302 Biography of Swedenborg. 



1 1 do not know what you mean/ I answered. ' Are we not/ 

 she said, f to be man and wife to-morrow V " Hereupon 

 Jesper Svedberg jumped up, shook hands, and gave a loving 

 embrace to his wife elect ! 



Swedenborg's father was thus a strange character ; hard- 

 working, vigorous, self-seeking, yet duty-loving; quite sure 

 that angels talked with him, and able, as he states, to exorcise 

 devils, and turn them out of mind or body. 



Further curious particulars concerning Jesper Svedberg 

 will be found in Mr. White's book ; but enough has been said 

 to indicate some of the peculiarities which he transmitted to 

 his son Emanuel. 



In 1709, at the age of twenty-one, Emanuel took his 

 degree as Doctor of Philosophy, at Upsala, and in the follow- 

 ing year paid his first visit to London, and spent four years in 

 England, Holland, and France. During this period, physical 

 science and mechanical invention chiefly occupied his thoughts, 

 and he designed a ship to float under water, a mode of lifting 

 weights by means of a syphon, a mode of constructing sluices 

 in places where there is no fall of water, by means of which 

 large ships and their cargoes may be raised to any height 

 within an hour or two, a flying chariot, and many other 

 things, amongst which was "a method of discovering the 

 desires and affections of the minds of men by analogies.'" 



In 1716, Charles XII. appointed Swedenborg Extraordinary 

 Assessor in the College of Mines, and also availed himself 

 of his services as engineer. After the death of Charles XII. 

 he continued his scientific pursuits, and complained bitterly of 

 the neglect which useful novelties then experienced in Sweden. 

 Methods of finding the longitude by means of the moon, 

 observations and speculations in geology, propositions for 

 reforming weights, measures, and currency, so as to facilitate 

 calculation — these were among his studies ; and as they brought 

 him no employment, he again took to travelling, writing, 

 and publishing. His revelations of trade secrets in mining* 

 and metallurgy being objected to, he replied, that " whatever 

 is worth knowing should, by all means, be brought into the 

 great and common market of the world. Unless this be done, 

 we can neither grow wiser nor happier with time. - " 



Attempting to trace how the physical frame of things began, 

 he assumed motion to have originated in a point, which he 

 defined as the simplest existence, and proceeding immediately 

 from the Infinite. This point he described as pure and total 

 motion. By a union or combination of " points/' the first 

 finite is derived, -having two natural poles formed by the spiral 

 motion of the points, and revolving on its axis. By further 

 combinations he fancied other finites were composed, the 



