Dr. BAYLEY said that, looking back to the operations of the Society some sixty years ago, he could recognize what a considerable change had taken place in the condition of mankind. He rejoiced in the work of the Society during the past year, and thought that we ought to be grateful that the Society had been able to distribute the True Christian Religion to so many clergymen, a class of men which possessed powerful influence. Ministers of religion were leaders of the people, and the ideas they expressed were widely diffuséd.

As a marked instance of right thought in influential quarters he would mention a recently published work entitled "The Unseen Universe." This book was the production of two leading physicists, and was intended to demonstrate the reality of the existence of a spiritual world, and the authors plainly intimated their high estima tion of Swedenborg and his writings. Dr. Bayley proceeded to read some extracts from the work in which the authors discussed Swedenborg's system, which, they say, "is that of a philosopher," and throughout treat with marked approval. Dr. Bayley had always considered that the first doctrine of the Old Church which would be changed would be that of the Resurrection, and in the work before him the writers stated that the common interpretation of this doctrine is easily recognized to be untrue. To obviate this some had contended that a single material germ only was necessary for the creation of the new body; Boston, in his "Fourfold State," taking as an extreme case a drop of perspiration, but this the authors characterized as a gigantic manufacture of shoddy, and ask the holders of such a dogma to compare it with the writings of Paul on the subject.

The

When, then, said Dr. Bayley, such a book can be written, we ought to take courage at these marks of public estimation and growth. A friend had once asked him whether a certain sect were not stealing New Church truths. He had replied "Let them by all means.' results of last year being so satisfactory, let us take courage, and endeavour to surpass them during the coming one, and call on our friends to come and help us. And like Jethro, we might "rejoice for all the goodness which the Lord hath done."

Mr. BATEMAN, in seconding the resolution, said that it was always a pleasure to him to co-operate with Dr. Bayley in anything. A remark had been quoted in the Report that "Christians when they understand one another love one another." And this unity of Christendom was extending, and Mr. Bateman mentioned an incident connected with his meeting an old patient of his which showed this. Men were beginning to see that a good life is the one thing needful, and that "the life of religion is to do good." Some forty years ago it required courage to attend a New Church, or to publicly declare one's self a New Churchman, but it was different now. The Swedenborg Society had worked on, year after year, and its influence was now beginning to be recognized. The progress of the Society was satisfactory, not only in England, but also in the various foreign countries in which New Church works had been instituted. It had been said that "all other books take me to Swedenborg, and he takes

me to the Bible," and we should ever remember this. He had much pleasure in seconding the resolution.

The Chairman having alluded to the recent opinion given by counsel as to the legality of Church of England clergymen preaching in the pulpits of Dissenters, called on the Rev. W. Anderson Smith, of the Athenæum, Camden Road, to address the meeting.

Mr. SMITH said that the spirit of the day is the spirit of Catholicism. He had heard it said that when the tide is low you may find solitary shrimps in pools formed by the shifting sands. But when the tide came in, then "shrimp met shrimp." And it was when the tide was low that a policy of isolation was adopted by religious bodies, to the exclusion of that catholic spirit which was now increasing. He was afraid he must plead guilty to the charge of plagiarism from the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. He had been educated amongst the Scotch Presbyterians, and inducted into the work that Dr. Bayley had named, Boston's "Fourfold State." He had received the ordinary teachings of an angry God, and salvation by predestination; those horrible ideas he could now call them by no milder word-which sent a few elect to heaven, and consigned the remainder of mankind to eternal perdition. But, on turning to Swedenborg, he found there the teaching that salvation is not a mere setting a man from one place down to another, but a complete reformation of heart and life. Swedenborg's True Christian Religion had made him, he hoped, a better and a wiser man. It afforded him great pleasure to be present at the meeting. Mr. Smith concluded by exhorting his hearers not to despair because the work they were doing was unostentatious. Great truths required time before they could thoroughly permeate the minds of men. We labour here, but in heaven is our rest. The highest honour a man could have in this world was not to wield a powerful sceptre, not to wage successfully a dozen battles, but to present glorious truths to the minds of men. And this, he believed, the Swedenborg Society was doing. "Let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not."

The resolution was unanimously adopted.

The Rev. W. BRUCE, in moving the second resolution,

"That considering the increased and increasing number of the readers of the writings of Swedenborg, as evinced by the enlarged operations of this Society, and the frequent and favourable notices in the public press, and the limited constituency of this Society, the Committee is recommended to take such steps as may be deemed judicious for extending its list of members, and, by thus adding to the means at its disposal, to increase its power for effecting the important uses it contemplates,"

said that the Committee had been complimented on the way their work had been done, but they had made one mistake, that of putting into his hands a resolution appealing in some measure for pecuniary support. In his opinion, when New Church people saw there was a need for money, they would supply it to the best of their ability. The Report of the Committee had been read. It had been told how the True Christian Religion had been distributed, and how it was contemplated to make a similar gift of the Apocalypse Revealed, a work

which was specially applicable to the present time. The Book of the Revelation describes the desolation of Christendom, the evils that have arisen, and the restitution of all things by the descent of the New Jerusalem. Mr. Bruce expressed his desire to see this book distributed, and therefore hoped that ample support would be given to the Committee.

Mr. J. A. BAYLEY, in seconding the resolution, expressed his gratification at the brilliant report that had been presented, and suggested that in each volume presented a short notice of the aims and objects of the Society should be enclosed. This was arranged to be done, and the motion being put to the meeting, was unanimously adopted.

Mr. JOHN SMITH then moved a vote of thanks to Dr. Stocker for his able conduct as Chairman. In the course of his remarks, Mr. Smith suggested that the Committee should publish a series of tracts containing extracts from Swedenborg's writings.

The resolution having been seconded and carried, was acknowledged by Dr. Stocker, who expressed his gratification in being able to serve the Society in any capacity.

The Scrutineers not having presented their report, Dr. Bayley made some remarks, especially on the subject of the last resolution. He said the speakers upon it had mistaken its meaning and object. They had addressed themselves to the audience, with the view of inducing them to show greater liberality, but had not said one word on the real subject of the resolution. It was not an appeal to those who now favoured them with their presence and support, but was a recommendation to the new Committee to take steps for obtaining new subscribers. There was great reason for this. The Swedenborg Society had a general object, and was entitled to general support. Many of our societies, including that of Kensington, contributed very little to the funds of this Institution. Though on the whole liberally supported, the Society had thus a comparatively small constituency. He was sure it only required an active agency to increase the members to three times their present number. Let some one be appointed in each New Church Society to obtain subscriptions. It had been recommended by one of the speakers to reduce the annual subscription to 5s. Any sum would be gratefully received; but whether an annual subscription of 5s. should entitle subscribers to all the privileges of membership must be left for future consideration. He advocated energy in obtaining additional members of the Society, and suggested that the Society should have a representative in every important town in England.

The Scrutineers then presented the list of the new Committee, which

is as follows:

Mr. H. Bateman.
Rev. Dr. Bayley.

Mr. E. H. Bayley.

Rev. W. Bruce.

Mr. T. H. Elliott.

Mr. R. Gunton.

Mr. R. Jobson.

Rev. J. Presland.
Dr. Stocker.

Rev. Dr. Tafel.

Mr. R. Thexton..

Mr. H. R. Williams.

The meeting was then closed with prayer by the Rev. W. Bruce.

[It may not be uninteresting to read in connection with the Report the following, which appeared as a leading article in the Daily News of June 17th, the day after it had given a report of the meeting.]

Like other religious and philanthropic societies, the Swedenborg Society has been holding a meeting, on the sixty-fifth anniversary of its foundation. It is ninety-three years since the death of the Seer, whose works the Society distributes, and never it appears has the interest in these strange writings been "more widely evoked, or more fully satisfied." The lifetime of Emanuel Swedenborg coincided, as his English biographer, Mr. Wilkinson, says, with the most sceptical, and in philosophy, the most materialistic age of thought. The movement that the Germans call the Aufklärung, that the French call the éclaircissement, was in full vigour. Only in Swedenborg's later years did the natural reaction begin, the reaction from Hume to Kant, from Voltaire to a spiritual philosophy. Even Voltaire, perhaps, regretted sometimes that he had done his destructive work too well. Rationalism, he says in one of his poems, is gaining a morose credit, and error has merits of its own. He would like to have left to peasants and children their fireside tales, while he laughed what he thought more pernicious superstitions out of court. There were three men in Europe, at that time, who in their several ways were helping to restore to Europe the belief in a spiritual life, in a spiritual world, in the existence of things not seen, and the possibility of hope and faith. The three were Kant, Wesley, Swedenborg, all working in very different fields, but all sowing the seeds of the present state of thought, the state of thought which is widely interested in the works of Swedenborg. The criticism of Kant threw doubt and discredit, to say the least, on the reasoning of the materialist philosophy, the preaching of Wesley renewed the life of the English Church, and the visions of Swedenborg were to many minds satisfactory evidence as to the unseen world, while his moral application of his mysticism is full of fervent and persuasive eloquence. It is not safe to venture on any account of the system of Swedenborg, for his writings are even more voluminous and various than those of Comte, while his disciples, like the Positivists, are apt to ask critics if they have read all the works of the master. It is easy, however, to select a few points in the general tendency of the Swedenborgian theories, and to show how they are adapted to modern wants, and have thus exercised no slight influence on modern imaginative literature. The life of the Seer, as it is generally told, is more strange than any fairy tale, and the incidents and doctrines, with a difference, have been used by Balzac in two of his most powerful stories, "Louis Lambert' and "Séraphitus Séraphîta."

The Life of Emanuel Swedenborg was a kind of commentary on his views. Born in 1688, he was distinguished as a child for the intensity of his devotion, and as a young and a middle-aged man, for success in scientific research, and mechanical invention. He was the engineer who invented a way of carrying provisions and artillery to the siege of Frederickshall, where Charles XII. was shot. He was noted for treatises on the assay of metals, and on docks and sluices. Some time after he had gained high office in the mining service of Sweden, he turned his attention more to speculation, and his philosophy is of that mystic sort which recognises in the universe a system of correspondences and harmonies, sees in bodies the expression of souls, and believes that the natural world exists in obedience to the spiritual one. Thus Swedenborg would agree with the French student who has lately frightened the Bishop of Orleans by asserting that the sun is the cause of the world. But then, Swedenborg goes a step further, and observes, according to his latest translator, "There is in the spiritual world a sun which is different from that in the natural world. To the truth of this I am able to bear solemn witness, inasmuch as I have seen that Here we touch the point where Swedenborg ceases to be the philosopher, in the common sense of the word, and becomes the seer. In was in 1743 that what he considered his education was accomplished, and that he had a view of the spiritual world. Most people have heard the curious anecdote of how, after a hearty meal in a London tavern, he saw a vision of snakes and reptiles, and

sun.

heard a voice say, "Eat not so much." From that day, with intervals of discouragement, in which doubt of his own gift seems once to have been near him, Swedenborg had what the heathen Norsemen called Forspan: he was a secondsighted man. Apart from his visits to the places of departed spirits, and his detailed accounts of them, apart from his seeing a friend at the friend's own funeral, and frightening the sister of the dead Frederick the Great with intelligence from that lamented monarch, the tale of how he saw and described a fire at Stockholm, while he himself was at Gottenburg, three hundred miles off, is strange, and fairly well authenticated. Kant is usually given as the authority for this marvel, and Kant seems at least to have done his best to find out the truth of the story. With the religious and philosophic beliefs based on Swedenborg's writings, we have no concern here, but it is easy to see how, in an age when physical science is so powerful, people are glad to turn to a philosophy which makes physical nature as it were the veil of spiritual nature, and how the fairy tales of science are neglected for experiences more like the elder fairy tales of childhood in their simple marvels.

The influence of Swedenborg on imaginative literature is nowhere so obvious as in the novels of Balzac. There are traces of his theory of correspondences in a place where they might not have been looked for, in the Fleurs du Mal of Charles Baudelaire. The poet, in "a mystic strain of verse," sings how colours, and sounds, and scents, mingle and blend in the world, and produce an inaudible harmony, a colour invisible, to the eyes and ears of the uninitiated. In the pretty tale of "Spirite," too, a masterpiece of Théophile Gautier, it is Swedenborg's theories of conjugial love that are travestied, and it is a Swedenborgian mystic who unlocks, to the lover of "Spirite," the gate of the spiritual world. But the gross, sensuous Balzac, Balzac whose ideas of la vie conjugale are so frankly material, really felt, more than any other man of literary genius, the attraction of these new regions of which Swedenborg was the Columbus. Balzac's "Louis Lambert" is partly autobiographical, a sketch of his own sufferings when, as a schoolboy in Vendome, he neglected his Latin exercises to pore over such works as "Heaven and Hell Revealed." Lambert in the novel is a secluded and unap preciated genius, whose life is an attempt to develop the true, the angelic, nature that is hidden within our frames. Even as a boy Lambert is second-sighted, beholds places in vision, and recognises them later in fact, as Swedenborg saw the fire of Stockholm three hundred miles off, and as Shelley used occasionally to do, or say he did. The dream of his life is to meet an angel-woman, and meet her he does, like other people, at last. Unfortunately he falls just before his marri age into a state which may be beatific contemplation, or may be idiotcy, and when he opens his lips after months of silence it is only to say, "The angels are white." In his more fucid intervals he would make such profound remarks as, "The Abstract thinks, the Instinctive acts." In this failure and decay of the mystic vision, when it seemed on the point of solving the secrets of the universe, Balzac probably symbolized his own mature views as to the mysticism that always attracted him. To him the system of Swedenborg is like his own mysterious Séraphitus Séraphita, a brilliant sexless creature of strange birth, tantalizing, alluring, fading at last out of human view among the glittering snows and glacial peaks of the mountains round the Stromfiord. Séraphitus Seraphita allures her lovers to heights where the breath is caught by the sharp air, where the sight grows dim, and the brain reels. She vanishes from those who love her, leaving only a memory and a hope, the sense of having seen wonderful sights, with eyes waking or dreaming, the trust that these marvels have a meaning and a promise, and the certainty that, after all, the life of earth, and not the visions of the Alpine summits, is the only life for men. Perhaps this is no uncommon_result of the reading of Swedenborg's very voluminous writings, which are not, however, destitute of humour, if the Seer is correctly reported to have said that the English all hang together, and see few foreigners, in some circle of the invisible world.