72 LETTER FROM DR. TAFEL. edification and the necessary nourishment of our soul in certain states and degrees of regeneration,—we must feel a strong desire to have at hand, and be able to run through with as little loss of time as possible, all the different applications and modifications of the spiritual signification of a word. For ministers and theologians, too, such an instrument or apparatus, in the original Latin language, is a necessity which should long since have been satisfied, though our predecessors are to be excused, as the work left by Swedenborg consists of six volumes folio, two of which are very large ones; and the work can only attain the great use for which it is designed if accompanied with the supplements contained in his later works, which enlarge it still more, and require much time; and should also be followed by translations, or rather extracts, in a modern language, so as to make the work accessible to every one. I say "rather extracts," for although Swedenborg's Latin translation of the Bible is even in itself very important for the church at large, it is not so necessary for every one as the explanations, and, therefore, in the English translation of the work, all the numerous passages of the Bible which he left without explanation ought to be omitted. I hope the third volume of this Index Biblicus sive Thesaurus Bibliorum Emblematicus et Allegoricus, of which twenty-three sheets are already printed, will leave the press towards the end of next January. It must, however, be observed that there is an impediment to the reception of the spiritual sense in the minds of theologians and clergymen and others, which can only be radically removed by science; for instance, I had a conversation here with a celebrated Professor of Philosophy, while we walked together, on which occasion he repeated what he had long ago declared to me, that he fully agreed with Swedenborg's doctrine, which, as he said, is evidently the best, but he could not receive his spiritual sense of Holy Scripture, which, according to his opinion, is overthrown by the science of the present day, especially by the science of criticism and hermeneutics of the theologians. To this I replied that I must confess to have very little respect for this science, which I consider rather as a want of science. The case is the same as with the physical philosophers of the present day, who, as he knew very well, for want of logical and metaphysical knowledge and education, always confound mere conditions with efficient causes, and build a system on every kind of sophism, in consequeuce of which they deny God, the immortality of the soul, and free-will. They reject metaphysical science and all demonstrations à priori, and nevertheless cannot avoid always leaving their department of experience and facts, and indulging in mere dreams of metaphysics. The case is the same with the theologians, LETTER FROM DR. TAFEL. 73 every one of whom believes himself to be a born critic and interpreter, and therefore follows only his own routine in criticising and interpreting Holy Scripture. There was either no study of the principles of criticism and hermeneutics whatever, or they follow mere critical and hermeneutical traditions, without deeper investigation, as if these traditions were really founded in the very nature of the matter in question. As such a principle, they adopt without proof the dogma that Holy Scripture, like every other writing, can only have one sense, not a double one; by which assumption they neglect the principle of historico-grammatical interpretation, according to which every document must be explained according to the language of its time-and even the pyramids testifying that the language of the oldest times was a figurative or hieroglyphic one. There is in this way also a latent bias to the denial of a Word of God altogether. For if they would form the idea of a Word of God, they would see that it can only reach us by continued veilings or coverings, and at last, by covering itself by its correspondent reflexes in the things of nature, and in the facts guided by God and written by His dictation, or spoken, as in the case of Balaam, by constrained instruments. And in order to be a universal means of education, it must speak the language of appearances to reach even the children and simple persons, by virtue of which character it has also not only the power of affecting every one, but also the majesty of the symbol and the capacity of containing an infinity of truths, and thereby of being the covering or body of God Himself, and so of producing heavenly feelings. The professor, at last, promised to inquire more into the matter. To many persons who are not yet prepared to acknowledge the spiritual sense, the work on "Heaven and Hell" is a kind of bridge by which to come to the doctrine. Several years ago, I received a letter of thanks from a well-known clergyman and author in the Grand Dukedom of Oldenburg, who lauded my German translation and its contents to the skies, but confessed that he could not yet acknowledge the spiritual interpretation of Holy Scripture. In the German periodical of the New Church, I read an extract from a journal of Montreal, in Canada, in which it was said that your Queen had found consolation in Swedenborg's works, that the late Prince Albert had read them, and that King Leopold reads them. When I was in London, the widow of a bookseller told me that the Duchess of Kent had sent to her late husband for Swedenborg's works. After my return from London, we had here also a visit from a Queen of the Continent, to whom I had the honour of showing the library of our University and the fine view from my windows, and one of her Majesty's suite afterwards told me 74 LETTER FROM DR. TAFEL. that during dinner she had expressed a desire to have my Pamphlet on the Proofs of the Immortality of the Soul (by Scripture, reason, and facts of experience, as testified by Roman and Greek classics, and writers of the following centuries) which I accordingly sent to her, with a copy of my "Irenic," or Theology of Peace, and a short letter, in which I said that (as stated in the book itself) I could not be answerable for all these facts, but, as others did (for instance, Christian Thomatius and Hugo Grotius), considered them only as proofs, in their ensemble, adding, however, that one fact was already fully proved-viz., that certified by a Queen (of Sweden) on the 8th of October. Her secretary answered me "Sincerely rejoiced by so interesting a communication, her Majesty has commissioned me to signify to you, right honourable sir, her most friendly thanks," &c. I know, indeed, no fact so fully evidenced as that of the Queen of Sweden, and we know that Swedenborg himself quoted it in his answer to the Landgrave of Hesse, not only as a proof of his intercourse with the other world, but especially also as an evidence of the immortality of the soul, of which we have now, as shown in the "Abriss des Lebens und Characters Emanuel Swedenborgs" (Sketch of the Life and Character of E. Swedenborg) of 1845, seventeen guarantees, and amongst them, since that year 1845, also the authority of one of the greatest philosophers, viz., Emanuel Kant, who carefully examined this fact, as well as two others, and communicated the result of his inquiry in a letter written two years after his unfavourable tract written in 1766. Before 1845, the said letter was considered to have been written in 1758; but in 1845 I was enabled to inquire into the three dates of the letter, and to prove by public documents, and all the circumstances, that the date of the letter, and the date of the facts recorded in it, were falsified, and that there is full evidence that Kant's letter was written two years after his Dreams of a Seer Explained by Dreams of Metaphysics," of 1766, in which he did not yet know Swedenborg's very name, but called him always "Schwedenberg," &c. I am happy to say that my reprint of the Latin original of the work De Cœlo et Inferno-so ardently desired by the New Church scholars of the United States of North America, who subscribed for sixty copies of it-has left the press about two months ago, and that also my German translation of it is nearly sold, and therefore a new edition should be published. I remain, my dear Sir, with great esteem and kindest regards for your family and all friends, very truly yours, EMANUEL TAFEL. 75 REVIEWS. BISHOP COLENSO ON THE PENTATEUCH. Ir is a remark frequently made by Swedenborg, that in the present age of free inquiry, unless the internal sense of the Word of the Lord be revealed, the Word itself will be regarded as not Divine. Hence the necessity of the New Church, and the revelation of the internal sense of the Divine Book. Without the continued acknowledgment of the divinity and sanctity of the Holy Word, all genuine progress would cease among mankind, and they would sink back into darkness and chaos. Without a church of true doctrine, the internal sense of the Word cannot be revealed; for it alone agrees with doctrines genuine and true. These views receive a remarkable illustration at the present period. The Church of England is unveiling her nakedness at the present time in a most remarkable manner. The celebrated Essayists and Reviewers, potent to pull down, not only spied out, but declared the nakedness of the land. Now the Bishop of Natal makes a wider breach. He declares the unsatisfactory character, from the point of view in which he has been taught to regard them—that is, in the letter only-of the first six books of the Word, the five books of Moses, and the book of Joshua. He realises the apostolic declaration, so far as to show "the letter killeth," but is very feeble indeed in his appreciation of the second part of the same teaching—“The spirit giveth life." (2 Cor. iii. 6.) When we reflect that the Word is the true foundation of the church, and the Divine character of the Word is scarcely acknowledged at all by the school of Professor Jowett, Dr. Williams, and the Bishop of Natal a school evidently growing, and very extensive in the Church of England-we cannot but feel that the most serious times are coming on that church. The spiritually-minded in her must accept the spiritual sense of the Word as revealed fully in the New Church, or no acknowledgment of the Word at all will remain in the great community of the Established Church of this country. She must go higher, or sink lower. This state of things has been long in preparation. The dogma rampant in her theological teaching at the universities, that the Scriptures have only one sense-that they must be treated as you would treat any other book-has been insisted on by bishops, by professors, by preachers, usque ad nauseam. True, too true, to her position as a state church, she has given her activity to classics and mathematics, and left the spiritual things of man's inner life-the everlasting things of heaven and hell, the eternal things of our Lord's person and kingdomcomparatively uncared for and unthought of in her great training schools. The result is such books as have lately astonished the world— books which throw aside, it is true, huge masses of error as childish things, but at the same time reveal the non-acknowledgment of the Divine Word, the only real source of spiritual and eternal truth. The position of Bishop Colenso is not very clearly defined. He contends that the five books of Moses, and that of Joshua, are "unhistorical," but does not definitely state what else he conceives them to be. There is a faint hint here and there that he can still regard them in some sense Divine-as providential books which have accomplished great good in the world-but these hints are very faint. He says “I use the expression unhistorical, or not historically true throughout, rather than fictitious, since the word fiction is frequently understood to imply a conscious dishonesty on the part of the writer, an intention to deceive. Yet in writing the story of the Exodus, from the ancient legends of his people, the Scripture writer may have had no more consciousness of doing wrong, or of practising historical deception, than Homer had, or any of the early Roman annalists. It is we who do him wrong, and do wrong to the real excellence of the Scripture story, by maintaining that it must be historically true, and that the writer meant it to be received and believed as such, not only by his own countrymen, but by all mankind to the end of time." (p. 17, note.) Again he says "This conviction, which I have arrived at, of the certainty of the ground on which the main argument of my book rests-viz., the proof that the account of the Exodus, WHATEVER VALUE IT MAY HAVE, is not historically true-must be my excuse to the reader for the manner in which I have conducted the inquiry." (pp. 18, 19.) In a note at the bottom of page 18-the chief portion of which is taken from "Aids to Faith," by the Rev. Preb. Cook, and at the end of which that writer says— "One thing with him (an Englishman) is fixed and certain-whatever else is doubtful, this at least is sure-a narrative purporting to be one of positive facts, which is wholly, or in any essential or considerable portion untrue, can have no connection with the Divine, and cannot have any beneficial influence on mankind;" Dr. Colenso remarks that he cannot concur in the latter portion of this extract, "with the examples of Lycurgus, Numa, Zoroaster," before him. From these hints, one might be led to conjecture that he had some view by which he could reconcile to his own mind the possibility of the professedly historical books of the Bible not being true history, and yet being in some way Divine, and exercising a beneficial influence upon mankind. If that, however, were so, it is much to be regretted |