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useful and profitable duties. The prayers are richly fraught with enlightened Christian sentiments of every kind, expressed as much as possible in the divine language of the Word. Every prayer is, at the same time, a lesson of wisdom, illustrating some point of heavenly doctrine, inculcating some spiritual sentiment, and carrying it out, in its various applications to the mind, into life and practice. The "Plain Hints on the Importance of attending Public Worship with regularity," are extremely important and valuable. The "Persuasive to the regular and devout Receiving of the Holy Supper," cannot be read without great profit to the mind, and without feeling a Persuasive," more or less effective, to throw off the spiritual lethargy which so often benumbs us, as to the important uses of this holy ordinance. The "Heads of Self-Examination," search the heart through and through, and probe all its motives and springs of life and of action. And, lastly, the "Hints in Aid of the Perception of the Spiritual Sense of the Word," are a powerful help and guide to enable us to read the Word with the peculiar advantage of that superior instruction and edification, which arise from the opening of its spiritual sense, and which it is the peculiar privilege and blessing of the members of the New Church to enjoy.

Manchester.

MINUS.

CORRESPONDENCE A PRACTICAL SCIENCE.

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To the Editors of the Intellectual Repository. GENTLEMEN,

ANY lengthened argument on the subject of correspondences as applicable to the existing state of nature, may probably be as unacceptable to you as the further illustrations of the subject I had prepared purposely for your pages, and which you appear to have declined, by the return of my last paper.* My opinions, however, such as they are on this important point, having been formed from many years' study of the phenomena of nature and science, in conjunction with an anxious examination of the testimony of Swedenborg, I cannot for one moment entertain the suggestion which has been made me, to modify my future observations, so as to avoid such objections as they have met with; because this would be to admit the force of these, and at the same time to resign, on the mere dictum of another, the sure grounds on which I believe my opinions to be built, and the authority by which The editors beg to state, that they did not decline inserting the papers of their correspondent; they only delayed inserting them for the reason expressed in the editor's note below.-ED.

alone they can be confirmed. It is indeed with these objections, that I have now to do; and I will therefore only beg your insertion of a few remarks in correction of the apparent mis-conception and misstatement of my views, by your correspondent Q., in the Repository for January last; premising that these have only been delayed until I was made acquainted with your intentions with regard to the continuation of my papers, because I considered that to such observations the best answer I could make would be a further elucidation of the subject. I will briefly notice that :

In the first place, I was totally unaware of ever having conceived or argued that the correspondence of spiritual things with natural was any otherwise than as to their uses, and this not their recondite uses only, but their most obvious; since correspondence extends, as we learn from Swedenborg, to the most minute particulars, and embraces all natural uses, from first to last, whether they are discerned by the simple rustic or the eye of philosophy; and this would have been the subject of my after papers, had you, gentlemen, thought them worthy of a place in your pages.

It was proposed, indeed, as far as this could have been done by an extended series of illustrations, to have replied to the question which your correspondent has placed at the head of his second communication, (page 13,) and to which he does not, himself, profess to have found a complete answer.

But I am called upon to give some proofs of my position. Does Q. seek a natural proof of a spiritual cause? then is he striving to invert the order of influx; but if by "an appeal to known facts,” he merely means confirmation from the appearances of nature, this is precisely what I had in view in introducing my observations to the public.

It may, however, be noticed in passing, that no happier illustration could have been afforded, because none more obvious, than that which has been adduced by Q. himself, to prove the contrary; I mean the correspondence of the horse. It is asserted, indeed, that these animals, as they exist in the world, cannot be representative of the states of its inhabitants, or the breed would have been greatly more deteriorated (page 13). Is not Q. then aware of the real grandeur and beauty of this noble animal, as he is found at this day in the Arabian deserts? And who shall say that even here he attains the highest perfection of which he is capable? And, on the other hand, let him in this state be compared with the vile way-worn drudge, too often met with in more civilized countries, shorn of his spirit and his beauty, and

deprived of the first use in the order of creation; and is not the difference sufficiently marked? Can anything, indeed, more plainly point to, or represent, the enslaved and perverted state of the understanding, than the utterly degraded condition of this the noblest of man's brute friends? I would not wish to appeal to a better "known fact."

How carelessly your correspondent must have read the arguments which he professes to refute, may be seen in his first quotation (from page 14), where the subject is opened by me in a proposition, to be subsequently confirmed, that changes in the human mind produce corresponding vicissitudes in nature, as surely as in the spiritual world; and the objector has strangely interpolated,," (and of course, as quickly,)" although in my very next sentence, the contrary is distinctly stated, and a reason is offered why the effects may not so momentarily follow here, as we learn they do in the world of spirits.

The further unqualified assertion, that "all my facts tend the other way," (page 15,) only exposes how slightly they have been attended to, since the plain object of the whole of my subsequent remarks was to shew how the world, on which we live, is in the progress of gradual but never-ceasing change in all its forms and appearances, in accordance with a corresponding progress and alteration in the human mind and character; and here is another palpable mis-statement, for I am made to say, that national character is changed by emigration, whereas, with a simple admission, that such a fact may occur in individual instances, my whole argument is founded on the contrary, viz., the distinctive identity preserved, age after age, throughout whole families and races of men.

But Q. objects that a change of character, such as that produced by civilization, is only a civil change, and has, therefore, nothing to do with spiritual representation. Such an argument, coming from a professing New Church-man, has somewhat startled me; since, if I am indeed chargeable with a confounding of natural and spiritual causes (page 15) in this particular, it must be in common with my authority, Swedenborg, who plainly informs us, that the mind, with all its states and operations, is the spirit of man. And surely it cannot be asserted, that even national character is any where but in the mind?

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Again, how your correspondent could have raised such a visionary chimera," as he well terms it, on my passing remark on the character of northern vegetation, I am at a loss to conjecture. To its refutation, however, he is perfectly welcome, since it is wholly foreign to my views and arguments; for in the first place, from my knowledge N. S. No. 28-VOL. 3.

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of the country, I should never have placed "the peak of Derbyshire," to which he refers (page 16), in the northern part of this kingdom. And in the next, my observation had not reference to particular persons or places, but simply to the north, as distinguished from other quarters in this country, as elsewhere; and this we learn from Swedenborg, corresponds to the predominating influence of faith alone in the human mind, wherever it is met with. My remark, however, was only introduced incidentally, as applying to the subject in hand, and intended to be further illustrated when I came to treat of the geological changes effected on the earth's surface.

At the close of his objections (page 16), Q. has further shewn his inattention to the real subject, by ringing the changes on, and triumphantly parading the absurdity of, a sentence of his own creation,— "Every thing corresponds to everybody." This, professing though it does to claim kindred with, is totally different from, my observation, that by the laws of correspondence we may learn " that every outward object is but an effect whose cause is in the workings of our own minds;" a conclusion which, however erroneous it may be, is but the fair deduction from my previous premises, if not also from the testimony of Swedenborg, who assures us that all natural things were created for man and through him, because they were produced through the spiritual world. The only question then seems to be, how far single minds tend to vary the aggregate of natural effects? And here the objector seems completely overwhelmed with the multiplicity of things and objects in every degree of beauty and use, and their contraries, which may find their correspondence in the state of one individual mind. But has he forgotten the repeated assertion of our author, that," though man knows nothing at all of the interior state of his mind, nevertheless, there are there infinite things, whereof not one comes to his knowledge ?” (Div. Prov. 120.)

In concluding these observations, I am induced to notice, what seems to have been intended as a reproach,—the pointed allusions to my train of reasoning, as well worded, and the language as powerful; because, as it is more than intimated, the reasoning and the language go no further than the words. Of this species of objection, I, of course, am no umpire, and I can freely leave the sweeping condemnation to the judgment of your readers; but I do regret that your correspondent has so far forgotten every principle of fair criticism and charity, as further to assign to my style sinister motives,-motives which I should be loth to lay to his charge," the captivating uneducated minds, and confounding the simple" (page 14). At the same time, I may perhaps

be allowed to say on this subject, that I have ever thought it due to the public, that in every thing written for their eye, both the arguments and the words, should be well weighed and considered, and divested of partial and personal application; an attention to which point might often save much subsequent discussion and irritation.

Having now, I trust, exposed the erroneous statements and insufficient grounds on which these objections to my views have been based, I would beg to make one inquiry of Q. on the subject of his own opinions, which he has volunteered in comparison; and this I do with more earnestness, because I have since learned, on what I cannot but consider good authority, that these are held in common with a great majority of the church. The simple information I seek is, where, in the writings of Swedenborg, any such statement may be found as that "all things in nature have a tendency to become correspondences of the states of man" (p. 15, 16), or from whence even such an inference can be drawn; because his unequivocal and oft-repeated testimony, as I have ever read it, is that all natural objects are ultimate images and correspondences, as quoted in my first paper, and I should be loth to resign the substantive fact for a vague tendency,

And this leads me to observe, lastly, that had your correspondent sought, in a spirit of fair and sincere inquiry, to learn the grounds and reasons of opinions with which he seems so needlessly offended, I should have had much pleasure in attempting to satisfy him. Indeed, the task would have been much more congenial to my feelings than troubling you with remarks which cannot be made of that general application and utility, which I have ever considered as alone suitable to the pages of the Repository; and for this reason, Gentlemen, I cannot but regret the non-insertion of my succeeding papers on the subject, which might have rendered this communication unnecessary.

As, however, it is not my place, nor my wish, to dictate to you how your duties, as impartial journalists, may best be performed, I will only trust that in these remarks I have not transgressed the bounds of charity and courtesy to yourselves or your correspondent, and beg to subscribe myself, in the cause of truth, yours very sincerely,

Yarmouth, March 9, 1842. VIATOR. [The Editors beg to inform their correspondent, that they have not refused to insert his paper; they have only delayed inserting it, thinking that the writer might first wish to consider the objections urged against some of his views by their other correspondent, "Q.," before he proceeded any further with his subject. The question at issue between our correspondents, if we are not mistaken, is this,-Does