THE DOCTRINE OF DEGREES. 203 



civil, psychological or spiritual worlds, and even to the infinite 

 Divine Constitution itself, of which they are the outbirths and 

 correspondences. He, indeed, maintains that all and every 

 thing in each form of being, from greatest to smallest, of 

 which triunity may be predicated, contains Degrees both con- 

 tinuous and discreet. He maintains that the knowledge of 

 Discreet Degrees is of the greatest philosophical importance, 

 and that one who adequately possesses it, will thereby be 

 enabled to see causes without the previous indications of their 

 effects, and may even form accurate conclusions respecting 

 things invisible, to which the same doctrine of, degrees must 

 necessarily apply.* 



Such, then, is the doctrine of Degrees as taught by 

 Swedenborg. But, though it is true, so far as it goes, I am 

 not aware that it even claims to be perfect in such a sense 

 as not to admit into its composition some additional con- 

 siderations. I do not suppose that Swedenborg himself 

 meant to convey the idea that each one of his Discreet De- 

 grees was itself an absolutely simple unity ; and it is highly 

 probable that if he had been questioned directly on the sub- 

 ject, he would have admitted that each one of these was 

 itself of a three-fold constitution, especially as he has ap- 

 parently carried, the doctrine of the trine down even to in- 

 finitesimals. 



Let Swedenborg's first Discreet Degree, then, stand for 

 what, in the septinary classifications given in the preceding 

 pages, has been called the " Primary Trinity ;" let his second 

 Degree stand for our " Secondary Trinity ;" and let his third, 

 or ultimate Degree, which he says is the " complex, continent, 

 and basis of the prior degrees," stand for our seventh division, 



* See Swedenborg's " Divine Love and Divine Wisdom," from No. 1T9 to 241. 



