astonishment. I had put my effects into a chest which stood in my apartment, and being one day desirous of taking out a book in order to amuse myself with reading, as soon as I opened the chest I discovered in it an innumerable multitude of what are improperly called white ants (The appellation, termites, from the Latin systematic name, termes, is better. There are various kinds of them, but only in warm countries, which are all equally destructive and occasion great devastations, not only in sugar plantations, but also among furniture and clothes in habitations). When I examined the different articles in the chest, I observed that these little animals had perforated my shirts in a thousand places, and gnawed to pieces my books, my girdle, my amice, and my shoes. They were moving in columns

each behind the other; and each carried away in its mouth a fragment of my effects, which were more than half destroyed. BARTOLOMEO, by Johnston, p. 13.

SINGLE EYE.

[Matt. vi. 22.] The light of the body is the eye: if, therefore, thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.

1154. [Luke xi. 34.] The human understanding, like Moses in the mount, does by an assiduous converse with God acquire a lasting luminousness.

1155.

BOYLE, on the high Veneration Man's Intellect owes to God, p. 92.

The eyes of a man, who sees from natural light, are of the substance of this world; and the eyes of an angel are (single or) of the substance of his world: so formed in both places as adequately to receive their proper light.

Men, as to the interiors of their minds, receive heat and illumination from the same sun that influences angels. By its heat they are warmed, and by its light they are illuminated, in proportion as they receive love and wisdom from the Lord. The difference between men and angels is, that angels are under that sun alone; but men not only under that sun, but also under the sun of this world. Unless the bodies of men be under both suns, they cannot possibly exist and subsist. It is otherwise with angels, whose bodies are spiritual. (SWEDENBORG's Divine Love, nn. 91, 112.) —When natural light is removed, the spiritual sight is opened to the light of heaven alone; and, in that case, the eye is single, and the whole spiritual body, distinctly, full of light.-The understanding, which is the internal sight of man, is no otherwise illuminated by spiritual light, than as the eye or external sight of man is by natural light.

1156.

SWEDENBORG's Div. Prov. n. 166.

Cheselden relates that a man having sustained a hurt in one of his eyes by a blow, so that he could not direct the optical axis of both eyes to the same point, saw all objects double; but this inconvenience was not lasting: the most familiar objects gradually began to appear single, and his sight was at length restored to its natural state.

HUTTON'S Recreations, vol. ii. p. 200.

1160. [Ps. cxxxix. 2.] Before a spirit speak, it is known by his thought alone what he intends to say; for the thought is quicker in its influx than the speech, and therefore precedes it.

The thought of a speaking man is nothing but the speech of his spirit; and the apperception (or interior perception) of speech, is nothing but the hearing of his spirit. Thought, when a man speaks, appears not to him indeed as speech; because it conjoins itself with the speech of the body, and is in it. Apperception also, when a man hears, appears not otherwise than as hearing in the ear. Hence it is that the generality of people, who have not reflected, know no other than that all sense is in the organs of the body; and consequently that when those organs fall to decay by death, nothing of sense survives: when yet, in such case, the man, that is, his spirit, comes into his veriest sensitive life.

See SWEDENBORG's Arcana, nn. 1640, 4652.

EVIL EYE.

1161. [Matt. vi. 23.] If thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If, therefore, the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

There are two lights; one, which is of the world from the sun; the other, which is of heaven from the Lord. In the light of the world, there is nothing of intelligence; but in the light of heaven, there is intelligence. Hence, so far as the things which are of the light of the world are, with a man, illuminated by those things which are of the light of heaven; the man so far understands and is wise.

end, but the impulse is felt at the other, as happens in a row of bullets touching one another. Grauting this to be true, and admitting the appearance of light to be caused by the flux of fire; we shall be enabled to account for the visible motion that has been perceived even in its stationary particles. Mr. Reaumur and Sir Isaac Newton observed, that when the earth was between the Sun and Jupiter, the eclipses of his satellites happened sooner than was marked in the tables : but that when the earth was moving towards the opposite side, and the Sun between Jupiter and the earth, the eclipses of the satellites happened several minutes later, because the light (or rather fire) had the large orbit of the earth to traverse in this last situation more than in the foregoing from which discovery they have concluded, that the light (or fire) of the sun is seven or eight minutes in traversing the thirty-three millions of leagues that are between the sun and the earth. See ABBE PLUCHE'S Hist. of the Heav. vol. ii. p. 167.

1163.

The substance of light is constantly the same, whether it be inactive and without impulsion around us, or repeat its services in proportion to the vibrations that push it on our eyes. It is as real and as nearly about us at midnight as at noon: the minutest particle of fire, striking against the body of this light, betrays its presence to us.The Abbe Nollet has by experiments convinced the most incredulous, that not only a body of light is spread all around us, but also that each ray of it has its peculiar nature, which could not be changed by conveying it singly through twenty different mediums, and which might be found again at pleasure, after it had been re-united in a mass with the other colors. Ibid. pp. 91, 94.

1164. [Ps. cvii. 10.] We live in the fluid of light, as fishes do in water. When nothing agitates the water, fishes cannot feel it; neither can we feel the light, when nothing puts it in motion. It surrounds without striking us, and is in that state darkness.

Nature Displayed, vol. iv. pp. 85, 86.

1165. [Matt. vi. 23.] The cause of the extinction of light in bodies, is a subject of very great difficulty. M. Bouguer supposes that the power which absorbs or extiuguishes the light is confined to the surfaces of bodies, and that it operates chiefly when the rays fall on it with a certain degree of obliquity; whereas Newton supposes that a ray is never stopped but when it impinges on some of the solid parts of bodies. Whatever be the cause, the fact is, that the light which is again emitted by phosphoreal substances is trifling compared with that amazing quantity which is received and absorbed by all terrestrial bodies from the light of the sun. (Dr. PRIESTLEY, on Vision, p. 779.) —Its extinction is caused by its loss of the matter of heat.

1166. The spiritual light which they who are in hell have from rationality, is turned into infernal light, as the light of day into the darkness of night.

SWEDENBORG's Div. Prov. n. 167.

1167. [Ezek. xxxiii. 31.] Acknowledgment of the Lord from the wisdom of doctrine, gives presence; and acknowledgement of the Lord from a life according to doctrine, gives conjunction. Consequently they who reject doctrine concerning the Lord, remove themselves from Him; and, as they also reject life, they separate themselves from Him: while they who do not reject doctrine, but life, are present, yet separated. These are like friends who converse together, but do not mutually love each other; or they are like two, of whom the one speaks with the other as a friend, but hates him as an enemy.

Ibid. n. 91.

1168. [Matt. vi. 23.] All living creatures, we know, emit effluvia both by the breath and the pores of the skin; and therefore all bodies within the sphere of those effluvia will be affected by them according to the quality of the effluvia, and according to the disposition of the emittant and recipient parts. If this be granted, we must admit that of all the parts in the animal body the eye is the quickest in its movements, the most permeable in its coats and humors, dispensing through the optic nerve a fund of volatile matter from the brain, and thus emanating from an enraged or evildisposed mind those phenomena of fascination which, though the reason were unknown, have obtained from many the imputation of an evil eye. A pernicious effect was apparently produced by that organ, but in what manner no rational idea had been suggested: it may now however be perceived from our Lord's words, that evil engenders a dark, a malignant and cursing spirit, which, darting through the eye, must necessarily blast whatever it falls upon with the baneful influence inseparable from its nature.

See Beauties of Nature and Art displayed, vol. xiv. pp. 25–27.

1169. [Matt. vi. 22, 23.] The hypocrite, in assuming appearances and directing his attention to contrary objects, resembles the cameleon, whose eyes, rolling like spheres on an invisible axis, turn different ways, enabling the animal to see what passes before, behind, or on either side. Nay so singularly divided are its optical powers, that it can give one eye all these motions, while the other remains perfectly still. As to the general color of the cameleon, says FORBES, one kept several weeks in my possession, while unmolested, was of a pleasant green, spotted with pale blue: from this it changed to bright yellow, dark olive, and a dull green; but never appeared to such advantage as when irritated, or a dog approached it, the body was then considerably inflated, and the skin clouded like tortoise-shell, in shades of yellow, orange, green, and black. A black object always caused an almost instantaneous transformation; the room appropriated

for its accommodation was skirted by a board painted black, this the cameleon carefully avoided; but if he accidentally drew near it, or we placed a black hat in his way, he was reduced to a hideous skeleton, and from the most lively tints became black as jet; on removing the cause, the effect as suddenly ceased; the sable hue was succeeded by a brilliant colouring, and the body was again inflated. — The cameleon also, and the flatterer, are equally dexterous in catching their prey with the tongue the cameleon's is hollow like an elephant's trunk: this it darts nimbly at flies and other insects, which it seems to prefer to the aerial food generally supposed to be its sustenance.

Month. Mag. for Jan. 1814, p. 586.

1170. [Matt. v. 28.] Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. The evil a man deems allowable, is appropriated to him. Being kept from doing it only by the external restraints of fear, when those restraints are removed, he does it freely; and in the mean time he continually does it in his spirit. a man thinks in his spirit in the world, that he does after his departure out of the world, when he becomes a spirit.

SWEDENBORG's Divine Providence, nn. 81, 101.

1171. [Hos. iv. 11.] When any one commits adultery, heaven is instantly closed against him; and he afterwards lives immersed solely in worldly things. The interiors of his mind cannot possibly be again opened, but by earnest repentance.

SWEDENBORG'S Arcana, n. 2750.

TRUST IN PROVIDENCE.

[Matt. vi. 25, 33.] Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? But seek ye first the kingdom of GOD, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

1172. [Matt. vi. 23.] Always dissatisfied with the present, Man alone of beings regrets the past, and trembles at the thought of futurity.

St. PIERRE's Studies of Nature, vol. i. p. 95.

1173. [Matt. vi. 34.] The desire of foreknowing the future is connate with most people. But this desire originates from the love of evil it is therefore taken away from those who believe in the Divine Providence; a coufidence being given

them, that the Lord will dispose of their lot. They consequently do not desire to foreknow it, lest, by any means, they should interfere with the Divine Providence.

See SWEDENBORG's Divine Love, n. 179.

1174. [Mutt. vi. 31, 32.] They who assuredly know and believe there is a life after death, are concerned about heavenly things, as being eternal and blessed; but not about worldly things, only so far as the necessities of life require. See SWEDENBORG's Arcana, n. 6810.

1175. [Matt. vi. 30.] All the works of nature have the wants of man for their end; as all the sentiments of man have DEITY for their principle.

St. PIERRE's Studies of Nature, vol. iii. p. 122.

1176. [Luke xii. 29-31.] He who makes the wisdom of his understanding subservient to honor, glory or gain, puts himself and the world in the first place, the Lord and heaven in the second; and what is put in the second place is loved in proportion as it is subservient, and if it be not subservient, it is renounced and rejected; if not before, yet assuredly after, death.

SWEDENBORG's Div. Love, n. 419.

1179. [Luke xiii. 24.] If admission into heaven were of mere mercy, without regard to the life; the Lord being essential Mercy, all would be received by Him however great their numbers. To push down any one into hell, when yet he might be received into heaven, would be not mercy, but unmercifulness; and to choose one in preference to another, would be not justice, but injustice. Those, however, who, in the world, receive mercy, have the all of their life of good and of their faith of truth from mercy: they have also from mercy reception into heaven; and are they who are called the elect. See SWEDENBORG's Arcana, nn. 5057,-8.

1180. [Ps. lxxxv. 10.] The Divine Providence in reforming, regenerating and saving men, participates equally of the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom. From more of the Divine Love than of the Divine Wisdom, or from more of the Divine Wisdom than of the Divine Love, a man cannot be reformed, regenerated and saved. The Divine Love would save all, but it can save only by the Divine Wisdom: and, as all the laws by which salvation is effected are of the Divine Wisdom, Love cannot transcend those laws, because the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom are one, and act in union. See SWEDENBORG's Divine Love, p. 29.

REPENTANCE.

1177. [Mark i. 15.] Repent ye, and believe the Gospel. No repentance can be effectual, but such as entirely changes the nature and disposition of the offender; which, in the language of Scripture, is called," being born again." Mere contrition for past crimes, nor even the pardon of them, cannot effect this, unless it operates to this entire conversion or new birth; as it is properly and emphatically named for sorrow can no more purify a mind corrupted by a long continuance in vicious habits, than it can restore health to a body distempered by a long course of vice and intemperance.

JENYNS' Works, vol. iv. p. 50.

1178. [Luke iii. 3.] They who think that by the sacrament of the Lord's Supper their sins are forgiven, though they have not removed them from themselves by repentance; they also, who think to be saved by faith alone; and they who think to be saved by dispensations from the Pope; all believe in immediate mercy and momentaneous salvation. But when this proposition is reversed, it then becomes a truth: that is, when sins are removed, they are also forgiven; for repentance must precede forgiveness, there being no forgiveness without repentance.

See SWEDENBORG's Div. Prov. n. 280.

FORGIVENESS OF SINS,

[Matt. vi. 14.] If ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you;

1181. [Mark i. 4.] Remission of sins does not mean merely the pardon of sins, as it is generally understood, but the removal, or taking away, of sins; not only the guilt, but also the very nature of sin, and the pollution of the soul through it: and comprehends all that is generally understood by the terms justification and sanctification.

Dr. A. CLARKE, on the Eucharist, p. 69.

1182. [1 John i. 7. The blood of Jesus Christ-cleanseth from all sin]-Clearing the understanding by displacing the spirit of error, and purifying the will by removing the evil influences that previously work there in the children of disobedience; as the natural blood, circulating in the arteries and veins, cleanses and renews the corporeal frame.

1183. [Matt. ix. 20.] With the spiritual man that purer blood, which by some is called the animal spirit, is rectified by the purification of his love; and, flowing into the venal blood, purifies it. The contrary takes place in those with whom the love is defiled in the understanding.

SWEDENBORG'S Divine Love, n. 423.

1184. [Mark vii. 3.] A man is not purified, unless he explore himself, see his sins, acknowledge them, condemn himself for them, and repent by desisting from them. These things he must do as from himself, but still from an acknowledgment at heart that he does them from the Lord. SWEDENBORG's Div. Prov. n. 121.

1185. [Acts ii. 38.] If a man sin, and actually repent, that sin shall be removed from him.

Laws of Menu.

1186. [John i. 12.] The evil which is of man does not receive good from the Lord in a moment; neither does good from the Lord cast out evil from man in a moment: if either one or other were done in a moment, life in man could not remain.

SWEDENBORG's Divine Prov. n. 177.

1187. [Luke xxiv. 47.] Abduction or deliverance from evils, as effected of the LORD by a thousand most secret means, cannot better be seen, and thereby concluded, than from the secret operations of the soul in the body. Those with which man is acquainted, are the following: With respect to the food he is to eat, he sees it or looks at it, smells it, has an appetite for it, tastes it, chews it with his teeth, turns it about with his tongue, swallows it thus down into the stomach, and so into the belly. But the secret operations of the soul with which man is unacquainted, because he perceives them not, are the following: The stomach turns about the food it has received, by means of its solvent liquor opens and separates its parts, that is, digests it, and presents such as is properly prepared to the mouths of the vessels that open into the intestines, which drink it up: It also distributes and sends some parts into the blood, some into the lymphatic vessels, some into the lacteal vessels of the mesentery, and conveys some down into the intestines: Afterwards the chyle, which is drawn through the vessels of the mesentery into its receptacle, is conveyed through the thoracic duct into the Vena Cava, and so into the heart, and from the heart into the lungs, and from thence through the left ventricle of the heart into the aorta, and from the aorta by its different ramifications into the viscera of the whole body, and also into the kidneys; in each of which there is a separation and purification of the blood, and a removal of the heterogeneous parts: Not to mention how the heart distributes its blood to the brain after it has been purified in the lungs; which is done by the arteries called Carotids: and how the brain returns the blood vivified into the above-mentioned Vena Cava, into which the thoracic duct empties the chyle; and so again to the heart. These, besides innumerable others, are the secret operations of the soul in the body. A man perceives nothing of these; and he who is not skilled in anatomy, kuows nothing of them and yet similar things are done in the interiors of a man's mind. Nothing can be done in the body, except from the mind, inasmuch as the mind of man is his spirit, and his spirit is

equally a man; with this only difference, that the things done in the body are done naturally, and the things done in the mind are done spiritually, there is a perfect similitude. Hence it is evident, that the Divine Providence operates by a thousand hidden ways in every man; and that its end is continually to purify him, because its end is to save him; and that nothing more is incumbent on man, but to remove the evils in his external: the rest the LORD provides, if He be implored. SWEDENBORG'S Divine Providence, n. 296.

DISORDERS OF THE BODY ORIGINATE IN THE MIND.

[Matt. ix. 5.] Whether is it easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and walk?

1188. [Matt. ix. 2.] With respect to Man, the moral affections are of such extensive influence, that in the whole catalogue of diseases there is not one, as Jesus Christ affirms, but what owes its origin to the abuse of those affections. See St. PIERRE's Studies of Nature, vol. ii. p. 67.

1189.

The passions have a greater influence ou health than most people are aware of. All violent and sudden passions dispose to, or actually throw people into, acute diseases. The slow and lasting passions, such as grief and hopeless love, bring on chronical diseases. Till the passion, which caused the disease, is calmed; medicine is applied in vain. The love of God, as it is the sovereign remedy of all miseries, so in particular it effectually prevents all the bodily disorders the passions introduce, by keeping the passions themselves within, due bounds. And by the unspeakable joy and perfect calm serenity, and tranquillity it gives the mind, it becomes the most powerful of all the means of health and long life.

WESLEY'S Primitive Physic.

1190. [Mark ii. 9.] According to the doctrines of Stahl, the primary cause of all the disorders in the human body proceeds from the mind, and consequently the mind, being differently affected, produces different diseases. Experience, we are told, demonstrates, that when the mind, which animates the most robust and best organized body, is violently affected, either by sudden sensations, or by such as are long and painful, the body thereby manifestly suffers. Thus, sudden fright, terror, rage, corroding grief, envy, vehement desire, and every other passion, occasion disorders, sometimes suddenly, sometimes slowly, such as apoplexy, palsy, madness, fevers, hysterics, and a variety of other diseases. It evidently appears that, in these cases, it is the mind which has affected the body and occasioned its derangement. Sir JOHN SINCLAIR's Code of Health,

vol. i. p. 75.