respond 'One! One! One!" an emphatic affirmation of the unity of Jehovah. (P. 55.)

"They are in possession of several literary compositions, such as poems, allegories, &c., but none that are common to their brethren elsewhere. (P. 93.)

"Their alphabetical characters bear the impression of great antiquity, and these are certainly the old or ancient Hebraic character." (P. 93.)

"They are in the possession of a few manuscript copies of the law of Moses, which are divided into five books like ours, which they call the book of the Covenant, Exod. 24, ver. 7. They are written in the original Hebrew character, without any division or points; which manuscripts they hold to be very ancient, and would not part with them on any account." "Their copies do not differ from the Hebrew copies in our possession, except in two places; first, in the book of Deut. chap. 23, where the last blessing of Moses places Judah after Rheuben, in our copies, and Simeon is omitted altogether, whilst in their copies Simeon and Levi are placed together as in the blessing of Jacob, Gen. chap. 49. Second, The last chap. of Deuteronomy is omitted altogether, and the book concludes with the prophetic blessing, 'Happy art thou, O Israel; who is like unto thee, O people: saved by the Lord, the shield of thy help, and who is the sword of thy excellency; and thy enemies shall be found liars unto thee: and thou shalt tread upon their high places. From this it appears that they are in possession of the original text of the book of the law of Moses; for it is certain that the last chapter of Deuteronomy was added after the death of Moses. (P. 95.)

"They are in possession of a part of the book of Esther." "They are very anxious to get the Psalms of David; and so ignorant are they of the New Testament, that in the year 1837-8, when two of the Jews from Andrewa visited me, and saw the volume, they put it three times to their forehead and three times to their mouth, and kissed it. They are free from the hatred and superstition of their brethren towards Christianity." (P. 97.)

"Until the Russians took possession of Georgia, they had no knowledge whatever of any printed or pointed book." (P. 97.)

N. S. No. 31.-VOL. 3.

M M

A NOTE FROM A CORRESPONDENT.

VIATOR begs to thank the Editors for their note in the last number of the Repository (page 223), as it gives him an opportunity of assuring them and their readers, that it was the farthest from his intention to intimate, that natural objects and spaces are "only appearances" of objects and spaces; since it is the plain testimony of Swedenborg that they are fixed and real to man in the world, because they represent or correspond to spiritual things within him. What he learns, however, from the same source, and what he meant to convey, was, that all things in nature are "but appearances" of truth, and “ are not real, unless so far as they are joined with those things which are of the light of heaven," A. C. n. 3485; for "internal things are the objects represented, and external things the objects representing.” A. C. n. 4292.

The writer is much gratified, also, to see that his observations have called forth the valuable remarks of W. M., and trusts that they may be the means, as is his sole object, of inducing a full and impartial investigation of what Swedenborg has taught us on this subject. Reigate, June 10, 1842.

THE NAME "LUNACY" A POPULAR ILLUSION.

To the Editors of the Intellectual Repository.

GENTLEMEN, IN page 185, I find these words :-" The melancholy condition of lunacy must ever be an inexplicable riddle to the unassisted rational powers; for we can in no way conceive what effect the distant moon in its changes can have on the reasoning faculties of an inhabitant of this earth. Yet we have only to look to the spiritual correspondence of this phenomenon, and we may read at once the cause of this startling fact."

But, gentlemen, this "startling fact" is no fact at all! as I believe all medical men are of opinion. Some little time back, I inquired of a friend of mine, who has been the resident surgeon and superintendent of the County Lunatic Asylum at Stafford, for the last twentyfive years, with an average of 200 patients under his care, whether he could account for the popular illusion implied in the word lunatic; and whether he had ever observed any access or recess of disease according to the changes of the moon; when he positively assured me, that the notion of any connexion between cerebral disease and the

moon, is perfectly illusory; and that the word lunacy, as signifying disease of the brain, or what is popularly called mental disease, appears to be the creation of popular superstition in the earlier periods of medical science, when, certainly, as in all rude periods, much of superstition was mingled with the science and practice of medicine.

I do not suppose that VIATOR could mean to say, although his language is liable to be so construed, that individual cases of insanity, that is, of cerebral disease, originate in individual spiritual insanity ; because such a conclusion would be equally cruel and absurd; and therefore, it ought to have been guarded against by greater definiteness of expression.

Granting even that the moon's changes had the influence supposed on lunatics, I can see no particular connexion between that circumstance and the great general principle of E. S., that all bodily diseases originated with the moral diseases created in the mind by sin; nor do I see any closer connexion between the spiritual insanity of a perverted judgment, attendant on the dominion of evil, and cerebral disease, than between it and other bodily diseases.

I would not wish to speak of any writer's efforts to amuse, amend, or enlighten us, with unnecessary harshness; but really it does appear to me, that to deal with the sacred science of correspondences as it pleases VIATOR to do, is nothing less than trifling with things divine; it tends to render that science ridiculous, to the exultation of its enemies, and to the deep grief of its pious and intelligent friends.

If I were at all singular in this conviction, I should forbear the expression of it; but, unhappily, that is by no means the case. I have been deeply pained by this (to me unknown) writer's speculations; for although he has invested them with a pious exterior, I have felt them to be, in themselves, highly irreverent.

I am, &c.,

WILLIAM MASON.

ON THE PROSPECT OF ECCLESIASTICAL CHANGES. Being the ADDRESS delivered on the 33rd Anniversary of the Society for Printing and Publishing the Writings of the Hon. Emanuel Swedenborg, Instituted in London in the year 1810, held at the Freemasons' Tavern, June 21, 1842.

BY THE PRESIDENT, JOHN SPURGIN, ESQ., M. D.

WERE number the test of the importance or the success of the Society for Printing and Publishing the Writings of the New Church,

I might be discouraged from taking the duty of its chairman year after year. Fortunately, however, my friends, we are independent of all individual discouragement, seeing that our funds, and with them our means of accomplishing the great good contemplated in the establishment of this Society, are on the most satisfactory increase. Small, then, as our party may happen to be, let us congratulate one another on the increasing stability and efficiency of the London New Church Printing Society, and delight ourselves with the reflection that the good cause needs not the stimulus of mere festivity to make it successful.

There is much, indeed, for us to reflect upon in connexion with the objects and uses of this Society, of a highly interesting and important nature, and which, at this time, I feel myself at liberty to advert to somewhat at length. I allude, more particularly, to the present state of Christianity, as depending on its doctrines on the one hand, and as influencing mankind on the other. That Christianity or the Christian religion has experienced many vicissitudes and changes, must be well known to every one; also, that in no form of it has it as yet exhibited that unity and consistency which should accompany the profession and assumption of orthodoxy, is equally obvious; and lastly, it is very generally admitted, that it never was threatened with so great a change, or was in so unsettled a state, as it is at the present day.

These are undeniable positions in regard to Christianity, viewed in its widest range, and also in its more prominent subdivisions; for in no one of these can we discover immutability, or unity, or a settled state of things. Varying doctrine in each division respectively, is assuredly the producing cause of this condition of Christianity; and were there no remedy provided, it is difficult to conjecture to what result it would sooner or later arrive.

Men of observation and discernment appear to be fully sensible of the grounds there are for apprehension on this head; and their chief consolation is derived to them from a trust in a divine providence, which not only the fulfilment of prophecy, but the manifest advancement of knowledge and civilization declares to be operating for some ulterior good.

To the members of the New Church it will ever prove most gratifying to be witnessing the efforts of individuals of exalted station, and eminent for their piety and learning, to suppress the ignoble passions and emotions which are too frequently excited by discussions on matters of Christian doctrine and faith, and which render the war of

opinion more desolating to the Church than that of the sword is to the human race; and I rejoice in being enabled to call your attention to an instance of an effort so directed, which is calculated to produce results of no small importance to the New Church, seeing that the course of reasoning, the example set forth, and the spirit that is inculcated therein, are so many aids towards bringing her superior claims and her intrinsic value into greater notice and more patient examination than they have hitherto met with. The charge of the Bishop of Oxford to the clergy of his diocese, is the instance I refer to; and I trust I shall be excused for making quotations from it, when I state it to be my opinion that they ought to be regarded, by us, as strong incentives to our persevering in our work of printing and publishing the writings of E. S., with all zeal and diligence.

The worthy bishop confines his charge to the subjects brought forward in the Tracts for the Times, and to the circumstances that appear to be in close connexion with them.

Since (he says) I last addressed you collectively from this chair four years have elapsed, and, although it commonly happens that men are disposed to exaggerate the importance of events occurring in their own time, and in which they are themselves more or less the actors, still I cannot but think that those four years will be hereafter looked upon as the commencement of one of the most eventful epochs in the history of the English Catholic church.

The last four years have witnessed the rapid development of those principles, which the world (though untruly, for they are of no locality) has identified with Oxford, and to which I felt it my duty to advert at my last visitation. Those principles have, during this short interval, spread and taken root-not merely in our own neighbourhood, and in other parts of England, but have passed from shore to shore, east and west, north and south, wherever members of our church are to be found,nay, are unquestionably the object to which, whether at home or abroad, the eyes of all are turned who have any interest or care for the concerns of religion. I am not now saying anything about the tendency of those principles: I am simply asserting the fact of their existence and development. There they are, whether for good or evil; and they are forming at this moment the most remarkable movement, which, for three centuries at least, has taken place amongst us.

on.

And now, in the next place, I would advert to the manner of their growth. Certainly they have been fostered with no friendly hand. No adscititious aid of powerful patronage has helped them forward; no gale of popular applause has urged them On the contrary, they seem to have been the single exception, which an age of latitudinarian liberality could discover, against the rule of tolerating any form of belief. And while many, whose motives are above all suspicion, and whose honoured names need no praise of mine, have unhesitatingly and utterly condemned them,— while many more have looked on with caution and mistrust,-while many in authority (myself among the number) have felt it their duty to warn those committed to their trust of the possible tendencies of the doctrines in question, they have likewise been exposed to a storm of abuse as violent as it has been unceasing, to calumnies