CARL THEOPHILUS ODHNER 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL      JANUARY, 1920           No. 1
[Frontpiece: Photograph. Carl Theophilus Odhner.]

     AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

     COVERING THE PERIOD FROM MAY 14, 1863, THE DATE OF HIS BIRTH, TO DECEMBER, 1890. WITH AN INTRODUCTORY ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE ODHNER FAMILY.

     PREFACE.

     Not long after the death of Professor Odhner, on March 11, 1918, the undersigned, as being one of his oldest and most intimate friends, was asked by the Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE to write a biographical sketch of Mr. Odhner's life for publication in that journal. Such a sketch was eminently desirable. For no man was more widely known in the literary field of the New Church than Carl Theophilus Odhner, whether among friends or theological opponents. The regret on my part was that the task had not fallen into more able literary hands.

     While thinking over the problem put before me, and despairing how or where to begin, I was told that Mr. Odhner had left among his papers the data for a biography. Accordingly, two manuscript volumes were placed in my hands, from which I was informed I could obtain matter far the proposed sketch. On examination, I found that the MSS. comprised: First, an elaborate family tree, with a history of the Odhner family in all its branches; and Second, an autobiography in diary form, covering the life of Mr. Odhner to the end of the year 1890. Here was material to be sure, and there was no reason why I should not compile from it a sketch for the LIFE, at least so far as abundance of material was concerned. But when I began to read the MSS., I was convinced that no compilation I could make would do. The writing was so graphic, so brilliant, so charged with wisdom, wit, humor, and perhaps a little folly,-in a word, so Odhneresque,-that it would be a misfortune to have it lie hidden in family archives, and not see the light of day. Needless to say, I abandoned all thought of writing a sketch of Mr. Odhner's life.

     The documents were reviewed by the Odhner family, and when a few portions that were of interest only to the immediate relatives had been eliminated, a typewritten transcript was very kindly made for me by Lieutenant Loyal D. Odhner, and this we now present to the public,-Mr. Odhner's beloved public, the General Church of the New Jerusalem, which he so often addressed through the pages of NEW CHURCH LIFE, of which he was Editor for nearly seventeen years.

     It is perhaps unnecessary to explain that the family tree and the family history are not included, as Mr. Odhner made sufficient use of both in his autobiography. But all of the original manuscripts have been returned to the family, and will no doubt be preserved as precious heirlooms.

     Carl Theophilus Odhner was a man sorely missed by the Academy of the New Church, in which he was a professor and must efficient teacher. He was a genial, hearty friend with his friends, and a sharp assailant with his enemies-namely, those holding theological views which he believed to be unsound. When in controversy, his rapier glittered. But it can be truthfully said of him that he had "charity for all and malice toward none."

     As Mr. Odhner's autobiography closes with the year 1890, that part of his life which was perhaps the most important to the Church came afterwards. When, in 1897, The General Church of Pennsylvania and the Academy separated from Bishop Benade, Mr. Odhner took an active and prominent part in the formation of the General Church of the New Jerusalem and the reconstruction of the Academy. In September, 1901, he became Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE, With the Rev. Alfred Acton as Assistant Editor, who served in that capacity until August, 1911, after which time Mr. Odhner was sole Editor.

Throughout his editorship, his writing was voluminous. He took an active part in nearly every controversy arising in the Church. Whether or not he always pleased all the readers of the LIFE, I am sure that all did and do acknowledge his deep earnestness, and his steadfast adherence to what he conceived to be the true interpretation of doctrine. Although he possessed a remarkably mercurial temperament, and wit and humor bubbled forth from him as spontaneously as water from a spring, he could tolerate no levity in connection with the Doctrines of the New Church or the Letter of the Word.

     Almost all of his writings appeared in NEW CHURCH LIFE at one time or another. Much of it was in the domain of church history, for which he had a notable gift. A number of his works have been published in book form, and are invaluable. The following is a list, with date of publication:

Brief Account of Swedenborg's Life                         1893
Biography of Robert Hindmarsh                         1895
True Story of Swedenborg. For the Young                    1900
James John Garth Wilkinson                              1901
De Verbo. Translation                               1902
Testimony of the Writings                               1902
A Brief View of the Heavenly Doctrines                    1903
Annals of the New Church. 1688-1850                    1904
Laws of Order                                    1904
Michael Servetus                                   1910
Correspondences of Canaan                               1911
The Golden Age                                    1913
Correspondences of Egypt                               1914
Creation in the Spiritual World                          1915
The Three Gods in "Christian" Art                         1917
Catechism, of the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer     1917
Swedish Tracts
Vaktaren i det Nya Jerusalem.
ENOCH S. PRICE.
Zionsville, Pa., August 19, 1919.

ODHNER FAMILY 1920

     INTRODUCTION.

     The name of our family is derived from the parish of Odensaker, or the acre of the old Scandinavian god, Odin, in the province of Westergotland in Sweden. Thus the origin of the name is found in hoary antiquity and mythology, which shows that the family is indeed an ancient one, our ancestors probably having come over to Sweden with Odhin from the Iranian highlands. It is probable, also, that these ancestors had their ancestors, who knows how far back!

     The name Odhner, however, is only about 150 years old, having been first adopted by my great-grandfather, Jonas Peterson Odhner, whose father, Pehr Johnson, was an honest farmer of unknown history. His eldest son, Jonas, was born in the year 1744, and adopted the name Odhner when he was sent to a school in Skara to study for the Lutheran ministry. The younger son remained a farmer, but his descendants have also adopted the name Odhner. Of this branch, there are various lines, some farmers, some merchants, and one a lawyer. They do not now keep up much connection with the older branch.

     JONAS PETERSON ODHNER,

after graduating from the College of Skara, continued his theological studies at the University of Upsala, was ordained into the Priesthood of the Established Church of Sweden, became Pastor of the Parish of Lyrestad, and subsequently Kontraktsprost, or nistrict Superintendent, over the churches in Wadsbo County in the Diocese of Skara, where old Jesper Swedberg, Emanuel Swedenborg's father, had been Bishop, until his death in 1734.

     My great-grandfather was a man of deep learning, not only theological and linguistic, but also scientific, being especially devoted to the study of Botany. It is likely that he had been a student under the great Linnaeus in Upsala. The love for the children of Flora has become an heirloom in the family, and has reappeared in myself, together with the traditional family affections for the science of History, and for the Doctrines of the New Church.

     It is probable that my great-grandfather received his first knowledge of these Doctrines during the lifetime of Emanuel Swedenborg, perhaps at the Gymnasium of Skara, whither Swedenborg's writings had found their way, about 1770, from Dr. Gabriel A. Beyer, of Gothenburg. Whatever be the date of his reception, he is not known in the history of the New Church until the year 1795, When he became a member of the secret New Church Society, "Pro Fide et Charitate." In the same year, he completed the first Swedish translation of the True Christian Religion, which was published at Copenhagen in three volumes. I possess a copy of this very rare edition, and can testify to the great faithfulness and excellence of the translation.

     Jonas Peterson Odhner was evidently one of the most thorough students of the Doctrines of that age. I have a copy of the original edition of De Coelo et Inferno, which belonged to him. The wide margins of the whole work are covered with Latin notes from the Arcana Coelestia and other works in his handwriting. At the end of the volume are appended two exhaustive indexes to the work, which he had compiled. Some copies of the original editions of the Writings bearing the autograph of J. P. Odhner are preserved in the Forbes Collection, at to Cooper Union, New York. A number of MSS. in his handwriting,-mostly translations of the Writings,-are contained in the Library of the Rev. J. R. Boyle, which is now offered for sale by Mr. Chas. Higham of London.*
     * The reader should bear in mind that this was written about the year 1890;-E. S. P.

     My great-grandfather was married twice. His first wife was a lineal descendant of a Polish Prince, who had accepted the Protestant Religion, and had been forced to flee to Sweden. A number of children were born from this marriage, but they all died as infants. His second wife belonged to a noble family; her grandfather was a count, but I have forgotten his name. He had in all twelve children, but only three sons survived him. The eldest of these was my grandfather, Pehr Hemming Odhner. The second was Claes Odhner, and the third, Johannes Odhner.

     Claes Odhner, my granduncle, entered the Established Church, and became Dean of Kinnekuile, a region which is considered the most beautiful and romantic in Sweden. I do not know whether he was a receiver of the Doctrines or not, but I have a copy of the original edition of De Telluribus that bears his signature. He married a sister of John Ericsson, the world-famous engineer, who invented the propeller and the Monitor, which had so important an influence upon the history of "the land of the free and the home of the brave."

     None of the children of Claes Odhner received the Doctrines of the New Church. His son, Claes Theodore Odhner, (of the same initials as myself), became Professor of History at the University of Lund, and wrote a History of Sweden which was adopted by all the Government Schools. He is now the National Historian of Sweden, Chief Archivist of the National Archives in Sweden, leader of the Conservative Party in the Swedish Diet, author of many famous historical works, and an especial favorite of King Oscar II. I have corresponded with this great man; and I met him in Stockholm in the summer of 1895. He has no interest whatever in spiritual things, but is very genial and interesting.

     The third son of Jonas Peterson Odhner, Johannes, was a military man. None of his descendants,-now living in the city of Wadstena,-are in any way connected with the New Church.

     My great-grandfather has been described as a most worthy and lovable man, especially fond of children and flowers. While on a botanical excursion in the year 1830, at the age of eighty-six years, he met his death while trying to escape from a mad bull. This is about all I can remember about this worthy man, to whom, no doubt, I owe the great debt of hereditary inclination toward the things of the New Church.

     PEHR HEMMING ODHNER,

my grandfather, was born in the year 1790. Having passed through the Gymnasium, or College, of Skara, he continued his studies at Upsala, received the degree of Master of Philosophy, and was subsequently ordained into the Priesthood of the Established Church. He was pastor of various parishes in the Diocese of Skara, and was finally raised to the dignity of Kontrakts-prost, or Archdean of the district of Horn, near Skara.

     He must have received the Doctrines of the New Church while quite young. I possess a copy of the original edition of Nova Hierosolyma, which bears on the title page the inscription, "P. Hemming Odhner, Stockholm, 1811." He was then twenty-one years old.

     My grandfather was a member of the Society "Pro Fide et Charitate," and is known as the translator and publisher of the first Swedish edition of De Atkanasii Symbolo, (Mariestad, 1842.) He also published two volumes of Sermons, which were in use among New Church families of Sweden for many years. I have a copy of this work, and also a portrait of my grandfather,-a beautiful face, noble, spiritual, refined, and benevolent. He died in the year 1858.

     His work for the New Church was quiet and unobtrusive, but not without effect. His published sermons are good New Church expositions of the spiritual sense of the Word, though the name of the New Church, or of Swedenborg, are not mentioned. He, as well as his father, acted on the belief that the Old Church would gradually reform and become infused with the spirit of the New Jerusalem. In this, they were woefully mistaken. Yet, such was the state of their conscience that they could act upon nothing else. They never hid the fact of their attachment to the Writings of Swedenborg, and were well-known as "Swedenborgians." At one time, a persecution was started against these "Swedenborgian" ministers of the Lutheran Church in Westergotland, but the Bishop was advised to leave them alone, as they-some forty in number-were "the best priests in the Diocese." I have met several members of the New Church who had received their first knowledge of the Doctrines from my grandfather. But he committed a grievous wrong in not educating all his children in the Doctrines. A very few have remained in the Church, and the family, as a whole, either know nothing about it, or have no love for it.

     My grandfather appears to have inherited his father's love for the science of Botany.

While in London, in the year 1895, I found in the British Museum a little work by Pehr Hemming Odhner, published by him while a student in Upsala, dedicated to his parents and prospective parents-in-law, and entitled "De Rosis Suecanis," being a treatise on all the varieties of Roses in Sweden.

Pehr Hemming Odhner was married twice. His first wife was named Petronella Fahreus, daughter of a New Church couple from the Island of Gotland. Her mother's name was Sturtzenbecker, an ancient family of considerable note in the military, scientific, and literary annals of Sweden. My grandmother's brothers were men of great prominence, and became ennobled. One was Governor of Gothenburg, and another was Councillor to the King. Both were receivers of the Doctrines. The children of this first marriage, which was a New Church marriage, have all been of a more spiritual form of mind. My grandfather's second wife was opposed to the Doctrines, and her descendants have inclined more to worldly things. By his first wife, ply grandfather had seven children:-Theophil Dynamiel, my father; Henule Israela, a daughter, who died young; Hulda Hemfrida, who married a Lutheran Minister named Vinquist, now dead; Justa Theodora, who married a merchant named Lundborg, and had many children, one of whom, Mrs. Sven Vinquist, is inclined towards the New Church; Gabriel, who died young; and Herrbed Jonas.

HERRBED JONAS SANNFRID ODHNER,

my favorite uncle, plays an important part in my own history. He was born in the year 1820; Studied at Skara and Upsala, and, like his father and grandfather, became a minister in the Established Church, and finally Kontrakts-prost, or Archdean, in Herrljunga, where he died in the year 1891. He was a loving and faithful receiver of the Heavenly Doctrines, although a minister of the consummated Church. He actively supported the uses of the New Church, and was a voting member of the Society "Nyn Kyrkans Bekannare" (the Confessors of the New Church) in Sweden. He often opened his Church for Pastor Boyesen to preach in it, and was very courageous in his acknowledgment of the New Church.

Yet was he never molested by his ecclesiastical superiors, being a man universally respected and loved. For many years he was in the habit of receiving the children of New Church parents into his home, in order to prepare them for the "rite of Confirmation," which used to be necessary for citizenship in Sweden. He would confirm them in the Doctrines of the New Church, but in the name of the Old Church,-a very peculiar proceeding, which certainly does not bear close scrutiny, yet must have been of some use, and may find some excuse in the peculiar conditions then reigning in Sweden. In appearance, my uncle was a tall and venerable old gentleman, with dark, deep, loving brown eyes,, and a beautiful, smiling, yet earnest countenance. I love him as my first spiritual father. His wife was a "Pietist," and violently opposed to the New Church. Throughout their married life, she would never listen to a sermon of her "heretical" husband. They had one son, Herman, who is superintendent of a high school in Sweden, but has no use for the New Church.

By his second wife, my grandfather had six children. Benedicta Sophia, who died young; Fidela Wilhelmina, once an exceedingly beautiful girl, now an eccentric old maid, but quite devoted to the New Church-the very last one of the old stock; Aaron Constantine, who died young; Aaron Clemens, a merchant in Stockholm; Gabriela Huldrika, who married a Lutheran minister named Wallgren; and Ernst Hemming, a sea captain, who was lost at sea. Aaron Clemens Odhner was the first inventor of oil-stoves, and has a large lamp business in Stockholm. He is a man of wealth, with inclinations to sport and politics. He was very kind to my mother during her widowhood, but in religion is something of a freethinker. His marriage has been an exceedingly unhappy one. He has twelve children, but none of them is married. They are a queer set.

It will be seen that my grandfather was influenced by New Church ideas in giving to his children new and significative names,-being, I think, the very first New Churchman who adopted this custom. My father did likewise in naming his children, and I have followed in their footsteps.

     THEOPHIL DYNAMIEL ODHNER.

my father, was born in the year 1816. He studied at the Gymnasium of Skara, but being of a practical turn of mind, devoted himself to mathematical pursuits, and became a surveyor. He is said to have been a lovable, jovial man, with a somewhat restless nature. Never having seen him, I do not know much about him, but I am informed that he was very much like myself in appearance and manners. He was a believer in the Doctrines of the New Church, to what extent I do not know. His married life with my mother is said to have been very happy, both being of a warm-hearted, sanguine, happy-go-lucky, romantic, and poetical nature; not very orderly folks, I fear, but lovable and contented, though poor in worldly goods.

     His wife, my mother, was Sophia Fredrika Wall, of a family of the province of Wermland. One of her brothers, Arvid, became a millionaire merchant in Gothenberg. His sons, Fridolph, Arvid and Gosta, are also well-to-do merchants in Gothenburg. One of my maternal aunts, Mrs. Wretman, had two daughters, one of whom married Count von Schwerin, and the other Baron Archibold Skoldebrand, of Noor, near Norrtelge. Another of my aunts married a man by the name of Raberg, and the third, "Moster Betty," married a merchant in Stockholm, named Peterson. Her sea, my cousin, and early playmate, Gosta Peterson, now lives in New York. He has no use whatever for the Church, but he was married by a New Church minister, the Rev. S. S. Seward, and I baptized his child, Ralph, in March, 1891. Gosta's sister, Elizabeth, married Captain Lundborg, a well-known inventor; and another sister, Helen, married Mr. Nissen, professor of Gymnastics in Boston. I baptized one of their children, in the summer of 1894.

     My mother,-whose memory I shall ever cherish with great love,-was a strong and remarkable character; lively, brave, intellectual, warm-hearted, and gifted with a real genius for poetry. Everything assumed a rosy, romantic, and poetical form in her mind, even her many struggles and bitter poverty. When I was eight or nine years of age, she left me in charge of some friends, and went to visit my eldest brother in St. Petersburg.

That was the last I saw of her. I shall never forget how hard it was for her to part from her naughty boy; how she ran after me again and again to give me a last hug and kiss. That was the last of genuine love that ever came to my share, until I married my own little wife. After my mother had been in Russia about two years, and just as she was about to return to Sweden and to me, she fell ill, and died in a few days from inflammation of the lungs. Blessed be her memory.

     My brothers and sisters have been closely united in life and in love. I owe them gratitude for their patient and unselfish care of me, and I love them as warmly as I can love anybody outside of the New Church. In spite of many and persistent efforts to interest them, in the glorious things of the New Jerusalem, they remain totally passive, though no longer opposed to the Doctrines. I feel that my kinship with them is of the body only.

     My eldest brother, Wilgot, inherited my father's love for mathematics,, and is a real genius in his line. We graduated from the College of Engineering in Stockholm, removed to St. Petersburg when a young man, and has had great success there. He has made many wonderful inventions,-one of these being a counting machine, which took the first prize at the World's Fair at Chicago, 1893. He has been knighted by the Czar of Russia, and has a large mechanical factory, where he manufactures machinery for the Russian government. He seems to be a good and genial man, is very happily married, and has a number of promising children.

     My next brother, Hjalmar Mildhag, learned the trade of passementerie, and perfected the knowledge of his art by working for a number of years in various cities abroad, such as Copenhagen, Berlin, Vienna, and Paris. On his return to Sweden, he opened an establishment in Stockholm, and has continued in it to the present time, though with indifferent financial success. He has been a most kind and loving brother to me, and is the quintessence of good nature and honesty, but does not seem able to raise his mind to spiritual things.

     My sister, Anna, received a very thorough education, and is a refined and intellectual woman, of a pietistic and self-composed turn of mind, but is, withal, a good wife and mother, and has been a loving sister to me.

Before her marriage she was a governess in several noble families of Sweden. Her husband, Captain Arvid Ahlin, is a jolly, strong, and energetic sea-bear. He has now left the sea, and is "Commissioner," or Superintendent, of the Epidemical Hospital in Stockholm. To me, he used to be a most cherished object of dislike, almost amounting to hatred, but we now understand each other better, and had some royal good times together when I visited Stockholm in 1895.

     My third brother, Sannfrid Victor Petrus, ran away from his home when a boy, to take part in the Polish Rebellion. He was caught, but ran away again, and. became a sailor, leading a most adventurous life far several years. He was shipwrecked time and again, broke his leg in China, and again at the Cape of Good Hope, and finally left the sea, settling first in Dundee, where he married a Scotch woman, and afterwards in St. Petersburg, where he opened a mechanical shop. He was an unusually gifted fellow, especially as a poet, but his mind was not well-regulated, and he inclined strongly to skepticism. He died suddenly of heart failure, in 1894, and his family returned to Scotland.

     My second sister, Hildegard, has had a life of many and great trials. After our mother's death, she was a governess for many years, but became housekeeper to my brother, Hjalmar, and assisted him in the passementerie establishment until he married, when his wife's jealousy and evil temper drove her away. She now opened a business of her own in the city of Orebro, and married Mr. Hugo Ljungberg, a poor government official of a philosophical turn of mind, who died in 1892, and left her a widow with two infant children. Hiidegard now moved to Stockholm, where she opened another passementerie shop, but in 1894 she suddenly Became totally blind, and stood helpless with her little ones. My wife and I have adopted her eldest child, Sigrid, now called Cyriel. Her little boy, Hugo, remains with her in Stockholm.*
     * Mrs. Ljungberg, some time after Mr. Odhner had written the above paragraph, came to Bryn Athyn, where she lived until her death in 1914. Both the children mentioned were adopted by Mr. Odhner, and educated in the Academy of the New Church. Of these, Miss Cyriel is now a teacher in the primary department of the Academy, and the Rev. Hugo Lj. Odhner is Pastor of the Carmel Church, Kitchener, Ontario.-E. S. P.

Now then, my beloved children, and possible grandchildren, you know the story of your ancestry and kinsmen. There is nothing very aristocratic about our connection, but there is nothing to be ashamed of. Our name is a good, honest, and. honored one. I know of no New Church family which can trace its continuous connection with the Church longer than our own. You are of the fifth generation in the New Church. May these generations never cease! May the inclination towards the marriage of good and truth increase in each generation! May the name and blood of the Odhners forever remain among the people of the New Jerusalem! Amen.

(To be continued.)

CHRISTMAS TALK TO CHILDREN 1920

CHRISTMAS TALK TO CHILDREN Rev. GEORGE DE CHARMS 1920

     "Glory to God in the highest, and on, earth peace, good will toward men." (Luke 2:14.)

     So sang the host of angels, suddenly appearing in the bright light from heaven that illuminated the sky on that night in the fields of Judea, where, so long ago, the shepherds were watching over their flocks. It is one of the most wonderful songs that has ever been sung. The words of it have rung through all the ages since that time, in every Christian land. Not a generation has passed that has not repeated them with joy, and from fullness of heart. Fathers and mothers have taught them to their children, so that every year at Christmas time they might again be sung, as a sign to the angels that men have heard, that men have remembered, the great message they came down from the Lord to give.

     And what is the message these words contain? Why should it make us glad? Why should men feel such happiness at Christmas time, and be everywhere moved to lift up their hearts to the Lord in song?

     You know that the Letter of the Word is in two parts. One part is called the Old Testament, and the other is called the New Testament. These two parts of the Word seem very different when we read them. The Old Testament tells about the Israelitish people, where they came from, how they lived; about the Prophets, Kings, and Priests who ruled over them; about the wars they fought,, the battles they won or lost. The New Testament treats of the Lord, how He was born on earth a little child, how He lived among men, the wonderful things He taught them about heaven and the life after death, and how the wicked Jews were aroused to anger by His words, until at last they crucified Him; and then how He rose on the third day, to rule the world forever.

     These two Testaments of the Word seem different, yet they both are given for the same purpose, namely, that men might learn from them the way to heaven.

This is what they teach from beginning to end,-how all meg, no matter where they live, or when, may enter into heaven after death, and be happy there always. And so these two parts of the Word really tell us the same thing, only in a different way.

     This will be clear to us when we understand the song the angels sang, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." For this wonderful song contains, in a few words, the whole of the Lord's Word.

     The Jews called the Old Testament the Law and the Prophets. And you remember that one day, when the Lord was on the earth, a young man came and asked Him, "Master, which is the great commandment of the Law'" The Lord answered, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

     In these few words, the Lord brought together everything that is taught in the Old Testament from beginning to end, that men might clearly see and understand the Law and the Prophets in one general idea, which is, that in order to be saved, in order to come into heaven after death, we must do two things: We must love the Lord, and we must love other men. Unless we love the Lord, and worship Him from the heart, there can be no place for us in heaven. For every angel loves Him. And unless we love one another, and do things to make each other happy, we can find no place in heaven. For the angels love one another, and they love everybody living on earth as well.

     Now let us compare the words of the Two Great Commandments with the words the angels sang on that: Christmas morning, and yet; will see that they are really the same, although they seem so different.

     "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." Here is summed up everything that the Lord taught while He was in the world. Here we have the whole of the New Testament, brought together into one short sentence.

In the simplest way, it tells men how they may come into heaven after death. And it is the same way that is taught in the Law and the Prophets,-in the Old Testament.

     To give "glory to God in the highest" is to love Him with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, and with all our strength. If we loved Him any less than this, we would not give glory to Him in the highest, but there would be something that we loved more, something that we would hold to be dearer, and thus higher, than He. This we cannot do, and come into heaven. For to love the Lord above all else is like a key that opens the gates of heaven. Without it, those gates are closed to us, and we must forever be shut out from the golden streets, the marble palaces, the beautiful parks and paradises, with the wonderful river of life flowing through them, where only the angels can live.

     And because we cannot love the Lord unless we know Him, He came down upon earth to tell us about Himself, and longing to open for us those gates of pearl. Ever since His coming, we have been able to knew Him, and so we are able to love Him, and He is able to give us the key to heaven, that we may enter in and dwell there forever. The angels who sang to the shepherds knew this, and because they loved men, and wanted them to come into heaven,-because there is nothing that gives the angels more pleasure or delight than to receive new angels from the earth,-they were very, very glad at the Lord's coming. And they sang this song in thanks to Him, because He had mercifully come to give men the key to heaven: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men."

     Now, if loving the Lord above all things is the key that opens the gates of heaven, then loving other men is the road that we must walk along, if we would cross the threshold of heaven, and actually enter in. If we can imagine the Lord opening for us the gates of heaven, while yet we stand outside, and refuse to walk along the road that leads through it, you can easily see that we could not continue to love the Lord. For to love the Lord is to want to do what He says, to want to be where He is. And He is in heaven with the angels, as their God and King.

If our love of Him does not make us want to go where He is, then it is plain that we do not really love Him, though we may think that we do. And if we do not really love the Lord, the key will be taken from us, the gates will be shut against us, and we will turn away toward hell.

     But if we would come into heaven, we must walk along the way, the road, the Lord has pointed out. We must love one another. We must have good will toward men. We must desire to be at peace with them. We must desire to serve them, to work for them, to make them happy. If we see them suffering, we must long to help them, and actually do it, so far as we can. If we see them in want, we must share with them what we have, that their hearts also may rejoice.

     When men feel and act this way toward one another, then there is peace on earth. For wars arise when men have ill will toward each other, when some men want for themselves what belongs to others, and try to take it from them. Then comes war, in which some attack and others defend. A righteous war is fought only that there may be peace once more. We should not fight because we love to fight, but only when by fighting we may bring about a real and genuine peace,-a peace in which we may be free to serve our fellow men, without being interfered with by those who are selfish and wicked. And as soon as this object is attained, we should gladly return to peace, a peace such as the angels in heaven have, where all love one another.

     It is only as we love men, and seek to serve them, that we walk along the road that leads through the gates of heaven. And that road lies open before everyone. The Lord has given men work to do, work that helps to make others happy. This is the road to heaven,-the road of work, of use. And if we do some work or use, because we love to make others happy, we are on that way which leads through the gates that are opened by loving the Lord above all things. For He said: "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."

     Now Christmas means these two things to us. It means loving the Lord, and loving one another. And so we do two things at Christmas time that show forth these two loves.

We have a service, a celebration where we worship the Lord, and try to show our love to Him by singing the songs, and telling the story, or His birth, and of what the angels sang to the shepherds. And after this we give presents to one another. And in doing these two things, we are perhaps happier than at any other time in the year. For on these two things "hang all the Law and the Prophets." Amen.
ANCIENT PHILOSOPHERS AND SPIRITUAL THOUGHT 1920

ANCIENT PHILOSOPHERS AND SPIRITUAL THOUGHT Rev. ALFRED ACTON 1920

     In a former contribution to the pages of the LIFE, I called attention to some interesting items concerning the Mohammedans, contained in Codex 36 of the Swedenborg Manuscripts. For the most part, this Coder is made up of quotations from philosophical writers, particularly Aristotle and Plate. These extracts afford a number of illustrations and confirmations of statements in the Writings concerning the Greek philosophers. It is to one of these that I would now call the reader's attention.

     In the Arcana Celestia, 6201, We read: "When a man thinks interiorly, he is said to be withdrawn from sensual things. That a man can be thus withdrawn, was known to the ancients, and therefore some of them have written concerning this state."

     In the pages of Codex 36 occur two extracts from Aristotle's Divine Wisdom according to the Egyptians, which give full confirmation of the above statement in the Arcana. The extracts referred to are:

     "The contemplation of the supreme world brings to the understanding neither fatigue, nor satiety, nor weariness; for in such contemplation nothing whatever is lacking. In this contemplation the understanding beholds, not one part only of that world, but all things which are most desirable, and whereby it is affected. . . . The more it contemplates, the more eager and admiring does it become; nor is it fatigued in the beholding, but rather is more and more strengthened." (Aristotle De Secretiore parte Sag. Div. secundum AEgyptios L. XIV. c. xi.)

     "Plate said, 'Often, when my soul, leaving the body, has been in contemplation, I seemed to enjoy the highest good, and this with incredible pleasure. Wherefore, I was struck with astonishment, discerning in dearest light that I was a part of a superior world, and feeling myself to be endowed with immortality; which experiences can neither be expressed in speech, perceived by ears, nor comprehended by thought. At last, wearied with this contemplation, the intellect fell back to its appearances; and then, with the ceasing of that light, I became sad. Once again, leaving the body, and returning to that world, I perceived the soul abounding in light, this light then flowing into the body, and afterwards raised up above the latter. . . . The soul, loosened from the body, ascends, and is enlightened; descending, it comes into obscurity; but being afterwards purged, it again ascends.'" (Aristotle, ibid, L. I. c. iv, v.)

     It should be added that the work on Divine Wisdom according to the Egyptians is considered as improperly ascribed to Aristotle, being more probably a product of some neo-Platonic writer. Swedenborg quotes from this work very frequently in his Philosophical Writings, and expresses the highest admiration for it.

     For a full discussion concerning the work itself the reader is referred to the NEW PHILOSOPHY for 1912, p. 143, and 1913, p. 5.

BRYN ATHYN TEMPLE 1920

BRYN ATHYN TEMPLE W. H. JUNGE 1920

This temple in Bryn Athyn,
This temple of the Lord,
Built strong and high against the sky
True worship to afford,
The artist and the artisan
With master strokes have wrought,
     And priests with prayer
     Have sought out where
     The very stones might picture fair
The glory of the Lord.

No sordid limitations
Have barred the builders' way,
No selfish guile, no random wile,
Have here held baleful sway.
     And we believe that angel throngs
     Will often gather here with songs
In heavenly array.

This temple is an offering,
An offering of love;
Of love enriching every part,
Making the whole a work of art
Inspired from above.
Here will the love of loves be taught,
And messages with blessings fraught
     Be sent to every shore.
Here shall both word and act proclaim
"The Lord God Jesus Christ doth reign
     Now and for evermore."
W. H. JUNGE. October 5, 1919.

ELEANOR 1920

ELEANOR EDWARD POLLOCK ANSHUTZ 1920

     CHAPTER VII.

     Wherein Phil appears and Dick disappears.

     "It is all nonsense," said Eleanor, as she flitted away, casting one laughing glance back.

     Dick watched her until she disappeared around the turn in the lane, and then he sat down on the old stone-her favorite seat-and buried his face in his hands. The questions he had so long fought off now pressed forward, demanding answer. He must choose between Truth and the woman he loved.

     For a long time he sat motionless, save for an occasional slight shudder. When he arose, it was with the cry: "What have I done! What shall I do!"

     It may seem that this was slight occasion for such a cry of agony. But be it remembered that he believed the Doctrines of the New Church to be Divine Truths. He knew that a marriage with Eleanor would be contrary to their express teachings; and when the Truth sternly bars the way wherein a man's will would go, he mat well cry out in great bitterness of spirit, for he is sorely troubled. Then do heaven and hell wage war for his soul.

     As Dick stood gazing at the gently flowing waters of the brook, and listening to their peaceful murmur, the poignant anguish of his soul seemed to pass away. The Truth had conquered. And now lit spoke to him, no longer sternly, but even as the waters of the brook spake, in unison with the voice of the spiritual and living waters.

     But the ordeal had been too severe for perfect peace to come at once, and it was with bowed head and lingering steps that he set out upon his homeward walk through the fields. Often of late the had traversed this path with a light heart and gaily singing, as springy steps carried him along. The trees and stones, the old fences, the fields-every object was familiar to him, inwoven in a past happiness.

But now, as he slowly passed these inanimate friends, they took on a sorrowful look, standing silent and mournful in the hazy atmosphere. The occasional faint breath of wind that floated by was in keeping with the scene, and seemed to bear in its soul the chill of coming winter. He rather felt than saw all this as he walked along, burdened with heavy thoughts; and his reverie was only disturbed when suddenly he heard a voice nearby: "Well, youngster, how are you?"

     Looking up quickly, Dick saw a man leaning back against the old rail-fence that skirted the path, both his arms spread out along the top rail, and his slouch hat pushed well back, displaying a full-bearded face-not exactly handsome, but, for all its apparent grimness, one that a child would not shrink from. The man was of average height, rather heavily built, and well, though carelessly dressed.

     "Phil!" was Dick's response, as he grasped the stranger's hand.

     David Brown, or Phil, as he was called by his young cousin, perceived the troubled expression upon Dick's face, but made no comment. They exchanged greetings, and as they walked on, Phil said: "I arrived about midday, and Kate told me I would be sure to meet you on this path. She said you never came or went by any other. So I thought I would stroll out to meet you. Well, how have you been getting on?"

     "Oh, very well!"

     "Been having a good time?"

     "Yes," very dolefully.

     "Where is your gun?"

     "At home."

     "Didn't go shooting today, then?"

     "No, not today. I haven't done much hunting-scarcely any, in fact."

     "What have you done, then, to put in time?"

     "Nothing much," replied Dick, absently.

     "Humph! Doing nothing doesn't seem to have made you very cheerful."

     Dick making no reply, they were silent for a time, and then Phil said: "We are in no hurry down here in this lazy old country.

Let us sit down a bit. I want a smoke."

     Dick's reply was to throw himself on the ground, while his companion took his seat on an old stump of a tree, and drew from his pocket a leathern case, from which he took a well-colored meerschaum pipe.

     "A fellow has to take to the woods when he wants a smoke where Kate is," said he, putting the case back into his pocket and drawing forth a tobacco pouch. "Kate is a reformer. Very uncomfortable, very," he continued, filling his pipe and striking a match. "Ah!" drawing a few vigorous puffs, and then slightly pressing down the tobacco in the bowl of his pipe. "Ah! there is nothing like a still day in the country for a smoke. And now, boy, let us talk. So you have been doing nothing down here all this time?"

     "Find it tiresome?"

     "Not very."

     "You always were a good one for doing nothing, but I didn't think you could keep it up for so long, especially in the country. It would be different in the city. But how a fellow who doesn't go in for reading or hunting, and who doesn't smoke, can do nothing as industriously as you have for the past few weeks, and not expire from boredom, beats me."

     Dick lay on his back with his hands clasped under his head, gazing at the leaden sky. Phil watched him with half-closed eyes, and thought he wasn't paying much attention. This did not disturb the calm smoker in the least, and he continued: "However, from what Kate tells me, I am inclined to the belief that the 'doing nothing' theory is not tenable. She said that you had been going to church, and to 'copenhagen' parties, and visiting as long as a week at a time; in fact, if I had not known Kate before, I should have inclined to the opinion that instead of doing nothing you had, in the language of the weekly-paper novelist, been 'living in a mad whirl of dissipation, in a seething vortex of society.' Who are all these people you have met?"

     "Oh! I got acquainted with the preacher, and Mr. Plowman, and-and a lot of fellows. I forget their names."

     "Just so, just so," replied Phil, deliberately. "She must be a very attractive girl," he added, after a considerable pause.

     "Phil," said Dick, with sad animation, and not heeding the abrupt way in which the subject was broached, "she is the sweetest, dearest, best being ever created."

     "Of course; I know all that."

     "You? You never met her, did you?"

     "No. What is her name?"

     "Nellie-Eleanor Mayburn."

     "Hum! Nellie. Rather neat name. So you have put in time by falling in love?"

     "Yes, desperately and forever," groaned Dick.
"You always were susceptible to pretty faces, but I never saw you look so doleful about one before."

     "Phil, this is serious."

     "You certainly look as though it were. This Miss Mayburn is one of the girls that go to Kate's church, isn't she?"

     "Yes."

     "Just so. Exactly."

     "I'm the most wretched fellow that ever lived," continued Dick.

     "Naturally," replied Phil. "Fellows in love are just as conceited about their misery as they are about their happiness; nothing short of the superlative will suit them."

     "It's all very well to be sarcastic and-and to preach doctrine, until you get into the state I am in."

     "My dear boy, I haven't said a word about doctrine."

     "No; but you thought it."

     "That's a new style of argument, certainly."

     "You don't know what it is to be in love with a woman."

     "Perhaps not, perhaps not," Phil replied, with a smile that seemed to have no mirth in it.

     "Nellie is just as good as I am, and a thousand times better," continued Dick.

     "Very likely," was the laconic response.

     "She is young and beautiful, and pure, and truthful, and gentle."

     "I'm glad to hear it; but there is no need to hurl these facts at me, as though I had disputed them."

     Dick petulantly dug his heel into the ground, as he said: "You cold, heathenish philosopher, I tell you I love her and she's all the world to me."

     "And for bonnie Annie Laurie, I would lay me down and dee,"

     sang Phil', in response to Dick's unpremeditated quotation.

     "Wish I could die for her."

     "Then she'd marry some other chap."

     "She wouldn't!" replied Dick, fiercely.

     "Then, of course, she would be an old maid."

     "Phil, do talk sense."

     "My, dear fellow, nothing would give me greater pleasure. If my conversation has lacked that quality, remember it has been apt to your remarks. Very abruptly, and without the least particulars, you tell me that you are in love, indulge in the regulation rhapsodies, and then wish to die. What is the matter? Has the girl refused you?"

     "No."

     "Then you must have had a row-I mean a lover's quarrel."

     "We never quarrel."

     "Don't, eh! Has the pater told you to make yourself scarce?"

     "No! no! no!"

     "Then why don't you marry the girl?"

     No reply save a groan. Phil gravely smoked, and contemplated his companion, who now lay with his face to the ground. "The boy is in a bad way and no mistake," thought he. "Love matters are dangerous things for third parties to meddle with. I see what the trouble is; but he knows the truth, and advice would be useless, perhaps worse." So he continued to smoke until Dick said: "She isn't a New Church girl, but she is just as good as any New Church girl that ever lived."

     "Well, I don't deny it."

     "Just because of a little difference in religion, you say we must part."

     "I didn't."

     "Well, you think it."

     "That is the second time you have brought what you call my thoughts into the argument-if argument it can be called, where the disputation is all on one side. You know enough about the rules of debate to be aware that such a proceeding is not admissible." Dick made no rejoinder, and Phil, after pulling at his pipe until it was aglow, continued: "Kate told me something of the way you made this girl's acquaintance. Upon that, and what you have said, I build the following theory: Being accidentally thrown into the girl's company, you were attracted by her pretty face, said pretty things to her, and made yourself agreeable, as you have the knack of doing. You 'didn't mean anything by it,' of course; no fellow ever does. But the first thing you knew, you were in love with her."

     "Yes, Phil."

     "Then, after getting nicely in love, you began to think of your religion. Is she religious?"

     "Yes; she tried to make a Christian of me," said Dick, dolefully.

     At this Phil removed his pipe, and gave a roar of laughter. "Tried to make a Christian of you! Well, that's rich! And failing to do that, I suppose you in your turn tried to make a Christian of her?"

     "Yes, I tried hard, and gave her my copy of Heaven and Hell."

     "Well, what did she say to it?"

     "She would never tell me what she thought of it until this afternoon, just before I met you, when I urged her to tell me."

     "What did she say of it then?"

     "She said, 'It's all nonsense.'"

     "Humph! Short, but to the point, at any rate."

     "Yes."

     "After that, then, I suppose the ugliness of your conduct toward her struck you."

     "Ugliness! I would not harm that darling little one for all the world."

     "Yet, very likely you have hurt her, and for considerably less than 'all the world.'"

     "What do you mean?" asked Dick anxiously.

     "I mean that very likely you have succeeded in making her as much in love with you as you are with her. Is that no harm, lad?"

     "Then," said Dick, springing to his feet, "I'll marry her, if she will have me, religion or no religion."

     All on fire, and trembling from the tension on his nerves, Dick confronted his cousin; but that gentleman, instead of responding in kind, calmly wafted a blue cloud skyward, and replied: "You can't."

     "Why not?" was the hot rejoinder. "If she will have me, who is there that will dare interfere?"

     "No one that I know of, my young fire-eater; certainly not I," replied Phil, knocking the ashes out of his pipe, and proceeding to refill it.

     "Then, why can't I marry her?"

     "You can, so far as ceremony and civil laws go, but it will not be a marriage, and," striking a match, and relighting his pipe, "you know it."

     He did know it. The fire and eagerness died from him, and he said, fretfully: "Phil, somehow that seems so narrow, and sectarian, and bigoted."

     Phil had his pipe in goad shape again, and, in a calmly argumentative tone, began: "It appears so to narrow-minded people only. You can put it down as a rule-as an axiom-that the more a man brags of his broadness and liberality, the narrower he is. No 'broad' man will admit that it is wrong for people of antagonistic religions to marry. When such unions do occur, the 'broad' man throws up his hat for the 'progress of the nineteenth century.' The marriage of a Jew and a Catholic, or of a Catholic and a Protestant, is hailed by the 'broad' man as evidence of enlightenment. But that only shows his real narrowness. In fact, it shows that he doesn't know what marriage is. Of course, such men," here the speaker gave his pipe an oratorical flourish, "be they Old Church or New Church, can marry whom they please-that will have them-and in one sense not violate the law, for they are ignorant of it.

But such is not the case with those who know the fact that a wife is the form of the love of her husband's wisdom. These clearly see that the marriage-real marriage-of a man with a woman who pronounces His wisdom to be 'all nonsense' is impossible. It cannot be done, in the New Church or any other Church. Imagine," continued Phil, waxing warm, "a devout Catholic woman united to an infidel man, she abhorring what is essentially the man himself-his wisdom-and he despising her love, which is not and can not be his. Or, imagine a pious Methodist woman united to a Unitarian; his wisdom is folly and wickedness to her, and she cannot love it, or, what is the same, him; and he, broad as he flatters himself to be, cannot cherish a love-for that is what woman is-that he holds to be mere foolishness and superstition. And this applies with far greater force to New Churchmen, who alone know the truth on the subject of marriage."

     During this long speech, Dick had laid himself down again with a weary sigh. When Phil ceased he made no reply, for all that he had heard he knew and believed already. After Phil had lit his pipe, which had gone out, he resumed: "This girl may be as good a girl as you think she is. I do not dispute that in the least, for I do not know her, and if I did, I must not judge of her internal state. Rut the hard fact remains that so long as she cannot love your Church or wisdom, her good is not fit companion far your truth; and all the broad-minded men in or out Of the Church cannot get over or around that hard and tangible fact."

     "I know, I know," said Dick, stretching out his arms, and rolling over on the ground as one in anguish. "The pain I suffer at the thought of leaving her is horrible enough, but not so bad as to think of my little girl waiting for me, for I believe she loves me. O Phil! I cannot leave her. Right or wrong, I cannot leave her; it would be unmanly, mean, and brutal."

     For some time Phil did not answer, and when he did his voice was very grave. Said he: "Awhile ago, yell objected when I called your conduct ugly. You now say that to leave her would be unmanly, mean, and brutal. Well, so it would. But what is the alternative? To take unto yourself a young girl whom you admit cannot be your wife.

The first is what all men call an ugly natural need, and so it is. The second is an uglier spiritual deed. The alternative is before you. Now, Dick, I have had my say." He put his pipe back into its case and arising, said, "Come, let us go home."

     Dick's hollow eyes and pale face next morning spoke of a wretched night. After breakfast, he and Phil started to walk to the village, about two miles distant, to get the mail. Nothing more had been said between them on the subject that lay sore at the younger one's heart, and nothing was said on this walk.

     There was but one letter in the box at the post office, and it was far Dick-from his brother. He lead it, then handed it to Phil. It was short, and the gist of it was in the closing paragraph, which ran, "I do not want to cut a day off your holiday, but you can see that this matter demands your immediate presence. Come by the first train."

     Inquiry at the station showed that the next train was due in a few minutes. "You had better take it," said Phil, "and I'll send your baggage after you."

     Without a word Dick bought his ticket, and then the two slowly walked to the end of the station platform. Stopping there, Phil said: "This is about as fortunate a thing as could have happened."

     "Why?"

     Phil stroked his beard a moment, and replied: "When I come to think of it, I cannot see that it makes much difference, after all. It struck me at first that this gives a sort of decent excuse for your sudden departure, but that is a caddish way of looking at the matter."

     "It would be in keeping with my conduct toward her," replied Dick, in a monotonous voice. "I wonder if there is a meaner being on the earth than I?"

     "Well, you might have done worse."

     "How?"

     "Offered to marry her, when you knew that marriage was impossible." There was a dead evenness in Dick's manner; he betrayed not the least feeling, and did not answer Phil's assertion, who continued, shortly: "I believe, though, that under the circumstances it is fair to let the girl know that you were called away suddenly.

As far the real reason, since you were not plighted to her, nothing can be said to her about it. I believe I'll loiter about here for a few days, and perhaps I'll meet her. I should like to very much."

     "You think you can soften my disgrace a little. It doesn't matter much. I wonder what Sam will think of it all?"

     "I can't tell what he will think, but I fancy he will not say much."

     "Dear old fellow!" said Dick, with a slight moisture glistening in his eyes. "How differently he would have acted if he had been in my place."

     "Yes, where he is concerned he has a quiet way of letting the simple truth cut away shams. But we haven't that, there is considerable sham about both of us."

     The air-brakes on the train, which at this moment dashed up, were hissing and grinding, as Dick said, "If you see her, tell her that I--," he paused, at a loss what to say.

     "All right," said Phil, grasping his hand. "Don't be too downhearted; stick to the Truth, and it will lead you out of your trouble somehow."

     "Yes, I suppose so," replied Dick, as he stepped aboard the moving train. Phil watched it until it disappeared around a curve, and then set out on his tramp homewards.

     "This is a bad business," he mused, as he loitered along the road; "bad for the girl, poor thing, for I know how she feels toward him; bad for Dick-; he ought to have known better. But who am I to flout him? And it's bad for me, too, for I must see her, and I don't like the job. If I had to do with a man, I could settle him with solid reasons. But she is a girl," and the philosopher shook his head.

     (To be continued.)

Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA.
Editor                         Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager                Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager.

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     THE RE-BAPTISM DISCUSSION.

     A point is reached in every doctrinal discussion when the various phases of a subject have been so fully presented that little remains to be said. The interchange of opinion is useful for a time, bringing an issue into clear light, so that all who read may choose; but a long-sustained reiteration of opposing views only serves to confirm those who hold them, and at length ceases to be instructive. To some of our readers it may seem that the discussion of Re-Baptism in our pages has reached this stage. A correspondent, whose letter appears elsewhere in the present issue of the LIFE, voices a feeling of impatience at what he styles the "interminable debate" upon an issue which ought to be clear to all. We are glad to have this expression of opinion, though we cannot entirely agree with it. In forming a judgment as to what is useful to publish, we are obliged to keep in mind the fact that we have a wide circle of readers, residing in all parts of the world, many of whom may be interested in what others are not.

The question of New Church Baptism is a very active one in some quarters, not only as a matter of practice and custom, but also as involving the whole doctrine of a distinct New Church.

This, indeed, is the real issue in the discussion on the subject of Re-Baptism, and justifies the extended treatment it has received in our pages during the past year. In itself, baptism is but the external sign of an internal faith and life; and if the New Church is new and distinct from the Old in respect to its faith and life, then its external sign is new and distinct, which everyone entering this Church should receive. The General Church so believes, and this is the origin of the baptismal requirement for membership in this body, and for attendance at our schools. Whenever, in recent years, this custom has come up for consideration, the result has been a reaffirmation of our traditional stand in the matter, because our belief in the distinctiveness of the New Church has not changed. Moreover, we regard this custom as essential to the stability of the Church, any loosening of which will tend toward the dissipation rather than the promotion of the New Church. The same would be the case with any nation that admitted foreigners to the full rights and privileges of citizenship without their taking the oath of allegiance to their new sovereign, and to the laws of their adopted country.

While not wishing to encourage a further repetition of the arguments that have already been set forth in our pages, we would suggest that there are many phases of the relation of the New Church to the Old that have not been touched upon or fully dealt with in the discussion of Re-Baptism. We should like to see more said about the comparison of the change from Judaism to Christianity with the change from the Old Church to the New. The latter involves fewer changes as to externals. The Jewish ceremonials were abrogated for the Christian Church, but the forms of the Christian sacraments are retained in the New Church. "Baptism," we read, "was commanded in place of circumcision to the end that the Christian Church might be distinguished from the Jewish Church." (T. C. R. 674.)

There is not this difference as to the external sign between the Christian Church and the New, and we believe that this fact is what makes it difficult for some New Churchmen to realize that Old Church baptism and New Church baptism are distinct internally as to what they involve and effect. In the New Church there is a new doctrine, a new faith, a new life, and thus a new state, and these are separate from the doctrines, faith, life, and state of the Old Church in the spiritual world,-a distinction that is ultimated in the externals of worship, however similar they be outwardly.
MR. ODHNER'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY 1920

MR. ODHNER'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY W. B. CALDWELL 1920

     In our issue for June, 1918, we promised the early publication of an account of the life and uses of the Rev. Carl Theophilus Odhner, which the Rev. E. S. Price had kindly undertaken to prepare. Until August of this year, however, owing to the pressure of other duties, Mr. Price was unable to complete the task, which had taken on a different form after it was discovered that Mr. Odhner had written an autobiography. This has now been edited and placed in our hands, and we take the first opportunity of putting it before our readers.

     In the present number we print the Introduction, wherein Mr. Odhner traces the origin and history of his ancestors, and their connection with the New Church. This will be followed by monthly instalments of the autobiographical diary. Here he tells the story of his life in the well-known entertaining style, and also touches upon many things of interest in the history of the Church. It closes with the year 1890. The later periods of Mr. Odhner's life will call for subsequent comment on the part of our biographers and historians, who, in the light of assembled documents and a future perspective, will be able to do justice to a career of such notable activity in the works of the New Church.
     W. B. CALDWELL.

OUR GROUND OF HOPE 1920

OUR GROUND OF HOPE HOMER SYNNESTVEDT 1920

     God is to be regarded by the New Churchman from the standpoint of the Divine mercy and love-not as of yore, from the standpoint of vindictive or implacable justice. Such stern justice as is ascribed to God the Father by the old theology is as far as possible from the nature of God the Father, by whom we understand the Divine Esse Itself, which is Love Itself. An evil and adulterous generation, such as the Jews were, had to be ruled by terror. They could not be brought to abstain from evils and do good, especially in their interior intentions and purposes, as a matter of spontaneous love and zeal for the Lord. Punishments were necessary at all times, therefore, and they even called the Lord by names signifying fear,-the Dread of Isaac, the Awful One, the Avenger. Even in the letter of the Word of the Old Testament, He was obliged to adopt this appearance, in order to keep them in trembling awe of Him. This attitude took the place with them of that inward reverence which is born of love and the heart's deepest loyalty and gratitude.

     But the Lord is His Second Coming has set aside all the clouds of the letter, and we see Him revealed anew as He really is,-a God of infinite tenderness, just and firm against evil and the false, but even here, moved by nothing but zeal for the welfare and happiness of His children.

     So, when we face the question as to whether we may hope to "be saved," which means to be allowed to live among our own people on the other side, and to share with them the love of serving (which makes heaven and its blessedness), let us recall that our Lord is certainly not less loving than any parent, in this respect, that His love will seize upon any chance to bring us there, as near to Himself as possible.

     The trouble is that even in the Christian Church the Trinity has been divided, and many do not realize that our Savior, Jesus Christ, is one with the Father, being only the full manifestation of Him, as He is in Himself. As it is written, "No one hath seen God at any time. The Only-begotten Son, He hath set Him forth." "I and the Father are one." "He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father." "In Christ dwelleth the fullness of the Godhead bodily."

     The old creeds taught that there was "one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost;" but unless Person is here understood in a very special sense, as meaning "aspect," "form," or "quality," that phrase means simply and plainly that there are three Gods. We must remember that the Athanasian Creed, which dwells upon this tripersonality of God, was written as a countercheck to the rising flood of Arianism in the fourth century, which would thus early have swept away all worship of our Lord as being really God Himself come upon earth. Yet this is the very Rock upon which Christianity is founded.

     This ancient "mystery" of the Trinity becomes very simple, however, when we realize the Biblical habit of speaking according to correspondences (or symbols), and accept the plain statement of the Gospels-especially John-that the whole Trinity was brought to its full unity in the Person of Jesus Christ.

     The chief purpose of all His temptations, and the chief result of His constant victories over the bells, which stirred up the imperfections of His humanity, was that He gradually perfected that Human, and thus united it to the Divinity within,-the Father, or Soul. For He alone, of all flesh, had no human father. So He made His Humanity Divine. Hence it follows that, whenever we think of Him, We should not dwell upon His merely human side, but remember that even while He walked this earth in the flesh, He was, in very deed, God Incarnate. It is similar in man, who is created in the image of God. Thus the Trinity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are one in the Lord, even as soul, body, and proceeding operation, or exhaling sphere of influence, are one in each of us.
     HOMER SYNNESTVEDT.
SWEDENBORG'S ESTEEM FOR HIS SCIENTIFIC WORKS 1920

SWEDENBORG'S ESTEEM FOR HIS SCIENTIFIC WORKS ERNST PFEIFFER 1920

There exists quite an abundance of weighty indications that Swedenborg's preparatory works are of great value and importance to the Church, and the admirers of these works are never at a loss to find ample evidence in their favor.

     We should here like to bring to the attention of those interested int his issue two facts which we have never found mentioned in the discussion of the subject, although they must certainly be considered as of extraordinary force, involving the testimony of Swedenborg himself, and being in this respect perhaps unique. For the majority of the other arguments are based upon the intrinsic value of the works in question, and upon the frequent general statements of Swedenborg to the effect that from early youth he was prepared by the Lord by means of the sciences and philosophy.

     According to Hyde's Bibliography, it was as late as 1760 that a copy of Swedenborg's Chemistry-one of his earliest scientific publications, dating back to the year 1721-was sent by him as a present to his friend, Stiernmann, with the following inscription written in his own hand on the flyleaf of the volume: "Hae lucubrationes, quae sunt primitiae, dono dantur viro nobili, Equiti, Consilianio Cancellariae, A. Stiernmanno, amico, ab autore Em. Swedenborg, Holmiae, 1760, d. 12 Maii. Eques in sensu spirituali, qui vocatur sensus mysticus, significat scientem et intelligentem; similiter Stiernmann, nam stellae in eo sensu significant cognitiones veri et boni, ita stellarum vir scientem et intelligentem." In English: "These lucubrations, which are firstlings, are presented to the noble man, the Knight, the Councilor, A. Stirenmann, a friend, by the author, Em. Swedenborg, Stockholm, May 12, 1760. Knight, in the spiritual sense, which is called the mystic sense, signifies a learned and intelligent man; likewise Stiernmann, for stars in that sense signify cognitions of truth and good; thus 'Starman,' a learned and intelligent man." The copy is preserved in the Royal Library, Stockholm.

     The other instance seems even more important: In the year 1748, five years after his spiritual eyes were opened, Swedenborg published a third edition of his Oeconomia Regni Animalis. This was in the year following his introduction into the celestial state, which, according to the Index Biblicus, happened on the 7th of August, 1747. It was only a year before the first volume of the Arcana Coelestia made its appearance. There is a copy of this third edition of the Oeconomia Regni Animalis in the Academy Library, Bryn Athyn.
     ERNST PFEIFFER.

MARY WELLS CLARK 1920

MARY WELLS CLARK GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

     Mrs. Mary Wells Clark, the oldest member of Sharon Church, Chicago, passed into the spiritual world on Wednesday, October 1st, 1919, two days before the opening of the General Assembly at Bryn Athyn. Having suffered from a spinal affliction during the major portion of her long life of nearly ninety-five years, she was provided for at The Home for Incurables, Chicago, being the oldest patient there at the time of her death. It was at this Home that the Rev. J. R. Hibbard spent his last years, and Mrs. Clark often spoke of her warm regard for him as her pastor of those days. Her mental faculties were keen and active to the end, and she continued to produce those marvelous bits of knitting and needlework which she was wont to bestow upon her friends as wedding and birthday gifts.

     Mrs. Clark is known to the members of the General Church as the compiler of the Summary of the Doctrines of the New Church, published in 1917. She was ever an ardent reader and student of the Writings, and this book was the outcome of a devoted labor for which her many invalid years afforded ample leisure. She was early impressed with the need for some kind of concordance or reference book to the voluminous theological works of Swedenborg, and it was in 1873, while residing at Urbana, Ohio, that a conference with the late Rev. Frank Sewall led her to begin the preparation of such a book. This was the year that the Rev. J. F. Potts began his Concordance, and when Mrs. Clark heard of it, ten years later, she changed the plan of her compilation to meet the needs especially of those who were but little acquainted with the Writings, realizing that the requirements of the student would be met by Mr. Pott's work. Besides this undertaking, she wrote many articles for the NEW CHURCH MESSENGER of fifty years ago.

     Mrs. Clark was born on April 18th, 1825, in Lewis county, New York. She came to Chicago in 1854, and had a most detailed and exact memory of the vicissitudes of the New Church in and around that city.

She was also familiar with the beginnings of Urbana University and its founders, was interested in the development of the African Mission of the Convention at Washington, D. C., followed the controversies attending the separation of the Academy movement from the General Convention, and gave her undivided sympathies to the cause of the distinctiveness of the New Church in education and life, although retaining a broad interest in the doings of New Church people everywhere. Shortly before her death, she offered it as her opinion that the General Church would grow in numbers and influence, and that: it would be only a matter of time before that organization would absorb all who are vitally interested in the Heavenly Doctrine. GILBERT H. SMITH.
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

     In our October number, (p. 672), we quoted from an editorial that appeared in THE NEW CHURCH WEEKLY, (London), for July 12, 1919, which referred to the relations of the General Church and the Conference Mission in South Africa. In later issues of the WEEKLY, the Editor reverts to the subject, and says:

     ". . . . But the prosecution of this work will not be made easier by interference on the part of a certain section not at one in all things with the General Conference which regards itself as responsible for the work in South Africa. The influences at work appear to us to be detrimental to satisfactory and harmonious work; and therefore we ought to send out a missionary to see to matters an the spot and ensure that what has been begun there by our Foreign and Colonial Mission shall not be rendered futile by the action of others in the same field. . . ." (WEEKLY for September 13, 1919.)

     "In our Leader in the issue of this paper for September 13, we referred to certain influences which we had reason to believe were at work in South Africa that would be detrimental to our mission there. Since writing in this regard, evidence of a recent kind has come to hand which shows that the mission work in South Africa, now being prosecuted under the direction of the Overseas Mission Committee and another body, has every prospect of being carried out in harmony and concord.

We are of opinion that the sooner our missionary goes out to South Africa the better it will be for the cause." (WEEKLY for September 27, 1919.)

     Freak communications and literary oddities find their way into every editorial office, and occasionally one of them is worth passing on to the reader. Above the commonplace for its tragicomic contents, we rescue the following post card from our capacious waste basket:

     Great Bend, Kansas, Sept. 30, 1919
To the Managing Editor:
     Having had the good fortune to discover the truths that the universe contains no real god, that man has no soul, and that life ends forever at death; and believing this knowledge to be of greatest importance to all people; I write to offer my services free to the readers of your publication to inform them of these truths being discovered, if you will kindly furnish me space for a series of articles or lessons explaining and proving them. Please answer, and oblige.
Yours respectfully,
     W. H. KERR,
     Great Bend, Kansas.
Title Unspecified 1920

Title Unspecified 1920

"For the last two years Mr. Godefroy d'Emmerez de Charmoy, a member of the Society in Mauritius, has been engaged in the translation into French of Pott's Swedenborg Concordance, and in the preparation of a French Dictionary of Correspondences."-NEW CHURCH REVIEW.

DEFENDS HIS POSITION AS TO RE-BAPTISM 1920

DEFENDS HIS POSITION AS TO RE-BAPTISM L. G. LANDENBERGER 1920

     Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:
     Although you have been kind enough to print two of my letters on the subject of Re-Baptism, it seems in order for me to ask you for further space to defend my position, as three writers have written articles criticizing my views which you inserted in your periodical, the first one being by the Rev. Albert Bjorck, which appeared in the August, 1919, issue, and the other two by Mr. Harold F. Pitcairn and the Rev. Gilbert H. Smith in the September, 1919, issue.

     As to Mr. Bjorck's charge that I am attempting to convert the members of the General Church to my views regarding baptism, it will only be necessary for me to say that my reason for writing on the subject under consideration is that the position of those who do not believe in being baptized the second time was criticized by the Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE. This was done in an article in which the Editor held that if the Mennonites who became New Church people had been baptized into the New Church, they would have avoided certain difficulties. As I labored among these people, and as BOTE DER NEUEN KIRCHE, which I edit, circulates among them in northwest Canada, I deemed it expedient to set forth in that paper my belief, and also in NEW CHURCH LIFE. That I had no intention of converting members of the General Church to my views, ought to have been evident from my first letter, which was entitled "Why I do not believe in Re-Baptism."

     But the strange part of Mr. Bjorck's letter, according to my judgment, is where in one breath he concedes the position I have set forth, and in the next one denatures it. His own words are: "if a person baptized in infancy in the Old Church, is later led to accept the Doctrines revealed by the Lord to His New Church. . . he is thereby brought into association with the new heavens, and that in such case, baptism into the Church on earth would seem to be unnecessary."

Now this is just what I have claimed. But he qualifies his admission by saying that if he is unwilling to be baptized in the Lord's New Church, it indicates he lacks understanding that would enable him to remold his thinking and affections, is not a true member of the Church, and is under the influence of Old Church spirits to some extent.

     How any one can receive the doctrines of the New Church and "live according to them" without remoulding his thinking and affections, I am unable to see. And as far as "Old Church spirits" are concerned, they have no influence over a New Churchman that forms his faith by means of the heavenly doctrines of the New Jerusalem. If Mr. Bjorck means by "Old Church spirits" all the Christian people in this world and in the World of Spirits, then I am unwilling to separate myself from those I have reason to believe are sincere according to their lights. It would be too much like the heart and lungs trying to live unconnected with the rest of the body. "The Lord's Church is also internal and external. . . they (the 'great multitude') cohere as the body with the head." (Apocalypse Revealed 363.)

     As Mr. Smith's criticisms include the point raised by Mr. Pitcairn, in regard to the relation subsisting between the Jewish Church and the First Christian Church, and the latter to the New Church, I will consider this matter as I proceed in replying to the first named writer.

     I am glad to note that Mr. Smith understands my position, as indicated in the first paragraph of his letter. In the second paragraph, he raises the question as to the baptism of an infant in the "Old Church," and asks if it might not be best, in case the parents became New Church people, that the child should be "baptized again."

     I would reply that, as we are taught that a child is ensphered by the Christianity of its parents or sponsors, so when the latter enter a New Church Society by profession of faith, the child becomes ensphered by their kind of Christianity. There is, therefore, no need of being "baptized again."

There is need, however, of instruction in the doctrines of the New Church, in order to enter the Church through the Rite of Confirmation.

In the third paragraph, he grants my position in one sentence, but seems to nullify it in the next. He says: "None but a cast-iron mind would have the hardihood to declare that an adult might not have his spirit inserted among New Church societies in the other world without the external act of baptism." If this be true-and this is what I have contended is true-are not the cast-iron minds on earth, if they are unwilling to admit a person into their societies without the external sign? But although Mr. Smith concedes just what I have claimed, he immediately says that "none but an inconsistent mind would object to the distinctive re-baptism into the New Church for an adult, if it is admitted that by that act the spirit is introduced into a spiritual society similar to the one into which he seeks admission on earth." Who is inconsistent here, my Brother? If one can be introduced as to his spirit into a New Church society in the other world without the external act of baptism, why do you insist upon re-baptism, and thus make it appear as if the Sacrament administered by a minister of one of the Christian denominations has no validity, making it a Sacrament of a sect? For what is a "sect" but a body of Christian people, who claim to be the only Church, and which cuts herself off from fellowship with other Christians? Not one of my critics has shown that I have wrongfully understood the statement in the True Christian Religion, that the Sacraments, Baptism and the Holy Supper, are the only two universal gates to eternal life (721), and "that every Christian is intromitted and introduced to what the church teaches from the Word about the other life; all of which serves as means by which man may be prepared for and led to heaven." Re-baptism makes the Sacrament a denominational and sectarian gate, I hold.

I now come to the fourth paragraph in Mr. Smith's letter, where he raises the same point as Mr. Pitcairn did, namely, that I deny that the New Church is related to the Old Church as the First Christian Church was related to the Jewish Church; and, after quoting a number of passages from the Writings, which state that the Christian Church was consummated, and give the nature of the evils and falses that caused it, he says that I would render a real service to the Church if I were to explain what they truly mean.

In the brief space which I feel justified in asking for in making a summary reply, I will say, in the first place, that the Jewish Church was the representative of a Church, whereas the Christian Church established by the Lord when He came into the world, was a spiritual Church. He "abrogated representatives," as we are taught in T. C. R. 670, "which were all external things, and instituted a Church, of which all things were internal," namely, Baptism and the Holy Supper. Consequently, when the Lord effected His Second Coming by executing the Final Judgment, the formation of a N,, Heaven, the revelation of the internal sense of the Word and the heavenly doctrines of its Holy letter, He did not abolish the Sacraments, nor give us a new Word, but gave us a spiritual and rational unfoldment of the true meaning of the Old and New Testament, and of Baptism and the Holy Supper. Baptisms or Washings under the Jewish code were only external things, but in the First Christian Church they were also internal things; and, therefore, it seems to me that the New Church is not related to it as the First Christian Church was related to the Jewish Church. For the Churches of the First and Second Advent are both Christian dispensations and their Sacraments are the same, which could not be said of the First Christian Church in relation to the Jewish Church.

In the second place, I do not see that I would be justified in concluding that the condition of the people in the Christian denominations about us is the same as the "Old Church" was in the days when Swedenborg wrote. I should hate to think that 150 years of missionary work, during which the truths of the New Church have revolutionized Christian thinking and living, should have left Christendom in statu quo. Especially would it seem strange in the light of what the Writings themselves tell us in C. L. 532: "The angels rejoice exceedingly that it has pleased the Lord to reveal (the knowledge of correspondences), and they said that it is to the end that the Christian Church, which is founded upon the Word, and is now at an end, may again revive, and draw breath through heaven from the Lord."

Moreover, it should, be noted that Swedenborg again and again speaks of the condition of the Church as it is in his day. This is evident in the quotations from the Writings given by Mr. Smith, for they say "the present day," "in Christendom at this day." He evidently thinks a reader may conclude that the Christian world has made some progress in the last century and a half, and so he warns them against thinking such is the case. I prefer to think of the Coming of the Lord in its broader, higher, and deeper aspects, as indicated in T. C. R. 764, where we read that it is like the spring season, and also like the morning of a new day. It seems to me that when some readers of the Writings find the statement that the Lord left the Old Church and came to the New Church, it is as if a Methodist Church were on one side of the street and a "New Church Temple" on the other, and the transition was made by walking across the street. Are we not apt to forget that the "Old Church" is a state of life, and may be in the heart of him who is furnished with heavenly doctrines in his understanding? Is it not well to remember that the messages of the Lord to the seven Churches in Asia are addressed as much to nominal New Church people as to all who are in the light of the Word?

     Let me close my long letter by saying that I believe in the distinctive use of the "organized New Church," but I do not understand the Writings to teach that the Lord's New Church is constituted only of such as receive the doctrine made known by Swedenborg, For, according to my reading, the Lord organizes the New Church into the human, form, and in this human form there are higher and lower uses performed. This is the teaching I find in Apoc. Rev. 363, where the "Sealed" and the "Multitude" are described as representing the Lord's New Church, which is constituted as a body with all its members. Thus, I can feel and recognize our distinctiveness as a Church and at the same time appreciate the uses which other religious bodies in Christendom perform. I believe in "the universal New Church," as taught in Apoc. Rev. No. 66, for out of many churches the Lord makes one Church, which is before Him as one man.
     L. G. LANDENBERGER.
374 Windsor Place,
     St. Louis, Mo.

SWEDENBORG AND THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN 1920

SWEDENBORG AND THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY 1920

     Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:
     In the June issue of the LIFE, my friend, the Rev. E. E. Iungerich, favors you with some ideas on the subject of the authority of the Writings respecting a scientific fact which appear to call for comment. He says: "The question of interest to us is whether we are to take this (the idea that 6,000 years was about the limit of the existence of mankind since the first creation) as an absolute fact, or only as a typical expression, based upon the insufficient data current in his (Swedenborg's) time, and therefore to be replaced by a figure assigned by subsequent investigations. If we take the latter course, it is evident that we must modify in some way the usual concept of the authority of the Writings."*
     * The italics are mine.

     In the first place, I would ask on what does the Divine authority of the Writings rest? I reply: On the unassailable basis that they are a "Revelation of truths from the Lord's own Mouth" as stated in Coronis 18, and, therefore, a "Revelation" of the highest plane conceivable. Or, as the Rev. William Bruce put it, in the INTELLECTUAL REPOSITORY for 1887: "He (Swedenborg) saw truth, not as in a glass darkly, but face to face" (p. 247).

     Nothing, then, can shake this fact. If so, how are we, while firmly holding this position-to my mind the only logical one possible-to explain the statement made in the Arcana and elsewhere respecting the antiquity of man which does not seem to have the support of modern science of geologists and paleontologists in particular, who declare, as Professor Alfred Russel Wallace declares, that "all the inductions drawn from man's relations to the anthropoid apes point to an origin far back in Tertiary times," that is, tens of thousands of years earlier than was supposed to be the case in Swedenborg's time.*

The passages quoted and referred to by Mr. Iungerich will enable us to understand how the discrepancy arises:
     * See Wonderful Century, by Alfred Russel Wallace, LL. D., F. R. S., pp. 131-132.
     Dr. Draper assigns even a longer period during which man has existed on earth. He says: "It is difficult to assign a shorter date for the last glaciation of Europe than a quarter of a million of years, and human existence antedates that. But not only is it that this grand fact confronts us we have to admit also a primitive animalized state, and a slow, a gradual development. But this forlorn, this savage condition of humanity is in strong contrast to the paradisiacal happiness of he Garden of Eden, and, what is far more serious, it is inconsistent with the theory of the Fair!" Conflict between Religion and Science, pp. 199, 200.

     First, I would observe that Swedenborg expresses himself in two ways, which we must carefully bear in mind. In C. L. 75 and H. H. 415 and 417, he says nothing about 6,000 years, but expresses himself in a general way. As Mr. Iungerich says: "The Word 'thousands' is left unqualified." This is specially observable in H. H. 415 and 417. There we read in the Latin: "Et hoc aprimis temporibus, a quibus intercesserunt aliquot millia annorum" ("and this from the earliest times, since which some thousands of years have elapsed"). In C. L., Swedenborg uses similar language. The primary meaning of aliquot is "some," it stands for what is "undefined in number." In A. C. 944a, however, and also in E. U. 120, he specifically mentions 6,000 years. How are we to understand the latter statement in the light of the former? I reply as follows: The "immediate revelation" given to Swedenborg was on the rational, philosophic and scientific plane. He had, therefore, to use the "knowledges" common among the learned in his day in order to convey to them some idea of the spiritual truth which it was his special or unique function to disclose. If he had stated any scientific fact unknown to the learned at the time, how could he have appealed to their rational faculty?

     Let us take the following illustration: In his admirable defense of Swedenborg in his work, entitled the Divine Order of the Universe. . . with special Reference to Modern Astronomy, the Rev. Augustus Clissold says: "In the age in which Swedenborg lived, no other planet beyond Saturn had yet been discovered in the solar system, and all astronomers at that time regarded Saturn as the planet farthest from the Sun; for which reason, in accordance with the state of astronomy at that time, Swedenborg speaks of the planet Saturn as farthest from the Sun." (p. 77) The distinguished English astronomer, Mr. Richard Proctor, had made this fact the basis of his attack on Swedenborg's teaching respecting the habitability of the planets. Mr. Clissold shrewdly and forcibly replied to him: "The system of Swedenborg gave no place to Uranus or Neptune, simply because he knew nothing about these planets!" (ibid.)

     Now Swedenborg, in speaking of the antiquity of man, for the same reason could only use the knowledges then current among men. Had he, for instance, been informed in the spiritual world (as he might have been if the Lord had thought fit to convey the knowledge) that there were spirits of the planets referred to (Uranus and Neptune) in that world, and, therefore, that there must be such planets in our solar system, although so far undiscovered, what possible use would such a scientific fact-made known in this way-have been to men on this planet? His statement would have been derided, and his religious system covered with ridicule and contempt. For similar reasons, when speaking of the antiquity of man, he had to move within the boundaries of the knowledges men then possessed.

     The fact we must bear in mind is that the truths revealed through him are on the spiritual rational plane. As such, they are eternally true, and as Wilkinson puts it, "eternal truths-the same yesterday, to-day and for ever"-and hence cannot be open to any kind of error or doubt. The ideas or theories of men on the ultimate or scientific plane are of a totally different character. They can be altered, modified, or even rejected, without affecting in the smallest degree a spiritual revealed verity which has the Word of eternal truth as its foundation.

We cannot tell when modern theories-so-called-with regard to the constitution of the sun may be changed, but we know the time will come when science will take a very different view of creation from what it does at present-when, in fact, it will believe, as is the truth, that "the sun of the spiritual world is pure love and the sun of the natural world pure fire-that the former is alive and the latter dead, and its solar fire death itself." (D. L. W. 89.) When that time comes, all the fundamental theories of the day will be radically altered, because they will have no longer a merely sensual, but a spiritual and therefore true, basis. As an inevitable result of such progress, the spiritual and Divine Truths revealed through the instrumentality of Swedenborg will have an "ampler bed," as Wilkinson so cogently remarks, in the discoveries of science. But whatever the progress may be, the supreme authority of the Writings will remain unimpaired.
Yours sincerely,
GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY.
22, Oakley Avenue,
Ealing, W. 5.
6th August, 1919.
CHURCH AND THE CIVILIAN YOUNG MAN 1920

CHURCH AND THE CIVILIAN YOUNG MAN GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

In the ATLANTIC MONTHLY for September of this year, appears an article, entitled "The Church and the Civilian Young Man," by Bernard Iddings Bell, which is of peculiar interest to those who study the subject of evangelism. Mr. Bell was for some months a civilian aide to the Senior Chaplain at Great Lakes Naval Training Station. In that capacity, and in collaboration with other chaplains and pastors, representing, in all, eight of the leading denominations, he collected data, through card records of conversations with about twenty thousand recruits, from which he draws several interesting conclusions as to the attitude of young men toward the Christian Churches. These men represented every part of the country, every important denomination, and every station in society, the records forming a fair "cross-section" of American civilian young manhood.

They came from every trade and profession. Some were college men, others could scarcely write their names. Some were from big cities, others from small towns. Many were from farms.

     The writer concludes that "religion, as a real motive power, is unknown to at least eighty per cent. of American young men, that the Churches have never gained the interest of eight out of ten of the generation just coming to maturity, and that, as far as vital motivation goes, these fellows are not Christians at all, but merely more or less decent young pagans."

     In this article, the writer attempts to define the essence of Christianity. His definition, he says, was agreed to when propounded to a Catholic priest, and to clergymen of the Methodist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Baptist, Disciples, and Episcopal Churches. Two points in the definition are noteworthy. The first relates to a man's attitude toward life, and the other to the nature of the Lord. The first is, "that man grows great by sacrifice willingly undertaken, and small by selfish acquisitiveness. . . . To know and feel God is necessary to moral achievement." The second point is of especial interest because of its apparent approximation to the teaching of the New Church concerning the Lord. It is this: "Jesus Christ is God, the only God that can be real to most people. In the light of Him, and through Him alone, are the eternal Creator, called the Father, and the mystical God who speaks within human hearts, called the Holy Spirit, understandable and knowable. The Father, the Christ, and the Spirit, are One God, and the point of contact is the Christ, met in prayer and sacrament."

     On its face, this is a remarkable statement of the essence of the Christian faith concerning the Lord. How the various clergymen who agreed to it would understand it, or reconcile it with their traditional trinitarian ideas, is another matter. In all probability they would rob the statement of the truth which seems to be embodied in it.

     But the article in question is of further interest because of the tabulation of certain things which indicate the religious attitude of the average civilian young man toward the Churches and worship.

In the first place, it is said that most young men love the Holy Communion, and want it. They feel that this is the one act of worship which makes God tangible. A second opinion gathered from conversation with all types of young men is that they do not like choirs, canticles, elaborate anthems, or sweet solos. They like congregational activity, and dislike sentimentality and "the cult of the pretty-pretty.

     This, if true, at least in the case of most young men, is worthy of consideration, and must be reckoned with by those who are interested in the development of ritualism. For it means that if New Church worship is essentially of the kind to which high ritual is adaptable, a certain amount of effort must be expended in removing the prejudice of young men against it and initiating them into the love of it. The aversion to highly developed ritual on the part of young men, if it is a well established fact, is one that the missionary will have to take into account. Even in well ordered societies, the Pastor may find it necessary to give attention to the removal of this aversion.

     According to Mr. Bell, there are three other faults laid to the charge of the Christian Churches by the rising generation of young men,-criticisms, however, which they do not make gratuitously, but which may be elicited, as he did, through questioning and conversation. They are these: Sermons, for the most part, are either over the heads of the average man or else hazy and indefinite, or both. They impart little that is definite about God. Church societies do not offer unconditional friendliness to newcomers, but are either too exclusive or to effusive. There is too much respect of persons. And,-not the least of the things which keep the young man out of the Church,-he feels that Christians are not sincere in their belief, and have no genuine enthusiasm for it.

     It may be profitable for us to consider how far these criticisms represent the state of young men growing up in the New Church. Without patronizing or effusiveness, we should strive, by the very fact of its being so, to make the young people feel that the members of the New Church are more kind, more honorable, more charitable, more loving, and more self-sacrificing than other men and women.

If we cannot produce this impression, and back the impression with the reality, we cannot expect to interest young men in the New Church.

     In regard to enthusiasm, the writer says that if Christians have indeed discovered the greatest thing in life,-their faith,-low can they keep quiet about it? Why should they not speak about it and recommend it, in the same way one would do if he had discovered a good brand of cigars or seen a good show? "To professing Christians," he says, "their reticence may seem an evidence of reverence. To the man in the street, it signifies merely disbelief."

     May not a similar question be asked in regard to New Churchmen? Young men are undoubtedly affected by the display of a genuine zeal on the part of older men. If we believe in the Second Coming of the Lord, and in the Heavenly Doctrine, why, indeed, should we not give more free and unaffected utterance to this faith that we profess, that our confession of the Lord may be more complete?
     GILBERT H. SMITH.
BAPTISM AND INSTRUCTION 1920

BAPTISM AND INSTRUCTION L. C. KNUDSEN 1920

     Editor NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     Why the frequent interminable debates upon the subject, Re-Baptism, in your valued paper? There ought to be in the church perception enough of the simple truth to reduce this issue to the fundamental elements in conflict, and contrast them without confusion to the plain understanding of most minds interested in it, with the complicated amount of learned verbiage eliminated which but clouds instead of clarifies the simple truth.

     As I conceive of this issue, it seems entirely simple of understanding; but if my view be in error, either in part or whole, I am for either reason of approval or correction from my interest in the truth impelled to submit it, with your kind permission, for such notice as it may merit.

     It is my belief that when baptism as a symbolic act,-not at all understood prior to the New Revelation as now extant in the Doctrines of the New Church formulated by Em. Swedenborg under the direct inspiration of the Divine Truth itself,-is reduced to its practical, rational sense, it amounts to instruction; and being a religious act, the instruction it typifies must necessarily be so also.

     Now the subject of instruction between the factors to it, which are teacher and pupil, will determine without fail the question of truth in the issue, Re-Baptism, under analysis. To accomplish it, the issue can be resolved into an antithetical proposition, as, What is the quality of the subject of instruction, whence the object sought by it may conclusively be determined also, of the Old Church ministry, or its theology, and what that of the New? Axiomatically, it follows that each faculty must and can but instruct in the kind of Doctrine they possess and endorse. Also, that instruction is an introduction to something of idea or notion formerly unknown.

     Now the Old instructs in, or introduces to, what by the New is proven to be fundamentally negative, because impossible of rational conception; while the New instructs by self-evidence in what is logically conceivable as positively existent. Both kinds of instruction revolve in essence, or at center, about the finality of conclusion,-Heaven and Hell,-as their object. It must be granted that truth leads to the former and falsity to the latter end. Conclusively, no baptism with false instruction, or guiding in the wrong direction, can introduce to the right church, or life, terminating in Heaven; nor conversely, can a teacher who teaches the truth straight convey his pupil by that route to Hell if he follows its lead.

     Evidently, therefore, as baptism is representative of spiritual instruction; false spiritual instruction is false baptism, and true such is true baptism; and only the latter can be the effective kind, which is what I wished to demonstrate rationally.

     By applying the formula used to a further investigation of the controversy, the truth and error may still more be brought into sharp contrast, convincing beyond a doubt to the rationally trained mind.

On the part of the heretical exponents, the error arises from the tenacious inclination to the Doctrine of a divided Divinity, as initiated and propagated from the Council of Nice, which is the entire opposite of instruction in the truth, amounting to the destruction of the very fountain. This insane heresy, nevertheless, being the base and premise of the Old Theological lore as taught up to the present, it follows that its act of baptism into the truth is vain and void; therefore, dead, worthless, and, indeed, profane, as the entire system itself within is.

     It also follows that, since the destruction of the Apostolic Church, accomplished at that infamous council of international prelates mentioned, no one in the intervening period up till the New can truly lay claim to have been baptized with the baptism the Lord commanded believers in Him to be baptized with.

     Since, therefore, as has been proved, there can be but one valid kind of baptism, the term Re-Baptism in reality is a misnomer, and a blinding, confused issue.

     When the truth that human nature is entirely a product of instruction on the positive as well as on the negative element in life is put in conjunction with the symbol of it, which baptism is, it discovers readily the great difference in Old and New Church baptism. The instruction each introduces to is the qualifying element.

     The angelic idea of God is the idea pervading in the one, and the hydra-headed in the other entirely. And unless the latter is minutely eradicated, hereditarily imbedded as it is, at the first base of human thought of the common kind, no superior light can enter it without division and so the destruction of sanity.
     Respectfully,
          L. C. KNUDSEN,
Waterville, Kas.

MISSIONARY WORK IN SWEDEN 1920

MISSIONARY WORK IN SWEDEN GUSTAF BOECKSTROM 1920

     Koping, Sweden,
October 22, 1919.
Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     It was our intention to send an Address to the General Assembly, but intensive work, especially in the missionary field, drew my attention from it until it was too late. Yet our thoughts have been with you, and we hope and believe that this Tenth General Assembly brought great blessings with it.

     I have now begun missionary work in the province on a larger scale than heretofore. As a rule, I intend to be on a journey every other week between Sundays. Thus far this autumn, I have visited 6 places and delivered 13 lectures. The following view will give some idea of the work:

     Place.      Population. Lectures.      Average Attendance.
Vasteras          24,000               2                200
Orebro           33,800           2                293
Enkoping           5,500           2               80
Gothenberg           186,000           4                    168
Skavde           9,700           2                    154
Koping           5,000           1               160

     The above figures for Gothenburg do not indicate the real extent of the interest shown there, since the hall was altogether inadequate, and many persons were unable to gain admission to the first and last lectures delivered there. I had advertised only 3 lectures, but in view of the great interest shown I gave a fourth one, which I was obliged to deliver extempore, with the people close to me and to each other, every bit of space being occupied, and others standing outside the open door.

     At these lectures, I have sold books to the value of Kr. 440 ($118.80, a kroner = about 27 cents). At Stockholm this autumn, I have sold literature to the value of Kr. 92. This makes a total during two months of Kr. 532 ($14364), while for the whole of last year the sales were Kr. 670 ($180.90.)

     These figures show that there is an awakening interest here now, and it is to be observed that an admission fee of 50 ore (12-1/2 cents) has been charged at all of the lectures. In this way, the very great expense has been more than paid by the lectures themselves. A friend in the other society asked whether we had not a very large fund with which to undertake such a missionary work, and was quite astonished when he learned the facts.

     The day after a lecture, people sometimes call upon me at the hotel to discuss religion, and so I have arranged special hours of reception, and this enables me to become better acquainted with those who are interested. At Skavde, such a visitor presented himself as "the man who never sins, either consciously or unconsciously, and who never makes a mistake." This remarkable man asked me if I had spoken with Swedenborg. I hastened to tell him that we are no spiritists, but he said: "I mean Captain Swedenborg. He is the richest man in the city." That Mr. Swedenborg had really been at the lecture the previous day,-a noble looking man, who is said to be a descendant of the relatives of our revelator. And when I found him there again the following day, I talked a little more than I had intended about Emanuel Swedenborg personally, and took up a voluntary collection. However, I did not get very much.

     I must now give another lecture at Koping. Yesterday, I spoke at the theatre in a blue forest. Today I will speak in a place where moving pictures are also shown. Sincerely yours,
      GUSTAF BOECKSTROM.

Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     BRAZIL.-Miss Anna Hamm writes from Buenos Ayres, Sept. 9, 1919, that on April 23rd the steamer conveying her family and the Heinrichs family was docked at Rio de Janeiro. Their Visit was made delightful by the many hospitalities shown them by the families of the Rev. L. C. de La Fayette and the Rev. Henry Leonardos. She says: "On Sunday we went to the chapel, which is about five or six blocks from our boat. It is a small room, with two adjoining ones, used as cloak-room and library. The place has been rented for the purposes of worship, and is located on the third floor of three-storied building. On the entrance door there is a brass plate with "Nova Jerusalem" upon it. The chapel is very simply but daintily furnished, containing a repository, pulpit, reading-desk, organ, and about fifty chairs. Mrs. de La Fayette played the organ. The Rev. de La Fayette delivered a short sermon in Portuguese, translating it into English for our benefit. After the service, the young women of the society presented us with the beautiful flowers which had adorned the chancel."

     The Rev. de La Fayette, writing on October 7, gives hope of the speedy appearance of an edition of 1,000 copies of O Ce'o e o Inferno. He says: "The New Church in Brazil is now to be assailed by Babylon. I send you herewith the message of Cardinal Arcoverde, recommending that prayers be offered for the purpose of destroying spiritism and Protestantism, which have made much progress during the last twenty years. The New Church is included among Protestants because her doctrine proceeds n from the Word. The danger to the members of the New Church here (though chiefly to me as their head), is not in the prayers that are recommended, but in the poison and other instrumentalities that Babylon is accustomed to use. An example in point is the recent poisoning of a priest who tried for the last four years to reform the Catholic Church,-a young man who enjoyed excellent health. At the outset of his work, he met no opposition. But in course of time, many other priests followed him, and many people were joining his movement. One day he was found dead."

     The copy of the Cardinal's address sent by the Rev. de La Fayette is an invitation to use means obligatory to preserve the integrity of Catholic doctrine, chief of which is Divine help in answer to prayer. The prayers are to be directed to the Virgin, and several historic examples are given to show that she has given response to such prayers in former times, notably the overcoming of the Albigenses [which was by fanatical, blood thirsty, persecution], which he says caused "piety, faith, and concord to flourish, and the projects and devices of the heretics to fall to the ground." On the margin, the Rev. de La Fayette adds the significant comment: "That is, the Inquisition and its work." E. E. I.

     PITTSBURGH.-All activities here at the beginning of the season naturally pivoted about the great Assembly. We are congratulating ourselves that the interest was strong enough to send over fifty of our members to Bryn Athyn, as it certainly was the experience of a lifetime, and could not fail to have a marked influence upon the whole state of the church here.

The "Get-together" supper that followed the Assembly was fortunate enough to hear a speech from Mr. Raymond Pitcairn. The toastmaster, Mr. Herman Lechner, also read Mr. Pitcairn's "Address of Presentation," which reflects not a little the quality of affection that entered into the construction of the wonderful new cathedral church.

     It has been a "grand and glorious feeling" for the Pastor to see folks coming to church on time, the crowded room at doctrinal class, the enthusiastic plans of the Little Theatre Company and the Social Committee, 'n everything. Still, it may be well to wait until the inevitable first reaction is safely over before we attempt to gauge the permanent results. It will be interesting, in this connection, to scan the next reports of the various treasurers! However, it is a gorgeous feeling while it lasts, and, like all good remains, the delight of it can always be recalled in the hour of need, even though covered over at times.

     On Hallowe'en, a committee of the young folks gave a lively and well-managed dance for young and old.

     Our school has been going forward better than ever, with slightly increased attendance; but our old enemy-contagious disease-caused a temporary suspension, this in addition to the week dropped out on account of the absence of the teachers at the Assembly and Teachers' Institute.

     Since five of the older members of our High School class left us for Bryn Athyn, we find it convenient, with the seven remaining, to meet earlier and have supper together. The readings so far have been selected from the Spiritual Diary, to give detailed views of the other world.

     The Wednesday doctrinal class, which has been following the Gospel of Mark, turned aside for two meetings to discuss a recent book by J. Arthur Hill, on Spiritualism, written in a careful and quasi-scholarly style, and with a strong preface by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It is likely to be rather widely and attentively read, and merits our own attention, because it places Swedenborg in such a prominent place, giving a highly eulogistic and fairly accurate account of his life and character. But it claims that he really advocated open intercourse with the other world, and that his followers, in denying this, and laying all stress upon his theology, are simply trying to avoid heterodoxy. He quotes many interesting passages from Heaven and Hell, but lays all the stress upon the "scientific" and "evidential" nature of such incidents as Swedenborg's clairvoyance of the Stockholm fire, and the incident of the lost receipt. But the quotation from E. U. 135 is relied upon to show that Swedenborg did not regard his own experience as unique. The passage reads:

     "Hence it may be evident that man was so created that, while living in the world among men, he might at the same time also live in heaven among angels and the converse; thus that heaven and the world with a man might be together, and act as one; and that men might know what is in heaven, and angels what is in the world; and when men die, they might thus pass out of the Lord's kingdom on earth into the Lord's kingdom in heaven, not as into a different kingdom, but as into the same in which they also were when they lived in the body." Hill omits the rest of the quotation: "But because man has become so corporeal, he has closed heaven to himself." And, of course, he does not mention the most powerful teachings as to the peril of such intercourse at this day. (H. H. 249 Ath. Creed 75; and elsewhere.)

Still less does he refer to Swedenborg's abundant teachings against miracles, signs, and wonders, and his own consistent refusal to use his gifts in any such way.

     Our Philosophy Club has been so busy with elections, initiations, and the discussion of some of our traditions with the new members, that the regular study is not yet under way. Meanwhile, we are getting used to cider and grape juice. We only hope that we shall not lose what wine corresponds to!

     We have much enjoyed visits lately from the Rev. Theodore Pitcairn and the Rev. Richard Morse, but they were all too brief.     H. S.

     PHILADELPHIA, PA.-Long live the idea of General Assemblies! Even if it does mean a great deal of labor, and a great deal of expense, we must not give them up. At least that is the reflection engendered by the spirit of the Advent Society two months after the Assembly has passed into the realm of memory. The Assembly did us a lot of good. It encouraged us. It gave us the strong sphere of numbers, a thing that is lacking in a small Society, and a thing which, when it is gained at a time like the General Assembly, remains for a long time to come with those who received the impression. And that powerful sphere is being felt here, and manifests itself in the loyal and ready response the members are making to the demands the Church makes upon their time, their energy, and their pocket-books. There seems to be lots of life and enthusiasm in everything. We repeat: Long live the idea of General Assemblies!

     During the month, Mrs. Reuben Walker passed into the spiritual world, and although she had been an invalid, and confined to her house almost all of the time for the past three years, she contributed to the uses and was actively interested in them. She survived her husband more than ten years. Her death is of special concern to our Society because of the active part that Mr. Reuben Walker took in our affairs, being the Secretary of the Society for many years after the Schools were removed to Bryn Athyn.

     This year we are trying a new plan in regard to the church suppers instead of having them weekly, or suspending them altogether, we now have a monthly supper. The first one was held on October 15th, and was attended by twenty-five persons, which is very gratifying. In the doctrinal class following the supper we are considering the Genesis Series of the Glorification of the Lord's Human, assisted by charts and diagrams. The idea of the course is to enable the members of the congregation to obtain during the year a systematic idea of this great subject, which they can remember and keep as a background for all the more interior instruction of the Church. The singing practice after the class was well attended, and under the able hand of our Organist and Choir Master, Mr. F. J. Cooper, we are learning some new Psalms, and we hope to surprise visitors at the next Local Assembly.

     On Friday evening, October 17th, the Advent Club held its annual meeting. Mr. W. A. Cranch was elected President, Mr. George Heaton Secretary, Mr. Artol Soderberg, Treasurer, and Mr. W. H. Alden, Jr., fourth member of the Executive Committee. The balance of the evening was given over to a checker match, enjoyed very much by all. Another feature was that no political discussion closed the evening, owing to the fact that Harvey L. Lechner, Esq., and Mr. Will Cooper had to catch an early train for Germantown.

     Thursday, October 23rd.-The ladies held their first meeting of the season, and planned the year's work. They arranged a calendar of suppers for most of the year, so that all will know when their turn comes, and will make arrangements ahead of time. The ladies are planning the Christmas celebration and a Fair for February.

     On Friday, the 24th, we had a Parents' night at the Scout meeting. This affords us a very good opportunity to do missionary work with the parents of the Sunday School children who are not yet in the Church. We had twelve visitors, and gave an exhibition of the work we are doing for the boys, closing the evening With a motion picture entertainment and refreshments. All present expressed their desire to come again in the near future.

     On Hallowe'en we had a party for the younger Sunday School children, and found on this occasion what an asset our new building is. There was a large turnout of little folks, and one who does not enjoy himself in their happy company must indeed be an incurable grouch. The adults present joined with the children in ducking for apples, placing their faces in plates of flour to get the coveted penny with their teeth, and many other like undignified actions. But all went home happy.

     On the following evening, Mr. Lechner entertained the Boy Scouts at his house, and we are told that more than forty were present at the party, counting boys and adults. Judging from the depth of peanut shells, etc., on Mrs. Lechner's floors after the party, it was a great success.

     On Wednesday, Nov. 5th, we held the second monthly supper, and were delighted with an increase of one person in the attendance, bringing the total up to 26. The supper happened to fall on the birthday of the Minister's wife, and she was greatly surprised and delighted when the lights were suddenly darkened and a birthday cake, with candles arranged in the form of a "?," was brought in and set before her. At the same time, all arose and sang "Happy may she be."

     On the first Sunday in November, the Society had the pleasure of hearing its former Pastor, the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal. His visit and sermon were much appreciated. He also gave a talk to the Sunday School which fired some of the boys with the desire to be missionaries in Basutoland. We hope that Mr. Gyllenhaal will be able to stop here again before he returns home.
     K. R. A.

     REPORT OF REV. J. E. BOWERS.-(As health and strength are still granted me, there is in my mind the same desire, as in the course of many years there has been, to do the uses of New Church evangelization. This has been and is the end in view in all my endeavors. And not only while on trips on the circuit, but at all times there are things to be done which are contributory to the work.)

     On my recent itinerary, the first visit was with Mr. R. G. Brown and family, near Streetsville, Ontario, August 21 and 22.

     On Sunday 24th, services were held at the home of Mr. F. Doering and family, near Milverton. Sermon and the administration of the Holy Supper. Calls were made on old-time friends of the Church in London on the 29th.

     The next place was Mull, Kent Co. A mile from the village is the home of Mr. F. E. Woofenden and family. My first visit there was in April, 1885. On the Sunday during my stay of several days, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Woofenden and seven of their eight children then at home were baptized. My visits to the family have continued till the one on August 26 and 27 last.

Then two infants were baptized, the one a grandchild and the other a great-grandchild. This latter was the first one of the fourth generation in the family to be baptized into the New Church. My register shows that the number of baptisms in the family is forty-five. And I have never known of anyone of the family becoming a member of the Old Church.

     At Kalamazoo, Mich., Aug. 28, there was the usual cordial welcome to the home of Mr. and Mrs. W. H. Peck. He is a son of Judge W. W. Peck, visited occasionally for sixteen years, till he passed into the other life in March, 1910.

     Our members and friends at Bourbon, Ind., especially Mr. and Mrs. John D. Fogle, had desired and planned to go to the Assembly, but were not able to do so on account of the serious illness of father Tyrrell. This was a disappointment to them. I was with them Aug. 29, till Sept. 2.

     At Richmond, Ind., two days were devoted to a visit with Mr. Jas. A. Powell, the only believer in the Doctrines we know of in that city. He has for many years been an interested reader of the Writings and of New Church Life.

     Mr. Edward Dill, at Bainbridge, Ross Co., Ohio, and Judge L. G. Dill and family, Waverly, Pike Co., who were friends of many years, were called on.

     Short visits at the home of Mrs. A. M. Lewis, a member of the General Church at Athens, and at the home of Mr. N. E. Loomis and family at Zanesville.

     Thence my destination was Foster, W. Va., where Mr. Quincy Cresap and family were visited. The next day I was with Mr. Fred. Waelchli, at Clarington, O. He is, or soon will be, fourscore and six years of age. And although feeble as to the body, his mind is still active; and it is a real pleasure to converse with him on matters of New Church doctrine and principles. Calls were made in Wheeling, W. Va. And on Sunday, Sept. 14, services were held at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Geo. W. Yost and Mrs. O. C. Pollock, at Bellaire, O. After the sermon, the sacrament of the Lord's Supper was administered.

     Thence my course was north to Columbiana Co., O. Visited Mr. and Mrs. Elmer Harold, at Leetonia. They kindly went with me in their car to call on Miss Lydia Rhodes, at Greenford. They also conveyed me to the home of Mr. Lewis Wunderlin, near Columbiana. In that vicinity also Mr. J. Renkenberger and family, and Mr. and Mrs. D. Detrow, were visited. During these calls we had many talks concerning the Church and the Heavenly Doctrines as the only means for the salvation of the human race.

     At Youngstown, O., Sept. 21, we had services at the home of Mr. Solomon Renkenberger and family. Sermon and celebration of the Holy Communion.

     A pleasant visit of two days with Mr. J. Schoenberger and family, in Pittsburgh, Pa. Then, en route eastward, also two days at the home of Mrs. R. H. Adams and family in Altoona, Pa., during which we had talks on several doctrinal and spiritual subjects.

     Thence I went to Bryn Athyn, arriving on Sept. 26, at the hospitable home of Mr. A. J. Moir and family, who have for some years most kindly entertained me.

     After the ever-memorable occasions of the General Assembly and Dedication of the incomparable new cathedral, four days were given to visiting a sister and her two daughters at Trenton, N. J.

     At Williamsport, Pa., Oct. 15, I called on Mr. W. E. Creamer and his family. On the 17th, Mr. J. J. Kintner and his family were visited. In the evening their four-months'-old girl baby was baptized at their home in Lock Haven, Pa.

     At the home of Mr. J. R. Kendig and family, Renovo, Pa., Sunday the 19th, services were held.

The attendance was seven adults and five children. The sacrament of the Holy Supper was administered, all the adults except one taking part.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-Services were held at WINDSOR, ONT., on Sunday morning, October 26th, and at DETROIT in the evening of the same day. At each of these the attendance was eleven persons. The Holy Supper was administered at the morning services to seven communicants. On the Tuesday evening following a doctrinal class was held at Windsor. The circle has been strengthened by the accession of Mr. Rowland Trimble, formerly of the Arbutus, Md., Society, who now resides in Detroit.

     On invitation of Mr. and Mrs. W. H. Wiley, of COLUMBUS, OHIO, whom I met at the Assembly, I visited them October 30th. In the evening a class was held and a delightful time spent in conversation on various subjects of doctrine.

     A new place has been added to our circuit, CRYSTAL CITY, MO., where reside Mr. and Mrs. Harold Pitcairn. Two days, November 10th to 12th, Were spent there. On the first evening, services were held for a congregation of two persons. On the second evening we had doctrinal class. Four friends of Mr. and Mrs. Pitcairn, one of them a New Churchman, were present, and the instruction took on something of a missionary character. We hope to visit this locality regularly.
     F. E. WAELCHLI.

     BRYN ATHYN.-With the passing of the Assembly, there came the necessity for picking up the threads of regular society life, and of adjusting ourselves to the new circumstances arising out of the dedication of the Cathedral. Services have been held every Sunday in the church, and we are beginning to feel at home there. The problem of seating proved far more difficult than we had anticipated, due in part to the fact that the Bryn Athyn Society had grown larger than anyone realized, and in part to the need for a correction of the acoustics of the building. To our surprise, we found that the nave was inadequate to accommodate the congregation, and we were compelled to use the Balcony for regular seating. This, together with the difficulty of hearing, and the consequent desire of all to be placed near the front, created some confusion at first. But the acoustics have been materially improved, and all are becoming more accustomed to their altered surroundings. The beauty of the ritual, and the architectural grandeur of the building have produced a profound effect, and the sphere of worship is becoming more and more powerful with each successive service.

     The Chancel Guild has been reorganized, and is performing the various duties assigned to it with a faithfulness, a reverence, and a genuine interest that is deeply gratifying. The lighting of the candles and the preparation of the Chancel for services, has added in a marked degree to the order and the beauty of our worship.

     The Choir also, under the able leadership of Miss Creda Glenn, has been doing excellent work that is much appreciated, and it gives promise of further development. The vestments designed by Miss Constance Pendleton are graceful in line, and sufficiently ecclesiastical to produce a very pleasing effect, although somewhat of a departure from the conventional. They will be perfected as time goes on, and opportunity is given for studying them in actual use.

     Bishop Pendleton has been conducting Sunday evening services, which have been well attended and greatly enjoyed.

     An average of more than three hundred visitors have gone through the Church every Sunday afternoon since the dedication, and scarcely a day passes but that some strangers come to see it, attracted by architectural or religious interest, or perhaps by curiosity. In order to receive them courteously, to answer their questions, and to follow up any religious interest they may evince, the young people of the society have been organized in such a way that two or three are present at the church every afternoon, and eight or ten on Sundays. Books of the Writings and missionary literature are on sale in the Choir rooms, and arrangements have been made to keep in touch by correspondence with such as show any inclination to learn more of the teachings of the New Church.

     The work on the building is progressing without diminution. The stone floor in the North Transept has been laid, and that of the Chapel is designed and cut. Wood carving, metal work, glass work, every branch of the construction is being quietly continued, without disturbance to the regular uses of worship.

     The children's services are at present being held on Wednesdays in the College Chapel, and in connection with the school work, except for occasional services in celebration of special events. We are planning a Children's Service in the Cathedral for Christmas Eve, towards the perfection of which we are now bending all our energies.

     The Friday suppers and doctrinal classes have been resumed. The price of the suppers has been slightly increased, but the attendance has been good, and it seems altogether probable that they will prove successful. The doctrinal class, under the direction of the Assistant Pastor, has been devoted to the study of the Prophets.

     We enjoyed a visit from the Rev. Richard Morse, of Australia, who arrived in Bryn Athyn on October 4th, and took part in the Dedication Service. We had the pleasure of hearing him preach on October 19. He began his homeward journey on October 30th, intending to visit Pittsburgh, Glenview, and Denver en route.

     The Rev. and Mrs. F. E. Gyllenhaal are again with us after a short visit to Glenview, and we hope to see a little more of them before they leave for England. They have brought the friends in Durban much nearer to us, and have given us a more living realization of the interesting development of the Church in that far distant land.

     The Rev. Theodore Pitcairn will soon start on his return journey to Basutoland, to continue the work which he has begun among the Natives.

     Several new students have joined the Theological School this year. Mr. Raymond G. Cranch and Mr. Svensson are taking the full course, while Mr. Loyal Odhner is attending some of the classes.

     Mr. Frank Hodson Rose, of London, accompanied by Mrs. Rose and the Misses Olive and Vera Rose, arrived in Bryn Athyn recently, and are residing with Mr. and Mrs. Donald F. Rose. Mr. F. R. Rose has come to attend the Theological School.

     Another recent arrival is Mr. George Mokoena, a native of Basutoland, who will study for the ministry and do translating for the benefit of his people.

     On December 9th, the Rev. Reginald W. Brown, on leave of absence as Librarian and Professor in the Academy, left for Vancouver, B. C., whence he will sail for South Africa by way of Australia, visiting the societies of the General Church in those places. G. DE C.

     GLENVIEW, ILL.-The annual meeting of the Immanuel Church was held on Friday evening, Oct. 17th, when the reports read were of a satisfactory character.

Several changes were made in the personnel of the Board of Finance; more young men being elected to serve on the Board. Mr. Harold McQueen has become Treasurer in place of Mr. H. S. Maynard, Sr., who resigned after two years of faithful service. Mr. Felix Junge is the new Secretary of the Board.

     We greatly enjoyed the visit of the Rev. Richard Morse, of Sydney, N. S. W., who preached on Sunday, Nov. 2nd, and on the evening of the same day gave very interesting account of the state of the church in Australia. Later in the month we had with us the Rev. and Mrs. Frederick Gyllenhaal, and their little child. During his stay, Mr. Gyllenhaal preached two very powerful and practical sermons, which were greatly appreciated. At two consecutive Friday Suppers he gave very full accounts of the work of the church in Africa, both among the white population and the natives. At the end of the second lecture, our Pastor expressed the pleasure felt by the society in having Mr. Gyllenhaal with us again, and another speaker referred to the great and unforeseen developments which had taken place since the farewell meeting held in our school- room years ago. At that time a good deal was said about missionary work, but nobody had any idea of the great missionary field which was being prepared by the Divine Providence; much less that it would he one of our Glenview members who would become the first minister to enter that great field. We wish him much success in his future work, and have every confidence that whatever use he is called to perform he will do it faithfully and well.

     Service was held in our church on Thanksgiving Day, when our Pastor preached a sermon on the text, "Praise ye the Lord. O give thanks unto the Lord for He is good; for His mercy is for ever." On Sunday, Nov. 30th, he concluded a series of sermons from the Book of Exodus which have been of unusual interest. The familiar stories concerning the Children of Israel under the leadership of Moses were shown to be the containants of spiritual teaching which is of very practical application to the New Church.

     The usual Thanksgiving Dance took place on the eve of Thanksgiving Day, Mr. and Mrs. Paul Carpenter being host and hostess. On the Monday following, a Library Talk was given by the writer to a number of our young people on "The Tonic Sol Fa Notation of Music." To most of them this system was entirely new, but they entered heartily into the exercises that were used to demonstrate the ease with which part singing may be acquired without the aid of any instrument other than the tuning-fork. G. A. MCQUEEN.

SPECIAL NOTICE 1920

Announcements.

Owing to the holding of the General Assembly in October, 1919, it has been decided to omit for 1920 the February Mid-Year Meetings of the Consistory, Council of the Clergy, Executive Committee, and Joint Council of the General Church of the New Jerusalem; also the Philadelphia District Assembly.
MAILING DATE 1920

MAILING DATE 1920

Beginning with the present number New Church Life will be mailed to subscribers on the 20th of the month preceding date of publication.

NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL 1920

NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL W. F. PENDLETON 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL      FEBRUARY, 1920          No. 2
     X.

     SACRAMENTS AND RITES.

     MARRIAGE.

     We have shown that betrothal is not marriage, but a promise of marriage. It is a state of preparation for marriage, and an introduction to it. In betrothal, marriage is the one end distinctly in view, but as a rite, betrothal is representative of a state that is internal, not as yet external, thus not yet complete and full, not yet established and permanent. But marriage, as a religious ceremony, is representative of that which is to endure forever. When the state of betrothal becomes the state of marriage, it remains, and new states follow, but there is no return to a former state. While the rite of betrothal is a solemn religious act in a state of worship, it is not as full and complete as the marriage rite, for which it prepares. It is not a doing, but a promise to do. This distinction should be made plain, so that, when clearly seen, it may govern in each service, and in all that is done in them.

     A Rite of the Church.

     It is incumbent upon us to look upon the ceremony of inauguration into the married state as primarily and essentially a religious act, or as a rite of the church. This is sufficiently shown in the fact that marriage is of Divine institution, established by the Lord God our Savior Himself in Genesis (1:28, 2:18, 24), and established anew by Him in Matthew (19:5, 6); and the same, as we are now taught, is not only for time, but for eternity.

It is from this Divine origin and institution of marriage, begun in the Most Ancient Church itself, that in all nations and in all religions the ceremony of marriage has been treated as primarily a holy and religious rite, as we know from the records of history, both sacred and profane. And because of the Lord's teaching in the Gospels concerning the sanctity of marriage, the Christian Church from its beginning has treated the marriage ceremony as a rite of the church, even going so far as to regard it as a sacrament. Nor did it become a civil rite until the corruption and consummation of the church made necessary the separation of the church and state, for the sake of preserving religious liberty.

     That in the New Church, marriage is to be regarded as mainly and essentially a religious ceremony, there can be no manner of doubt; since, besides the teaching we have referred to, it is distinctly said that the, nuptials are "to be consecrated by a priest." (C. L. 306:) It has become a civil ceremony, and largely separated from religion, because of the corruption and consummation mentioned above, and the consequent ever-increasing unbelief in the life after death. If marriage be only for this life, ending with the grave, it may be considered as proper to regard it as merely a civil rite; but if it be for eternity, it must be treated as primarily and essentially a solemn religious act, to be performed in a sphere of worship; and in it, as an act of religion, there is especially to be considered the use of the laying on of hands by the priests in benediction, and the greater strength and stimulus that may be added to the sphere of worship by the administration of the Holy Supper.

     The Marriage Ceremony Public.

     As we have shown, betrothal is the marriage of the spirit; and, as a religious ceremony, it is representative of that which it is in itself,-marriage in heaven,-and which is to take place before marriage in the world, in order that by marriage in the world it may return again to its heavenly origin, to remain permanently there; this return to its permanent state being made in the gradual processes of the regeneration of the two together.

Marriage for the world is first in order of time, to the end that by it preparation may be made for that marriage which is to be eternal in the heavens. It is for these reasons that the betrothal ceremony is to be treated as private, and of great simplicity as to externals. But the marriage ceremony is and ought to be considered as public, and before the world. It is, indeed, a public ceremony, and has always been treated as such in all the religions of the world.

In the past ages of the Christian Church, special care has been taken to make it a public ceremony. This is seen in what is known as the publication of the banns. The word means a public proclamation. It is a public notice of a proposed marriage, "in order that any person may object, if he knows of just cause why the marriage should not take place." Even where there are no banns, the same end is met by the obtaining of a license, which was formerly granted by the church, but now by the state. It is met also by invitations to the wedding. There should be public notice in some form, since marriage for the world is first in order of time, a particular reason being that it provides against clandestine or secret marriages. Even betrothals, while they are private, are not secret, and they are also announced afterwards. It is a matter of historical record that the purpose in publishing the banns, or making public a proposed marriage, was in order to prevent clandestine marriages, and that the early church fathers had this distinctly in view. (Wheatly, 375.) Because of the danger and abuse of clandestine marriages, we are informed that they were frowned upon by the church, and afterward forbidden in England by an act of Parliament. It is plain that a clandestine marriage cannot be justified, except under circumstances most unusual and extraordinary.

We are told that "the publicity of the marriage contract was always regarded as an essential part of it. Different means were taken in different countries for ensuring publicity, but that it should exist was recognized by every civilized state, as the foundation of its social system.

Among the Jews and Romans a certain number of witnesses were required; Tertullian declared that the church demands publicity; and the presence of witnesses is pronounced by a law of Theodosius to be one of the few things that could not be dispensed with in a marriage ceremony." (Smith, Christian Antiquities.)

     Since marriage is to be treated as a public and at the same time a religious act, it is better that it should take place in church than elsewhere; for a church building is a place for public worship. In a building dedicated, set apart, and used for Divine worship, there is a stronger religious sphere, and a more immediate and manifest presence of the Lord, than in any other place. Since God doth join together those who are truly married, there cannot be a more suitable place than the Lord's house for the two who contemplate marriage to enter into the conjugial covenant. Determining reasons may at times appear for a marriage to be consummated in some other place, but there is the possibility that the civil or social sphere may then take precedence, and that which is first be made last. However, there should be no attempt to make any rule of this kind absolute in practice, and where unusual conditions seem to require it, let no wedded couple think they have not been properly married if it does not take place in a house of worship; for, after all, it is their life together in the years that follow the marriage ceremony that truly unites them in spirit. For the marriage ceremony is not marriage itself, but is the orderly introduction to it, and as such is never to be omitted.

     Ritual of the Ceremony.

     As consent is the essential of marriage (C. L. 21), it is important that the signs of the mutual consent of the parties to a marriage covenant receive full expression in the ritual of marriage, such as approaching and standing together, the bride holding the arm of the bridegroom, the affirmative answers to the questions, the giving and receiving of the ring, the joining of the light hands, the removal of the veil, the pronouncement that they are now husband and wife, receiving the blessing, taking the communion together, and all with no mental reservation, no compulsion of any kind, external or internal, the whole heart of each in every act of the service, from its beginning to its end.

What should be the relative position of the man and the woman on entering and during the ceremony of marriage? In the Greek and Roman Churches, and in all Protestant denominations where attention is given to ritual, "the man is on the right hand of the woman, and the woman on the left hand of the man," and the reason given is that "the right hand is the most honorable place. . . . assigned to the man as being the head of the wife." (Wheatly, 401.*) The Jews, however, "place the woman on the right hand of her husband, in allusion to that expression in the Forty-fifth Psalm, 'At thy right hand did stand the queen in a gesture of gold.'" (Ibid.) In the Academy Liturgy, both ideas were introduced. The parties enter, "the woman at the right hand of the man," and when they are pronounced husband and wife, they change places, "the wife at the left hand of her husband," continuing in this position until the close of the service. This was something new in ritual, and the custom is continued in our present Liturgy. The change of position represents the change of state that takes place by marriage; "for the states of life with men and women are of one kind before marriage and of another after marriage." (C. L. 190.) Such a change of position in the marriage ceremony, while new on earth, is not new in heaven; for we read, in the account of a marriage in heaven, that "the bridegroom was on the left hand, and the bride on his right," but "after the nuptials the representation was changed," in order that the above-mentioned change of state might be signified. (C. L. 20, 21.) It is from this source that the makers of the Academy Liturgy thought proper to represent such a change in the ritual of the marriage service. That it has not been represented before, is because the fact of the change of state mentioned has been unknown or but dimly seen. When the pair enter the church, and approach the altar, it is as bride and bridegroom. They are still in the betrothal state.

But when they depart, it is as husband and wife. The representation of such a change thus adds to the marriage rite a new and interesting feature from heaven.
     * The reason gives in the middle ages was, as was then believed, that "the rib out of which the woman was formed was taken out of the left side of Adam." (Ibid.)

     The Wedding Ring.

     In betrothals and marriages, the ring or its equivalent has been in use from ancient times. The servant of Abraham makes a present of rings and bracelets of gold to Rebekah, as a token of espousal to Isaac. (Gen. 24:22.) The mention of it in the Scripture of the Old Testament is evidence of its use in the Ancient Church itself, and it is known that it was a custom, not only with the Jews, but also with the Greeks, the Romans, and the nations of northern Europe. We read also of a marriage in a heavenly society, where the bridegroom placed a golden ring on the finger of the bride. (C. L. 20.)

     The ring, therefore, was looked upon as the token of a mutual binding, until the parting that comes by death; and as being round, it was regarded in some nations as an emblem of eternity, or that conjugial love is to have no end. Thus it was a pledge of eternal love. According to the Writings, a ring signifies the same as a circle or a girdle. It is the marriage of good and truth, or the heavenly marriage (A. C. 9475), Which is eternal, and which is meant by "what God joins together." This is the marriage that man cannot put asunder. And we read that "all love returns as by a circle to that from which it comes." (D. Love X.) Hence the rubric in our marriage service, which not only calls for a ring, but also for the passing of the ring as by a circle from the man to the woman, from the woman to the minister, and back again to the man, to be placed by him upon the fourth finger of her left hand,-a ritual full of force and meaning. Along with this, there is another reason why the woman passes the ring to the minister, which is, that it may as it were be blessed before she receives it upon her finger; for the minister, on taking it, lays it for a moment upon the book, and then returns it to the man. It is also like the offering of the tithing unto God, as an acknowledgment that all we have is His, and then the return by Him, enriched with His blessing.

We read also of the circle of life, (A. C. 10057; D. P. 29; A. E. 242), and that a girdle of gold signifies "a common bond, by which all things are held in their order and connection." (A. R. 46, 671.)

The custom of placing the ring on the fourth finger of the left hand has come down to us, and is still observed. Like other things that are with us from antiquity, the choice of this in preference to the other fingers of the two hands must have had something of spiritual significance in it. A natural reason was sought for it shortly after the middle ages, and the conclusion was reached that "from thence proceeds a particular vein to the heart...and, therefore, they thought this finger the properest to bear this pledge of love." (Wheatly, 418) But that the fourth finger is in this manner distinguished from the other fingers is not borne out by modern anatomical research, and so we must seek other reasons for this ancient and universal custom. It has been said that it is because the fourth finger is "the least active finger of the hand, least used, upon which therefore the ring may be always in view, and yet least subject to be worn out." (Wheatly.) This, while doubtless true, is not a sufficient reason for a ritual of the Ancient Church, when spiritual origins were operative in all things of worship, and when the marriage ceremony was regarded as an essential rite of the church.

We now know that the cause of this ritual is to be found in the correspondence of the two hands, right and left, and of the fingers of each. When we go to the Writings, we find that by the hand is signified power, because the power of the body is exercised by the hands, and it is also plainly indicated, (H. H. 400 and A. R. 329), that by a finger is signified least power. And we read, (A. C. 1085) that by a finger is signified least power, by a hand greater power, by an arm greatest power, and by the shoulder all power. It would follow that the least power of all is signified by the fourth finger of the left hand, as being that finger which is least brought into exercise; for that which is the least active exercises the least power. The right hand also signifies to be in the first place, and the left hand in the second place. (A. C. 6267.) The right hand corresponds to love to the Lord, and the left hand to love to the neighbor (A. C. 9511); hence the right hand is the active, and the left hand the passive or receptive.

As it is with the right hand, so it is with the husband; and as it is with the left hand, so it is with the wife; standing to each other in the reciprocal relation of the active and the reactive or co-operative. And because, in ancient times, giving the ring signified to convey to another the power which he himself has, (A. C. 5317, 5318), the rubric required, as late as two or three centuries ago, that the bridegroom, after saying, "With this ring I wed thee.," should add the words, "With my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow," thereby signifying that all he had was hers. Also, since all power is in ultimates, and the ultimates of the body are in the hands and feet, (A. C. 9836, C. L. 396), and in ultimates is reactive power, therefore by them is signified least power, since least power is in reaction, which would be especially represented in the fingers of the left hand, as indicated.

     It may be thought that we have occupied much space with what is apparently a trivial matter, but we are sure to be justified when it is I realized that we are face to face with the necessity of deciding whether the placing of the ring upon the fourth finger of the left hand of the bride should be retained in our ritual of marriage, and that it ought to be excluded if it is a form without spiritual meaning or significance. And so we have been led to seek out the reason for a particular of ritual that has existed in all ages of the world. We need also to be reminded from time to time that for the most part the rituals of the Christian Church did not originate in that Church, but came down from a period before the Lord was born, and even before Abram was called from Chaldea to go into the land of Canaan.

     The Pronouncement.

     In the giving and receiving of the ring, the marriage contract is complete. But before the minister pronounces them husband and wife, the bridegroom may seal the contract with a kiss, following the reception of the ring by the bride, even as the bridegroom in the heavenly society did, after the bride had accepted the ring and other pledges. (C. L. 20.)

We use the word may, because it should be left as a matter of free choice to the parties concerned, which principle applies also to some other things in the marriage service, the minister merely seeing that essentials are not omitted.

     After the giving and reception of the ring, the minister directs the couple to join their right hands, which, as a representative cite, is most appropriate and beautiful. By common consent, and as it were by a common instinct or a perception of fitness, or of correspondence, it has been a custom in all nations, and in all ages, to join the right hands in covenants, as a token of friendship and love. So it is eminently appropriate in the covenant of marriage. And the signal of the sealing of the covenant takes place when the minister, as the representative of the Lord; places his hand on theirs and pronounces them husband and wife; for they have now fulfilled the requirements', both of the civil and the spiritual law,-the law of the state and of the church,-and it is as the representatives of both, or of the Lord in both, that the minister bestows a blessing. But the minister first pronounces them husband and wife, and declares in the words of the Lord Himself, "What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder," which words indicate clearly, in the very letter of Scripture, that the marriage bond is not for this life alone, but is eternal; and that if they do their part in being faithful to God and to each other, neither the authority nor power of the world, nor of hell itself, can separate them. The husband and wife now change places, to represent their new state and their new relation to each other; and all kneeling, the Minister delivers one or more suitable prayers, closing with the Lord's Prayer.

     The Blessing.

     We have already presented reasons in this article why the marriage ceremony should be treated as a solemn religious act, in which the idea of the Lord, the life after death, and preparation for that life by obedience to the laws of order, play a leading part; and we have mentioned that a chief reason why the religious element should be dominant on this occasion is the use of priestly benediction in the laying on of hands.*

We read that "to be blessed is to be introduced into communion with the angels of heaven, so that one is afterward as to his spirit in heaven (A. R. 8, A. E. 12); but more interiorly it is to be ushered into the presence of the Lord, preparatory to conjunction with Him (A. C. 981). This assumes that the two persist in the acknowledgment they have confessed, that is, continue to bless God for the blessing they have received. (A. R. 289, A. E. 340.) It then becomes the beginning of a life of good. (A. C. 3260.) It is the beginning of being endowed with heaven and eternal life. (A. C. 5981.) It is also the beginning and introduction to a life of order. (A. C. 8894.) On the other hand, to curse or be cursed is to turn away from heaven, and all that is in heaven, to the life of self and the world. (A. C. 245, 379, 927, 1093.) It is the adoption of false principles of thought and action that causes this turning away. (A. C. 378.) But to bless and be blessed is to turn, by means of the truth of faith, from the world and its life to heaven and the Lord. To be blessed in marriage is to depart from the roaming love of the sex to loving one of the sex, and the continued devotion to that love. The real curse, or turning away, consists in ceasing to acknowledge that which was once confessed and believed. (A. C. 1423.) The curse, or turning away, is at the same time a separation and disjunction, separation from heaven, and disjunction with the Lord (A. C. 3530, 9021), and thus introduction to all unhappiness and misery. (A. C. 4502.) Finally, to bless is to invite good spirits and angels to be present, and by their presence to bless with every good; but to curse anyone is to call on evil spirits to be present, and incite them to destroy. (S. D. 1778, 2354, A. E. 140.)
* See article on "Confirmation" in the Life for September, 1919, page 577.

The Doctrines teach us in many ways, and in a number of passages, of the great importance and use of the angelic presence with man. At the beginning of the three great periods of his life, he is introduced among the celestial angels,-at his birth, at his marriage, and at his death.

In the journey that follows he will probably depart from that heavenly association, but it is provided by the Lord that he may return, and remain in it permanently. The means for the return are Divinely provided, but the return itself depends upon the voluntary exercises of a man's life according to the truths of the Word.

There are some further considerations on the subject of the marriage ceremony which we hope to present in another article.

(To be continued.)
CARL THEOPHILUS ODHNER 1920

CARL THEOPHILUS ODHNER 1920

     AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

     DEDICATED TO MY DESCENDANTS.

     Being urged by my dear wife, and by an undeniable interest in my own personality, (an interest which is not shared by many); being also of an historical turn of mind, and having often felt how much I would have appreciated an autobiography by some one of my ancestors, I will now start upon a history of my own life as a bequest to you, my sons and grandchildren (if ever I have any),-the only bequest, in all likelihood, that I shall be able to leave you. In some respects, I really think that my life thus far has been an eventful one, and, to myself at least, a very pleasant one,-the most pleasant, in fact, that I have ever lived. Much there has been in it that I regret, but still more for which I feel profoundly grateful to the merciful Providence of the Lord; chief among the many blessings which have fallen to my lot being the Heavenly Doctrines of the New Church; next to this my office in the Priesthood, my wife, and you, my children. If the perusal of these memoirs shall in any way serve to increase your love for the New Church, and thus preserve our family within the walls of the New Jerusalem, my purpose in writing these pages will have been fulfilled.

     I. MY INFANCY: 1863-1871.

     1863.-Our Heavenly Father was pleased to send me into this world on Ascension Day, May 14th, 1863, just three months after the death of my earthly father, who, feeling indisposed one day as he was walking to his office, had stepped into a drug store on Regeringsgatan in Stockholm, presumably to get some medicine, but scarcely had reached the middle of the stare before he fell on his knees and died instantly from the breaking of a blood vessel in his head. Imagine the shock to my mother when his inanimate body was brought home by an ambulance.

It is surprising to me that both she and I survived. Kind neighbors and relatives at once came to assist us, and to relieve the wants of the stricken family. My father being a government official, a small pension was given my mother by the country, and another by the Freemasons, of which order my father had been a member. Soon after this, a big fire broke out near our home, and, as an effect of pre-natal impressions, I, and all of my children, have a slight fire-mark, or flame, in the middle of the forehead. Such were the sad circumstances surrounding my birth. I have been told, however, that L very soon showed a disposition to make a noise in the world, as also an inclination towards late hours and the bottle. Otherwise, I have been informed, I was a very nice and quiet child-when asleep.

     1864.-During this second year of my life, I took part in a political, revolutionary uprising, which nearly cost me my life. One day, while taking an airing in the arms of my nurse, a riotous mob came up the street, driving before them a cowed squad of policemen, whom they pelted with cobblestones. To protect me from these missiles, my nurse mixed with the crowd, which now attacked the police headquarters, smashing the windows, etc., but was soon afterwards dispersed by the fire department turning the hose on them. This, and other riots, resulted in a change in the Constitution of Sweden, and in greater religious freedom, owing largely, no doubt, to the active and vociferous part I myself took in the proceedings.

     1865.-This year is virtually a blank page in the book of my life.

     1866.-A violent shock at this time awakened the consciousness of my own existence, and marks the opening of my memory. My mother and I were spending the summer in the country.

I remember sitting on a sewing machine, and looking out of the window. Spying a large, strange dog in the yard, and unheeding mother's warnings, I slipped out into the garden and began to play with it, but the brute immediately knocked me down and fell upon me. Arising in a dazed condition, I made my way to the house, but soon lost consciousness, to awaken later on in a bed, while friends bathed my bleeding head and mother fed me with strawberries. The dog was shot, and mother got damages from the owner, but I was laid up in a hospital for four months, and will have to carry the scar throughout life. While at the hospital, I caught the scarlet fever, which nearly finished me. But "Unkrant vergeht nicht," I still remember the hospital, and the subsequent moving into the city in an open carriage. I was then three years old.

     1867.-Many confused memories, not worth relating. I was a week, puny child, was called "pale-face" by the other children, and had to drink goat's milk to gain strength.

     1868.-This year I had some peculiar mental experiences. Once I saw a "ghost" in a dark room, and at Christmas I saw a devil gliding across the wall. At least, I thought I saw these things, and they made very real and terrible impressions upon me. About this time I received some other painful impressions, especially from an A B C book and an old maid aunt, "Malla," who taught me to read. I also remember my great grief in parting from my three brothers, who went abroad this year. Two of them I saw for the last time.

     1869.-When six years old, I began common school in Stockholm, and remember my painful struggles with addition and subtraction. I am sure I was rather dull in school, but of a very philosophical and literary turn of mind at home. At this time I wrote my first essay, a description of Lapland, which was much admired.

     1870.-When seven years old, I left the common school and was entered in "Almqvist's" aristocratic private school, where I made my first conscious acquaintance with humbug, todyism, and injustice; laying the foundations of a very radical and rebellious spirit within my little breast.

I remember reading about the Franco-Prussian war at this time, and acquiring a very deadly hatred of Bismarck and the German nation.

     1871.-It was in this year that I bade a last farewell to my dear mother. She was to go to brother Willgot in Russia, and I had been invited to spend the summer at Noor with my aristocratic cousins, the Skoldebrands. What fun I had that summer,-bathing, fishing, sailing, driving, and living on the fat of the land! I have never seen a country-seat as beautiful as Noor. The other children and I had a private tutor, and I "beat them all hollow" in the studies, to the great dissatisfaction of the baronial parents. Returning to Stockholm in the fall, I was placed in a boarding school with a very religious old maid, Miss Kjellberg, where I was daily regaled with long prayers and bad soup. The whole sphere of the institution was intensely "faith-alone," but the Word was read regularly, and a certain unsatisfied affection for spiritual things began to bud within me.

     II. MY CHILDHOOD: 1872-1877.

     1872.-Sister Anna had some friends, the Johnson girls, daughters of an old country parson, at Taby, near Stockholm. I was put there in the summer, to stay until my mother had come home from Russia. A royal good time I had of it, but soon began to long very much for "mamma," whom I now expected every day. In honor of her advent, I had built a hut of moss and stone, and here I laid out a feast for her on the day she was to come. But instead of mother, sister Anna came, dressed in black, and with a tearful face. I did not understand the situation, but demanded that mamma should come forth from where she had hidden herself. Finally, the truth dawned on me, and I was heart-broken indeed. But, bitter as the blow was to me, it was also of great use, for it led my thoughts powerfully to the subject of the other world, and inclined me still more towards spiritual things.

     Soon afterwards, sister Anna teak me with her to Vra, a baronial countryseat, of which her prospective father-in-laws the steward. While we were there, brother Hjalmar returned from abroad. In the fall, I returned from Stockholm, and entered a school preparatory to the "Elementary School."

     1873.-The next summer I spent at Vra again, where I had a very fine time. In the fall, Miss Kjellberg moved to Sturegarten, and I entered the "Ladughrdstands Elementary School," making my first acquaintance with geometry and with the German language.

     1874.-In the summer I lived with sister Hildegard at a country place called Hammiarby, near Stockholm, and there I had my first "serious" love-affair. I entered the second class of the Elementary School in the fall, and spent much time with the Croneborgs, an aristocratic and wealthy family in which Sister Anna was governess. Fell desperately in love with young Betty Croneborg, and remained true to this "flame" for many years. Dabbled a great deal in chemical experiments and the making of fireworks.

     1875.-Spent the summer at uncle Sanfrid's in Herrljunga, also in the town of Falkaping, and in a country place near Scara. Developed a great love for Botany. In the fall I moved to Gothenburg, to live with sister Anna, (who had married), and there I entered into the Elementary School-the same as that in which Dr. Beyer and Dr. Rosen had been teachers.* Here I developed talents for History and Composition.
     * Victims of the first New Church persecution, 1769-1773.

     1876.-The summer was spent in Stockholm with brother Hjalmar. Smoked my first cigar, and became very sick, but persevered bravely. When returning to Gothenburg, I asked Hjalmar for a copy of Matter's Life of Emanuel Swedenborg, read it with the utmost interest, and embraced what I understood of Swedenborg's teachings, in spite of Matter's unfavorable comments. This was my first New Church book, and it made a profound impression upon me, young as I was (thirteen years). My whole mind underwent a change, and my life was turned into the channel which had been provided for it.

     1877.-The summer of this year was spent with sister Hildegard, in a fishing village on an island near Gothenburg, where I had no end of fun, fishing and botanizing. I had been rather lazy during the winter, devoting much time to History, Geography and Botany, but neglecting Mathematics and Latin, in consequence of which I had to remain a second year in the fourth class.

     III. MY YOUTH: 1878-1883.

     1878.-An important year of my life. In the spring, after school had ended, and I had been promoted to the fifth class, sister Anna, her little baby girl, Sigrid, and I, joined brother Arvid at Norrkoping, and went to sea with him. We first visited the interesting but dirty city of Libau, Russia; then Malmo, Sweden; then Hull and Grimsby, England; then back to the Baltic, to the ancient city of Dantzig, Germany; then Copenhagen, and finally Rotterdam, Holland. I had been a great reader of History and Geography, and all sorts of novels, and enjoyed my travels enormously. My mind expanded quickly, and my varied experiences made me a very precocious youngster, and laid the foundation for much trouble.

     Many interesting and memorable incidents occurred during this voyage, of which I kept an Itinerarium. While approaching Rotterdam, our ship, the "Edsvalla," got stuck on a sandbank, owing to the drunkenness of the Dutch pilot, and the steamer was so badly damaged that she was laid up in Rotterdam two months for repairs. I thus had a pretty good opportunity to study Dutch life and manners. Towards the end of the summer, Anna and I returned to Gothenburg by another steamer, and I entered the fifth class of the school, where I was now quite a hero, owing to my "foreign travels" and wonderful adventures. I now began to develop literary and convivial tendencies, started social clubs among the boys for the discussion of religious, political, and scientific questions, began to write poetry, and underwent great religious conflicts. I was under the theological instruction of a great pietistical preacher, in preparation for my confirmation. My imagination was greatly excited by him; and I experienced states of repentance and conversion, read the Bible diligently, and spent long hours of the night on the floor in prayer. But at the same time I read Swedenborg's Writings still more diligently, though surreptitiously, and fearing that my delight in them was inspired by my sinful nature being tempted by Satan.

At that time I did not know of another "Swedenborgian" in the world but my "esoteric" knowledge of the one Person in the Divinity, and of the Internal sense of the Word, I used to confide to some of my comrades, under promise of secrecy.

     It was while thus revealing dangerous theological secrets to one of my classmates, named Svenson, that he remarked, "Why, you are a Swedenborgian, like my father." Indeed, this was delightful news. I promptly made the acquaintance of old Mr. C. Y. N. Svenson, the first New Churchman I ever knew, and found him a very interesting man, the author of a little work comparing the doctrines of Luther and Swedenborg. He took great interest in his enthusiastic young brother-in-the-faith, gave me the Writings to read, taught me to play chess, drink punch, smoke a pipe, and inspired me with an ambition to become a minister in the Lord's New Church. The die was now cast. In the confirmation class I began to ask troublesome questions, and was called before the Priest, examined by him, and warned especially against Swedenborg as the deadly emissary of Satan himself. He wanted me to give a promise never to read Swedenborg again, but I refused, and read more than ever. I was, indeed, confirmed in the Lutheran Church, but that was the last time I ever entered a temple of the Old Church to worship in it.

     1879.-Sixteen years old, prematurely developed, bearded, spectacled, a confirmed smoker, a social leader of the boys, literary, conceited beyond measure, a young philosopher, politician, and theologian! Poor young fellow!

     I spent the summer in Westergotland with my relatives. Visited Jonas Odhner, a well-to-do but fanatically "faith-alone" merchant in Mariestad. I used to attend their conventicles, prayer meetings, and revivals, every day and all day long for weeks at a time, but got more and more disgusted with that sort of religion, and more and more confirmed in the glorious, rational truths of the New Church. I spent the last month of the summer with Uncle Sannfrid, in Herrljunga, and here I found, for the first time, not only that he was a "Swedenborgian," but that my father, grandfather, and great-grandfather had been receivers of the Heavenly Doctrines.

Here also I found a very complete New Church library, and started right in with the Arcana Coelestia, studying night and day.

     I was now to live with brother Hjalmar in Stockholm, and enter the ancient Gymnasium or College there. Before leaving Herrljunga, Uncle Sanfrid gave me a letter of introduction to the Rev. Adolph Th. Boyesen, Pastor of the New Church Society in Stockholm, which had been founded in 1876. I went to see him soon after my arrival in Stockholm, heard the first New Church sermon the following Sunday, and have ever since remained a member of the New Church.

     1880.-In the College, I now made rapid progress in my favorite studies, especially History, Church History, and Botany, but neglected Mathematics and Language, as usual. I became the Secretary of an ancient Botanical society in the College, called Linnaea, and gave lectures on Chemistry. I also developed an incurable "cacoethes scribendi," became a member of a literary society, called "Concordia," where I read numerous poems and novelettes, was flattered by my older comrades, and became puffed up with an incredible conceit. I also became the editor, printer, and publisher of a humoristic college paper, entitled BARA SKOJA (Only Fun), which made me very obnoxious to the school authorities. In the summer, I studied bookkeeping under a funny old crank, calling himself "Professor Vy-Bromander." In the fall, I became better acquainted with the New Church people, especially Mr. Joseph E. Rosenqvist, and Mr. Carl Hjalmar Asplundh, with whom I was destined to become so intimately associated in after-life, in another part of the world. We began to sell New Church literature after the services, and started a club among the young New Churchmen, called 'The Immanuel Society," of which I was the Secretary.

     1881.-In the meantime I had become a red-hot republican, and joined some political clubs of a revolutionary nature. One of these was the N. F. S.-"Nordens Forenta Stater," or the United States of the North,-i. e., a republic to consist of Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland.

I was the Secretary, and thus came to be associated with the Republican members of the Diet, and other prominent persons. It is a wonder that I did not become insane from conceit and the exciting, disorderly life into which I was thus introduced while only a youth of eighteen years. As it was, I really think I was a little "cracked." The result of all this was that I neglected my studies, and had great trouble at school, publicly advocating the New Church and Republicanism, and making things generally unpleasant for my teachers, especially the professors of "Systematic Theology," or Lutheran Dogmatism, which we were forced to study, nolens volens. I remember one incident particularly. A rather stupid fellow, who was asked to explain the doctrine concerning the Trinity, hesitated when asked point-blank whether there were three gods or one God, but exclaimed "three gods," on being prompted by me. Finally, I took into my head utterly to refuse to answer any questions in Theology, was dismissed from the class, called before the Chancellor of the College, (now Minister of Education), and given the choice of being expelled from the school or leaving voluntarily. I chose the latter, of course, and right glad I was to leave this institution, which I looked upon as a hell on earth, theologically, educationally, and morally.

I now adopted a kind of Bohemian life, studying by myself in preparation for private examination and graduation, but did not accomplish much. The New Church Society in Stockholm entrusted me with the charge of their Book Room, for which I acted as agent, and I slept on the premises. Much of my time was spent with Pastor Boyesen, whom I assisted in the translation of the True Christian Religion. I took a very active part in the work and life of the Church, as leader of the Immanuel Club and as writer in SKANDINAVISK NYKYRECTIDNING. Pastor Boyesen wanted me to go to England, to prepare for the Priesthood under Dr. R. L. Tafel, but I could not persuade myself to take the step of being baptized into the Church, which had been made a condition for my adoption as a theological student. I wrote much at this time, especially poetry. Some pretty good poems were published in SKAND. N. K. TIDNING.

In the meantime, I began to grow tired of my revolutionary political associates, whose extreme radicalism and insanity disgusted me. I had also became involved in debts,, and was extremely unhappy, and well-nigh insane, from conflicting channels of influx, and from my generally disorderly life.

1882.-Early in January I had become so tired of the life I was leading, and so disorganized in my judgment, that I made up my mind to disappear from the scene, leaving my poor brother Hjalmar to pay my small debts. I hired a small room in the extreme southern part of the city, and remained there about a month, totally isolated, and spending my days smoking, and preparing for a grand entree into the world of literature. I am quite sure that my mind was unsound at this period. Everybody wondered what had become of me. Finally, brother Hjalmar discovered my whereabouts through some means or other, hunted me up, and offered to pay my passage to America. This was now the only thing for me to do, and, after an hysterical scene, I accepted the proposition. Nobody seemed particularly sorry to lose me, except little Sigrid Ahlin, (four years old), and my sister Hildegard, who was the only one to see me off at the station. Poor girl! Little did I dream under what sad circumstances I was to see her again, thirteen years afterwards. Having been provided with a moderate sum for my traveling expenses, I set out in February, 1882, for Gothenburg, bought an emigrant's ticket for New York, and had, a beastly time of it on the "Polio," across the North Sea to Hull, and thence to Liverpool, where I had to wait a week for the steamer, the "City of Brussels," and finally arrived in New York on St. Patrick's day, after a pretty easy passage of twelve days.

Here I was, penniless, unable to speak English, and without friends, work, or prospects. I tried to find something to do in New York, but did not succeed, and finally applied to my illustrious, though distant kinsman, John Ericsson, for assistance to proceed to Chicago, where I had some hopes of employment at one of the Swedish-American newspapers. The assistance was kindly given, and after a few days I was in Chicago, again penniless, and frustrated in my hunt for work.

Knowing nobody, and utterly without resources, I had no other alternative than to set out on foot from Chicago, walking along the railroad track, in snow and mud and ragged shoes, miserable and despairing, begging for bread and a night's lodging. After a few days, I thus came to Rockford, Ill., where I fell in with some Swedes, who took me into their house, and found me a place as a painter in a plough factory. Here I did the first honest, earnest, and hard work in all my days. But after a month the factory shut down, and I was discharged. I then found work in a machine shop for another month, but could not keep the place longer than that, being entirely unacquainted with this kind of work. After some week of idleness, I was invited to preach to a Swedish Congregational church, which was temporarily without a preacher, Here I,-a layman, and a mere boy,-preached my first sermons. They were strongly flavored with New Church doctrine, which was quickly detected by one of the members, Mr. C. F. Peterson, Editor of SVENSKA AMERICANAREN, who introduced himself as a New Churchman, (a very watery one, indeed). After a few weeks, the regular preacher arrived, and I was again without a job.

In company with another Swedish ex-student, Henry Fagerstrom, I now started out tramping, but we soon built a raft, and sailed down the beautiful Rock River for several days, having a grand vacation, and no end of adventure. Finally, we came to the ambitious little town of Sterling, Ill., where we both found work, again as painters of agricultural implements. But, in spite of my very best endeavors, I was soon discharged as too soft a hand, and had to start out on the tramp again. I now trotted along the railroad track to Rock Island, Ill., and found work, painting some rooms in Augustana College, the Swedish Lutheran, ultra-orthodox, Seminary in Moline. After this was over, I found some work on a farm, where I was well-nigh killed with fatigue. Leaving the farm, I trotted off to Andover, Ill., where I had heard that there was a Swedish New Church woman, named Mrs. Florence.

She took pity on me, and I stayed in her house for about three months, tending her cows and garden, reading the Writings, and composing poetry. But I wanted to make money, and so I left her, returning to Moline, where I could find no work, and thence back to Sterling, where I spent the winter. Here I worked awhile in a carpenter shop, then in a dry goods store (during the Christmas holidays), then as an ice-hauler, and finally as a blacksmith,-though only for a few hours, for I was discharged the very first day, having inadvertently struck the smith in the stomach with a big hammer.

     1883.-The New Year opened under very dark auspices indeed, and at times I was in such despair that I thought I would end my misery by suicide. There seemed to be no prospects whatever for me. But it was an excellent school, in which my inordinate conceit and pride were broken down,-at least to some small degree.

     Early in the year, I succeeded in getting a place as stable boy to a very rich man, Thomas Gold, the "boss" of Sterling. I milked his cows and kept his horses and stable clean to the best of my ability, which, however, was not great, inasmuch as I was soon discharged. I became more despairing than ever, suffered great hardships on my lonely, cheerless road, and arrived at Clinton, Iowa, in April, where, at last, I found work in a cigar store. Here I worked manfully for three months, but gave up the place for a position in a dry goods store, where I worked for a month, when I was ousted through the influence of the Swedish-Lutheran minister, with whom I had gotten into a controversy. I then found work as a house-painter-or, rather, barn painter-keeping on in this noble art with varying success until the month of August.

     It was then that a letter arrived from Pastor Boyesen, in Stockholm, which proved the turning-point of my life. He wrote, urging me not to waste my time any longer in the wilderness, but to proceed to Chicago, hunt up the New Church people there, and seek an opportunity to study for the ministry of the New Church. A warm, nay, enthusiastic letter of recommendation accompanied his epistle. Well, I was heartily tired of the life I had been leading, and my isolation from the Church had created in me a desperate longing for it.

Having at the same time received some money from my brother Hjalmar, I was able to buy a new suit of clothes, and forthwith set out for Chicago. Thus ends the history of my boyhood and early youth, and now begins the story of another life.

(To be continued.)
TO THE ACADEMY WAR SERVICE COMMITTEE 1920

TO THE ACADEMY WAR SERVICE COMMITTEE ELSA SYNNESTVEDT 1920

Of that unselfish work which you have done,
Only the hours are numbered; limitless
The blessings which your noble use has sown;
For every work that finds its origin
In faith and mercy, love and loyalty,
Shall never die.

To all who labored so,
The splendid tribute of the grateful hearts
Who honor your devotion comes today.
With the glad knowledge of their thanks, humbly
Let this thought rest upon you as a crown:
"Not for myself, nor for the ties of home;
Not for my Country only,-but my Church!"
ELSA SYNNESTVEDT.
November 11th, 1919.

ELEANOR 1920

ELEANOR EDWARD POLLOCK ANSHUTZ 1920

     CHAPTER VIII.

     Treating of Phil's diplomacy.

     Returning to his cousin Kate's house, Phil waited patiently until after dinner for a quiet bit of gossip. With the cares of superintending the kitchen off her mind, Mrs. Davis was quite ready to gratify him, as she sat quietly sewing by the window. He deftly started her by a few remarks and a leading question.

     "David," said she, by way of a general preface, "if there is one thing more than another that I really despise, it is the habit some women have of gossiping about their neighbors. It is bad form. But the truth is quite another thing, and since you ask me, I will tell you the facts of that affair." The wily Phil now rested easy; all that was required of him was attentive listening, and an occasional question to keep her from too much diffuseness or to guide her in the direction he wished her to go. One after another, the neighbors were reviewed, until the object of his still-hunt was reached-the Mayburns. Eleanor was dismissed as a chit of a girl, not a bit pretty, though some people pretended to admire her "red hair.'" She had tried hard to catch Dick, but he wasn't so easily caught. Mrs. Mayburn? Well, that lady's little weaknesses and sins of omission and commission were frankly stated. Mr. Mayburn was next attended to; his great weakness was pride in his ancestry. "You know, David, that I believe in family-in blood. I am proud of mine. And just here I wish to say that I do not like to hear you laugh at our first ancestor in this country, as you sometimes do because he was sent over here two hundred years ago on account of a little wildness; and it isn't right to say that if he had been a common man he would have been sent to jail instead. Now, in Mr. Mayburn's case it is different; his ancestors, running back for hundreds of years in this country and England, have been nothing higher than farmers.

Of course, a good yeomanry is a very desirable thing in a country, but yeomen are hardly ancestors to be proud of. I will say this for Mr. Mayburn. He is honest and honorable. I don't believe he would cheat a person out of a cent, even if he were perfectly sure he wouldn't be found out. I will say that for him, and it is more than I can say for most of the men in this neighborhood."

     "Honor is the complex of all the moral virtues," mused Phil, as he thoughtfully stroked his beard, and ceased to listen to Mrs. Davis. "Where honor is wanting, heaven cannot be implanted. The girl has a good heredity at any rate. The natural basis for the New Church seems to be there. But whether anything can be built upon it is another question. Mr. Mayburn must be scrupulously honest and honorable indeed, or my good cousin here would have a hole in his armor."

     Having obtained all the information he wanted, Phil soon managed to escape, from the steadily flowing stream of conversation he had set agoing. He "took to the woods," and in their solitude indulged in the following chain of reasoning:

     "This guileless young pair have been in the habit of meeting somewhere not far from the girl's home. That somewhere will be easily found. Today she will trip down there, chirpy and happy. Dick won't be there. She will be disappointed and a little hurt. Tomorrow she will carefully reconnoiter the place from a distance, and not seeing him, will go home highly offended. Next day, she will be alarmed. The fourth day, she will be still more alarmed and very miserable, and will come to the tryst to indulge in her misery freely. That feeling will make her more candid than usual. So be it. I'll go on the fourth day."

     Having settled this, he spent the intervening days roaming field and forest in search of game. In this he was more successful than Dick had been, and received high praise from Mrs. Davis, who dearly loved a plump bird on her table. On the fourth day, he kept in the vicinity of Mr. Mayburn's "place," as farms were locally termed, and a little past the time that Dick was wont to appear, he walked boldly up the lane. Soon the gently flowing stream and the maple trees on its banks came into view; and beneath the now bare trees he saw a young girl sitting on an old gray stone.

She looked very dejected, with her head slightly bowed and her hands resting idly in her lap. She did not see or hear him as he drew near, for he purposely walked very softly.

     "Poor little child!" thought he. "I have read your heart aright; you have come here to indulge in your grief. All your happiness, your little coquetries, your sham fits of indignation-all the little tricks of love-swallowed in a great grief, perhaps the first you have ever known. How pretty she is! No wonder the lad was so broken up. Zounds! I don't feel much better, for I know how-But pshaw! we all, young or old, pretty or ugly, have to face the music of broken loves of some sort; so what is the use of growing sentimental over this case! I might as well march over and demolish this little thing's pretty dream at once. But-I wish some other fellow stood in my boots just now.

     As he crossed the brook, she heard his steps, and looked up with quick eagerness.

     "No; it isn't Prince Dick," said Phil (though not aloud), as he caught the look.

     Seeing a stranger, she arose and was about to depart, when Phil said:

     "Excuse me for intruding. I am a stranger enjoying a little shooting in this neighborhood. I do not wish to trespass on any one's land against his will, and, seeing you, I thought I would inquire if the owner of this farm, on which you probably live, would object to my hunting in his fields a little."

     "I do not think that father would object," she replied.

     "Tank you. Ah! one moment, please," as she started to leave him; "can you tell me where Mr. Mayburn lives?"

     "Yes, sir, This is his place."

     "Then I suppose I am addressing Miss Mayburn-Miss Eleanor?"

     "Yes, that is my name," said she, looking at him with some curiosity.

     "Thank you. I am glad to have met you. I intended-well, you see, a friend of mine who went home a few days ago, Richard Gray--"

     "Has Dick gone home?" she asked, quickly interrupting him.

     "Yes; Dick has gone. He-he went on the cars four days ago; yes-four days ago." A faint tremor shook her form, and she kept her eyes fastened on his.

     "Yes-he left four days ago," continued Phil, stroking his beard, and avoiding her steady gaze. "I am quite sure it was four days. I saw him off. He was very much-ah!-hum!-he was quite annoyed, you know; yes, very much annoyed, and--"

     "You are not a stranger," said she, interrupting his stammering speech. "You are Phil. I can't remember your name, but that is what he always called you."

     "What's coming now!" thought Phil, glancing at her nervously, and then he replied: "Yes; that is the name Dick generally gives me-sort of a nickname. My real name is David Brown. Dick's my cousin, you know, and I'm a sort of self-constituted guardian of the lad." ["I'm making a mess of this. I wish she would not look at me so."]

     "Why did he leave as soon as you came?"

     "Why, you see, he got a letter from his brother calling him home at once. A train happening along as soon as he had read the letter,-you know we were down at the village,-I told him to hop aboard and I'd see to shipping his traps home and saying good-bye, and-and all that sort of thing." ["I'm a nice one to straighten out this business."]

     "Why did he leave as soon as you came'" she repeated, just as though he had not spoken.

     "I have just told you; the letter, you know."

     "But I do not know. You are hiding something from me; you are trying to deceive me."

     She was not very conventional. She was suffering.

     "Really, Miss Mayburn, I assure you I am not. He got the letter just as I told you."

     "I do not deny that. But why did he say nothing to me or send me word? Why did he leave as he did?"

     "He left because-because--" ["I wish I was out of this. I don't know what to say."]

     "I know why he left. You deceived him and made him leave me. You are-oh! oh! oh!"

     She leaned her arm against the rough bark of one of the old maples, and resting her head on her arm, vented her feelings in passionate tears. She had struggled against this, but now, overpowered, she gave way completely.

     "Now I am in a pretty plight," thought Phil, as he nervously pulled his beard and looked at the sobbing little girl.

     "Miss Mayburn," he said, at last, "you have misjudged me, I assure you."

     "I haven't. You're a bad, meddlesome, old man, and-and I hate you." She raised her head to utter these words, and then let it fall again.

     He sat down on the stone she had been occupying, and then said very mildly, "I'm not sorry old you know, only-"

     "You are-you're a hundred years old," this without raising her head.

     He was so nonplused at this that he mechanically drew forth his pipe and had it filled before he thought what he was doing. Then catching a covert glance she directed toward him, he said, "Excuse me. Do you mind if I take a bit of a smoke out in the air here? I'm so broken up by this that I think it will do me good."

     "I don't care what you do."

     "Thank you." He lit his pipe, and began to puff vigorously. "Now, Miss Mayburn, please tell me why you have taken such a prejudice against me."

     No answer.

     "It is an unfounded prejudice, I assure you. You never saw me before today, nor I you. What have I done?"

     "You have sent Dick home without a word to me, who-who--" here a fresh burst of sobs.

     "Poor little thing, you who-who loved him so. I can see that now," said Phil to himself, as he slowly shook his head; then suddenly arresting the motion, he half smiled. "I think I see my way clear now. It's original, and I'11 try its effect at any rate."

     "Miss Mayburn, I admit that you are right. I did send him home, or at least I told him that it was his duty to leave you at once and never see you again."

     "I knew it! I knew it!" sobbing afresh. "You cruel, wicked man!"

     "No, I'm not that; at least, I'm not cruel, and what I did was out of kindness to you."

     "Your kindness will kill me."

     "I think not, and if you will listen to me calmly, I am sure you will say that I did right, and will thank me."

     "What you did was not right, and you have broken my heart. Oh, my! Oh, my!"

     "As soon as you are ready to listen to me, I will show you that notwithstanding your assertion I acted for the best, and you muse believe it; you cannot help believing it."

     He waited patiently until she grew quiet and said to him in a low tone, "I'm ready to hear you."

     "I know from Mrs. Davis, who is my cousin, that you are a good and pious Christian girl," he began.

     She raised her head from her arm and began drying her eyes, still keeping her back turned to him.

     "Now, this Dick, as you will be sorry to learn," he continued argumentatively, "is not a Christian as you are. I know you will be shocked to hear this, but it is the truth, and I will not conceal it from you."

     She faced him now, and he noticed with admiration that her tears had not in the least marred her fair young face. "No Dick is not a Christian as you are; he is far, far from your cherished faith. Now you know, and of course believe, that none but Christians are free from sin and therefore saved. All others are full of wickedness and evil and all manner of uncleanness-they will all go to hell, and be burned in fire and brimstone forever and ever."

     Half in amazement, half in terror, she regarded him, but he sat as impassive as the stone beneath him, and calmly smoked. After waiting for his words to sink into her mind, he continued, "But all this you know without being told by me.

Now, what did I find, when I fortunately arrived here four days ago?

     I found," removing his pipe, and giving his favorite flourish, "I found this sinful, wicked, evil boy, madly in love with a good, pious Christian girl, and "

     "Oh! sir, was he! was he! Oh! poor Dick!"

     "What!" burst forth from Phil, with a, mighty cloud of smoke.

     "I am happy now-so happy!"

     "I am astonished," said he, sternly. "I am! astonished, indeed. Do you mean to tell me that you are not shocked at this evil man's love?"

     She threw back her head, and replied:

     "I am proud of it! I glory in it!" Then closing her eyes, as though to shut out the grim-looking man with the pipe, she smiled lovingly.

     With a heavy frown, he said: "Although I am a stranger to you, I regard it as my duty-it is my duty-to point out to you the folly of your are sent conduct. You are a Christian; you are free from sin; you will go to heaven, and there wear a white robe and a golden crown, and all that sort of thing. Yet, in spite of all this, you have the effrontery to tell me that you glory in the love of an unclean, wicked, desperate-"

     "He isn't! he isn't!"

     "-man, who will for his crimes be sent to a black, smoky hell to fry and sizzle forever."
"You shall not talk that way in my presence!" said she, drawing near him, her eyes blazing with indignation. "He is the truest and best in the world, and I love him!" This, for all her excitement, spoken softly; then, blazing with indignation again: "Leave me, you slanderer; leave me, I say!"

     "Wonder what the little thing will do if I refuse to go? How splendid she looks, and how well fitted, if rid of her falses, to be one of the progenitors of a line Of New Churchmen that will each onward to, the golden age! But she is a poor reasoner; I must hurl the thunders of her Church against her. Wonder how she will take it." So ran his thoughts under cover of his frown, his beard, and his pipe, as she imperiously motioned him to go.

     "Young woman, pause in this madness. Think of what you are saying."

     "It is not madness. Go, I say!"

     "I will not go. It is my duty to speak, and I will not be silent. Your Church, your preacher, year religion, bear me out in what I say. If I am a slanderer, then they are, too. All that I have said, they have said thousands and thousands of times."

     "If they say Dick is wicked, they are as false and slanderous as you are!"

     "They do say so, and you know it." ["I used those same words to Dick the other day."]

     "Then they may go, all of them! I hate them-wicked, evil speaking things that they are! O Dick, Dick! you alone in ah the world are good and true. Oh! why did you leave me?" and here she began to cry again. "I have no one to look to now; I believe I shall die!"

     She made no attempt to conceal her tears now; but they no longer came with the passion of the: first outbreak.

     All torn up by the sight of this transition from indignation to weak and hopeless misery, Phil hastily crammed his pipe again, and began smoking like a locomotive to conceal his feelings.

     "It won't do for me to give way and cry, too," he thought, "for I've got to finish this surgical operation, or, rather, smashing operation. I guess I'm doing right in smashing her religious faith. She will make Dick her faith in the future, and-well, one thing at a time." So he said aloud:

     "Perhaps it will be better for you to die, for then, as you have saved your soul, you will be safe in heaven from this man."

     "I don't want to go there if he doesn't, and I won't. I'll go where he does."

     "Child! child! this is mere recklessness."

     "I don't care."

     "At least, consult with your minister, Mr. Helfir, before you go too far."

     "I will not, for he would say the same things you have said."

     "Then you admit that I am right'"

     "I do not. You are all wrong. There is nothing right but Dick."

     "Young woman," said Phil, in his deepest and sternest tone, "am I to understand that you pronounce your religion to be false and evil?"

     At this portentous question, she visibly quailed, and did not answer him.

     "This is a grave matter. The time has now come when you must make a choice."

     Suddenly there flashed upon her the remembrance that, on this very spot one Sunday afternoon, Dick had said that such a time must come. It was here now. She must choose, and she knew that her choice was made.

     "You must give up this man, or you must renounce your religion and adopt his, which, as you know, is all nonsense."

     She gave a start at these words, and shot a swift glance at him, but his stern face did not relax.

     "Think of what must happen, if you turn your back on your faith. Think before it is too late."

     For one moment she paused, and then with closed eyes: "O Dick! henceforth and forever 'thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.'"

     "Then you have made your choice!"

     "I have, and whether I ever see him again or not, I shall never change."

     "Then I have no more to say," said he, rising.

     "Please remain a little longer," said she, and he sat down again. "Notwithstanding all you have said to me, I know that you hold the same faith that we do."

     "We?"

     "Yes; Dick and I."

     ["'Dick and I!' The plot thickens in sooth."]

     "He talked a great deal about you to me, and liked you very much, and I do, too--"

     ["This is clipping the lion's claws with a vengeance."]

     "I can see now why he was so cast down, poor dear, the last week he was here, and why he left me. He followed the path of truth and duty and honor as a true man should, and I love and respect him for it. How could he know that every day, from what he said to me, and from what I read in the book he gave me, I saw and loved the truth of his-of our beautiful religion more and more.

He thought I rejected and despised it, and so thinking, he did right to go away; for if I were as he thought, we never could have been happy together."

     "Why did you not tell him this?"

     "I don't know. I was too foolish and happy."

     "I'll tell him when I go home."

     "No, no, no," said she, springing forward, and seizing his arm. "You must not, you must not tell him anything that I have said today."

     "Why not?"

     "Because you must not. Promise me-promise me on your honor that you will not. I have spoken today as a woman should not, but I could not help it. I was so unhappy."

     Phil saw that she was indeed in earnest about this, and he replied:

     "Very well, I promise."

     "Thank you. I know I can rely on your word. I would rather that we never met again than for him to know all-all that I have said today."

     "Miss Mayburn, does your father or anyone know that you have adopted a faith that is bitterly antagonistic to the one that you have been reared in?"

     "No one knows it. Do you think I cannot hold out against them?" she asked, smiling.

     "It will be a sore struggle."

     "It may be, but I think I could go to the stake, as the martyrs did in olden times, for anything I believed in and loved."

     "I believe you would," said he, clasping her hand, "and the only thing that now surprises me is to think that Dick had the strength to act as he has."

     "You do not know him, then; he has strength to do anything that is right."

     "Even to deserting the woman he loves?"

     "He did not desert me. By my weak concealment I forced him to choose between me and duty, and like a true man, he chose duty. True love and duty never really conflict.

During the past few days, when I have been so unhappy, I have thought over much that he told me; and, from what I have learned from you, I can see now that I forced him to a terrible ordeal; but he has gone through it nobly."

     "Well, yes, it was pretty rough on the lad," said Phil. "If you had heard him going on as I did the other day, you certainly would have said it was-rough."

     "Poor, poor fellow!" said she. "Tell me what he said."

     "That would hardly be fair, would it especially as you forbid me telling him how you acted when you-well, you know."

     With feminine arguments, she convinced him that the cases were not parallel, and furthermore that she had a right to the information. So he told her all, and incidentally gave her a pretty accurate outline of the doctrine concerning marriage, without seeming to preach at her in the least. Upon concluding, he said, as he looked at her radiantly happy face, "The story of his sufferings doesn't seem to have made you unhappy."

     "I am happier now than I have ever been before in my life," was her reply.

     After a little further conversation, she departed. He watched her as long as she was in sight, and then said:

     "Well!!"

     After this ejaculation, into which so much and various meaning can be crowded, he lit his pipe, which had gone out, and when it was smoked, he too departed.

     (To be continued.)

Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA.
Editor                    Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager          Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager.

     TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION
One Year                    $3.00 payable in advance
Single Copy               30 cents
     A DISTINCTIVE FORMULA OF BAPTISM.

     In an editorial on "The Re-Baptism Discussion" last month, we spoke of the fact that the New Church ceremony of baptism differs little from the Old in external form, the difference being internal, that is, in the new faith and life represented in baptism. To this statement we would add, however, that the internal distinction is ultimated in the words used in New Church baptism, where the candidate is asked to acknowledge his faith "in the Lord Jesus Christ as God of heaven and earth, in whom is the Divine Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,"-words not used in the ceremony as performed by the Christian denominations.

     We know that what chiefly distinguishes the New Church from the Old is its idea of the Lord, that in Him is the Divine Trinity, as three attributes of One Divine Person, even the Lord God the Savior Jesus Christ, who has made His Second Coming to raise up a New Church in place of the former.

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And the Christian who so receives the Lord comes into a new faith and a new life,-the life of regeneration signified by the waters of baptism, a life whereby he becomes a spiritual form of love, wisdom, and use, and thus an image of the Divine Trinity in the Lord, into whose name and quality he is baptized. This coming out of the old faith and life into the new, the candidate acknowledges in the response he makes to the minister in the New Church ceremony of baptism.

     Furthermore, the very formula used by an officiating minister of the New Church-at least, of the General Church-is different from that used by the Christian denominations, which mostly adhere to the Gospel words: I baptize thee "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." In our Liturgy, the formula reads: "I baptize thee in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Father, Son and Holy Spirit." Thus our baptism is new and distinct as to the very words used in the act, which embody the idea of the Lord into which Christians come when they receive the Heavenly Doctrines. We submit this consideration to those who hold that re-baptism is unnecessary.

     To those, also, who hold that the rite of Confirmation is sufficient for Christians entering the New Church, because it is a confession of the Lord as now revealed, we would observe that this rite is properly only a confirmation of baptism, and can scarcely be said to involve and effect the same as the sacrament of baptism, namely, actual insertion among Christians in the spiritual world, a memorial of regeneration, and a sign and distinguishing mark before the angels that one has adopted a new name, and entered a new faith and life. Is the newcomer to be satisfied with a New Church confirmation of his Old Church Baptism, in place of a New Church Baptism? (See NEW CHURCH LIFE, September, 1919, p. 577.)

     There are those who question the use of a formula of baptism different from that hitherto used in the Christian Churches, which have simply adhered to the words of the Lord in Matthew: "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." (28:9.)

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We may note that the Lord did not here enjoin any specific form, as He did, for instance, in teaching His disciples the Lord's Prayer, when He said: "After this manner therefore pray ye." Moreover, our formula of baptism does not omit the above words of the Trinity, but simply precedes them with the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom that Trinity is, according to the Revelation given to the New Church. And here is where the early New Churchmen in England found justification for the change they made.

In the Robert Hindmarsh Liturgy the formula prescribed is as follows: "I baptize thee in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is at once the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." (Baltimore Edition, 1792.) And the reason for this is found in the Preface to this Liturgy, the closing words of which are: "Reader-The Promoters of this Edition were induced thereto on a Belief that the Lord Jesus Christ is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; that on the Consummation of the Old Church, He departed from it, and takes up His abode in the New Church-On this consideration we do most earnestly recommend the Theological Writings of BARON EMANUEL SWEDENBORG, believing that he was divinely inspired to write for the Use of the New Jerusalem Church."

In the later English Liturgies, the formula underwent slight changes. In 1794, it reads: "I baptize thee in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, who in one person is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." And in 1816: "I baptize thee in the name of the Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ, who alone is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit." In course of time, however, there was a reversion to the former Christian usage, both in the English Conference and in the General Convention. The Academy Liturgy (1876) provided both forms, to be used at the option of the minister, but our present Liturgy retains the distinctively New Church formula only, as we have before noted. See remarks on this subject by Bishop W. F. Pendleton, (NEW CHURCH LIFE, June, 1919, pp. 381, 382), who also observes that the apostles Peter and John baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. (Acts 2:38, 8:16, 10:48.)

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     We will now cite a few of the passages in the Writings which amply justified the early New Churchmen in changing the baptism formula currently used in the Christian Churches, and which warrant the adoption of a similar form by the General Church, to the end that the acknowledgment of the Lord in His Second Coming, as revealed in the Heavenly Doctrines, may be embodied in this sacrament of entrance to the Church. To quote:

     "Because Christianity itself is now first beginning to dawn, and a New Church, which is meant by the New Jerusalem in the Revelation, is now being established by the Lord, in which God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are acknowledged as one, because in one Person, it has pleased the Lord to reveal the spiritual sense of the Word, to the end that this Church may come into
the very use of the sacraments, Baptism and the Holy Supper." (T. C. R. 700.)

     "That the Divine Trinity is conjoined in the Lord is the principal object of this work." (T. C. R. 108.)

     "That the Lord commanded that they should be baptized into the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, involves Himself, because in Him is the Father, in Him is the Holy Spirit, because the holy of the angels, or of the heavens, is His; thus one." (Diary 1368.)

     "The Lord said that they should baptize in the name of the Father, San and Holy Spirit; in the internal sense these signify nothing else than Good, Truth, and all good and truth thence; the Father is Good, the Son is Truth, the Holy Spirit is Good and Truth proceeding from Him; all this in the Lord Alone." (Diary 4340.)
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

THE NEW CHRISTIAN MINISTER, and Weekly News-Letter, of the Portland, Oregon, Society of the New Christian Church.

The Pastor, the Rev. Wm. R. Reese, has kindly sent us copies of this mimeographed sheet, containing a sermonette, doctrinal talks, and local news,-an excellent way of keeping in touch with a scattered flock.

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He states that the idea is not copyrighted, and that he will be glad to furnish information as to how it is conducted to anyone who would like to give the plan a trial.

     A copy of the HOMOEOPATHIC RECORDER, (Lancaster, Pa.), for October 15, 1919, has been sent us, containing the summary of an interesting address on the "Effects of the War on the Cultivation of Medicinal Plants," by our friend, Mr. Charles G. Merrell, of Cincinnati, Ohio. The address was delivered at a meeting of the National Eclectic Medical Association, held at Chicago, in June, 1919, and was illustrated by numerous lantern slides.

     In the November number of the MISSIONBOTE, published for the "Jehovah Congregation of the True Christian Church of the New Jerusalem," Chicago, the Rev. W. J. C. Thiel, Pastor, writes in warm appreciation of his visit among the "much condemned Academy" friends at Bryn Athyn during the recent General Assembly. The December issue of the same periodical has a front-page photograph of the Bryn Athyn Cathedral, and further descriptive remarks by Mr. Thiel.

     Through the enterprise of Mr. C. W. Barron, a new edition of Heaven and Hell for missionary purposes is to be published shortly by the Massachusetts New Church Union, Boston. It will be printed from the plates of the Rotch Edition, and thus will have the merit of including the footnote references to the Arcana, Coelestia which are found in the original edition,-a valuable feature to the newly interested reader of the Writings. This new volume will be sold at cost, estimated at 25 cents, and will be printed on very thin paper, which will make it possible to mail it anywhere in the world for 4 cents postage.

     Articles in the NEW CHURCH REVIEW (Boston), for October, 1919, cover a wide range of doctrinal and historical subjects, of value alike to the general reader and the student. Especially interesting are the following: "The New Church on the Defensive," by the Rev. Paul Sperry; "The Fountain of Perpetual Youth," by Mr. T. Mower Martin; "The Attitude to be taken to the Darwinian Doctrine of the Origin of Species," by the Rev. G. Lawrence Allbutt;

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"Historical Sketch of the New Jerusalem Church Society in Mauritius," by Mr. Cornelius Becherel; "The Rev. George Nicholson," by Charles Higham; and a Review of Mr. Acton's translation of Swedenborg's Treatise on the Fibre, by John P. Sutherland, M. D.

"The New Church and the Present Age" is the title of a symposium appearing in the issues of THE NEW CHURCH WEEKLY (London), for November, 1919, to which five writers have so far contributed. Of these, the articles by Messrs. A. E. Friend and George E. Holman exhibit loyalty to what is revealed in the Writings concerning the need of a distinctively New Church, which begins with a remnant of the Old, and can be fostered only by internal evangelization. The other three, by Messrs. Harold Robinson, H. McDowall, and H. N. Morris, while characterized by considerable soundness of view as to the real state of the "Present Age," are tinged with the non-distinctive, permeation idea and the false hope of reforming the Old Church en masse. Thus the series so far is a fair presentation of the two schools of thought existing in the New Church. This fact is noted by the Rev. E. J. Pulsford, whose letter appears in the WEEKLY for November 29th, and who says in part: "Mr. McDowall writes, 'To bring these truths home to the masses is surely one of the greatest works of the New Church today;' while in the previous number Mr. Friend says, 'It is a remnant only that is salvable out of the Christian World, and it is this remnant that at all costs we must reach.' It would be to the great benefit of our organization, I believe, if we could be agreed as to which of these sentiments should govern our aim and policy. . . . Internal evangelization means more and more definite doctrinal preaching and teaching, and distinctive New Church worship, and to read and study the Doctrines. . . . It scarcely needs to be added that making such internal evangelization our primary concern does not imply any cynical indifference to the unresponsive masses as unworthy of our help, or as having no claims upon us as custodians of the Lord's Revelation; it means qualifying ourselves for the worthy discharge of a sacred obligation."

105

     The articles are timely and interesting, and we shall hope to see the topics of distinctive marriage and education dealt with before the series is concluded, for there lies the central point of internal evangelization, as clearly shown in Conjugial Love 202-205.

     In the September number of NYA KIRKANS TIDNING (Stockholm), of which the Rev. C. J. N. Manby is Editor, we find an appreciative notice of a lecture by the Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom on the subject of "Man after Death," delivered before a large audience in Stockholm. The speaker emphasized the danger of communicating with spirits, and was listened to with close attention.

     The October issue of the same journal prints two reports by Mr. Baeckstrom describing his missionary lectures in other parts of Sweden, and also contains an article by Pastor Manby, entitled "Internal Unanimity (Inre samdrakt), the Solution of an Old Difficulty in our Church," which traces the history and cause of the separation whereby two societies came into existence in Stockholm, and indicates that there is now a desire on both sides for friendly relations, to the end that they may work in harmony for the welfare of the Church. To quote: "It has been as if a heavy cloud has been hanging over the Church. Would that it could be dispersed! It now seems possible. The correspondence so kindly initiated by Pastor Baeckstrom, in a letter of congratulation on my eightieth birthday, and afterwards continued, has now terminated in an open declaration on the part of the latter. As we now require all the good means at our disposal for the upbuilding of the Church, we cannot but rejoice at this possibility of unanimous effort by the two societies toward this end. We stand in different ranks, but are working for the same cause, with the Revelation of the New Church as the common means. We must not allow the slight differences in conception to prevent our seeing each other as brethren and members of the Lord's blessed New Church."

106

Then follows the "declaration" above referred to, in the form of a letter from Mr. Baeckstrom, wherein he expresses like sentiments of conciliation, and discusses the differences of view as to the interpretation of the work on Conjugial Love which had been the chief cause of division, but which, he holds, need not remain so if there be a common ground of belief in the Writings as a Divine Revelation.

The article then concludes: "Pastor Baeckstrom is at present working with all his young strength in the great mission field of this country, for our common, most important cause,-the establishment of the New Church. We greet him as a friend and fellow-worker, and shall rejoice to learn of his experiences and record what he is doing. We shall, of course, as experience and prudence dictate, work in different fields, but as faithful brethren. We can each attend the other's services, and rejoice in one another's progress, which is not the progress of one party or the other, but of the common whole,-the Lord's great New Church."

"For many years, sane investigators of psychic phenomena objected to reported messages from the other side on the ground that they were of no value whatever, that generally they were puerile, and especially that no information was given as to conditions in the spirit world. But since the war broke out, there has been a recrudescence of belief in spiritism, and one extraordinary result is that we get abundant details of every phase of life in the Great Beyond. Unfortunately, every person sending messages through gives details which differ so radically from all others that the sane man is confused, and must believe none of them, or else that heaven, is by no means the delectable abode we have long supposed. The latest report, to the effect that there is beer and tobacco in heaven, may suit some present thirsty souls, but is hard on zealous prohibitionists. Indeed, nothing which is alleged to have been revealed is in any way generally satisfactory, and conservative people still rely on faith and Divine Revelation rather than on any testimony from departed friends."-PHILADELPHIA EVENING BULLETIN.
Title Unspecified 1920

Title Unspecified 1920

The Criterion of Divine Authorship is the title of a new volume by the Rev. J. F. Buss, now in the press for the New Church Missionary and Tract Society, London.

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PALACE OF WISDOM 1920

PALACE OF WISDOM GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

     THE PALACE OF WISDOM; Eldred Edward Iungerich; the Academy Book Room, Bryn Athyn, Pa. 1919. pp. 130. Cloth, $1.00. Paper, 50 cents.

     This booklet of 130 pages, bound in scarlet paper, embraces a collection of eight essays, some of which have appeared separately; which, though not necessarily connected, nevertheless present a certain philosophical sequence of subjects vital to the thought of one who would enter, as the title suggests, into that magnificent palace within which his spirit may perceive more clearly the Wisdom of the Lord as appearing in the Doctrine of the New Church.

     This masterful presentation of profound thought, wrought out with admirable logic, and clothed in general with an excellence of English prose not often reached in argumentation and exposition of themes so weighty, is worthy of high praise. With a style that reminds one, in the earlier chapters at least, of Swedenborg himself, to whom the book is dedicated, in his calm philosophical inductions,-for instance, in the work on The Infinite,-this book appeals to me as a modern New Church classic which will not suffer by comparison with the best collateral literature that Swedenborg's disciples have produced in the past.
The first essay, on "Predestination to Heaven," is brief, urging the humble quest which each person should pursue for that use he is providentially fitted to perform better than any other, and emphasizing the unavoidableness of his eventual performance of it, either from free choice and delight, or else from compulsion in a negative servility.

     The essay composing the second chapter is directed to the thought of the eternity of the hells, establishing from, the Word and the Writings the truth that while hell is eternal it is not vindictive, and that to deny the eternity and mercy of the hells is tantamount to denying the eternity and mercifulness of God.

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     The next chapter, on "The Afflux of Truth," draws the important distinction between Divine Doctrine and doctrine drawn from the Word, showing that the latter operates mediately but the former immediately. The point is made that the Writings should not be classed as doctrine derived from the Word, but as Divine Doctrine itself, with which it is encumbent upon every intelligent New Churchman to compare the teachings which are derived from them.

     In the fourth chapter, on "The Ages of Man and the Five Dispensations," the five dispensations of religion on the earth are correlated in a convincing manner with five stages through which the mind is "born and re-born," as follows: The period of life from conception in the womb to one month after birth is correlated with the Most Ancient Church, in which the gifts of that Golden Age are implanted; the period from one month to five years is correlated with the epoch of the Ancient Church; the period from five to twenty years, with the Jewish dispensation; that from twenty to sixty years, with the Christian era; and finally the period from sixty years and upwards, with the New Jerusalem. To quote the author, "The two greatest events in the history of mankind are the two advents of the Lord. In the first of these, He exhibits His omnipotence; in the second, He stressed the laws of His order. . . . The two greatest events in the life of man are his two mental birthdays, which are to him what the two advents are to mankind. His first mental birthday, according to A. C. 10225, does not normally occur before the age of twenty. . . . That man's second mental birthday does not occur normally until forty years after he begins to think for himself, or about the age of sixty, seems quite likely, in view of the difficulty of subjugating all the exterior enticements that stand in the way of his acquiring that retortion of mental vibratory gyres that connote a truly Christian disposition." (pp. 41, 42.)

     This interesting correlation, supported ably by Leviticus, A. C. 10225, the Schmidius Marginalia Index Biblicus, and the Adversaria, is of sufficient moment to warrant further study and application in the educational field, if Mr. Iungerich's thesis is indeed a true one.

109

     The following essay, a disquisition on the terms "will," "good-pleasure," "leave," and "permission," as applied to the Lord's Providence, develops what seem valuable philosophical concepts of the Divine Human as the perpetual and eternal nexus between the finite and the Infinite. This nexus is described as standing or existing midway between the Infinite and the finite, and as being a "presence" of the Infinite "in and with the finite." The author's conclusion is that the terms "will," "good-pleasure," "leave," and "permission," constitute a series of discreted operations; that discrete degrees appertain exclusively to the realm of essential activities in and among finite entities; and that the aforesaid discreted operations are pertinently correlate with man's four faculties of soul, mind, animus, and sensual, respectively.

     This thesis prepares the mind for the next three chapters, treating, respectively, of "Spiritual Substance," "The Nativity," and "The Blood of the Lamb and the Word of His Testimony," the last being a fine treatment of the Glorification of the Lord and its perennial results for the salvation of men.

     In Mr. Iungerich's view, "spiritual substance is force, energy, animation, or conatus. It is not a finite, bounded, created, entity; except by courtesy of language with regard to the associated finite receptacles." (p. 72.) Thus, to interpret, it is a discreted series of Divine activity in and with finited receptacles. This concept is of importance as related to the subjects of the nativity and glorification of the Lord, as one may best see by consulting the final chapters in the booklet before us, which are replete with interest, and, to my mind, important contributions to the literature of the New Church. We recommend them as profitable study for the New Church student.

     There is a clear relation between these chapters and the recent controversy as to the bodies of spirits and angels. Here is presented a clear concept of the Limbus, agreeing with Mr. Iungerich's view of spiritual substance, as well as of the nature of the Lord's resurrection body. For the nature of the glorified Human and of the organisms of men after death are subjects that can scarcely be separated.

     The author first confirms the thesis that the "infirm human" of the Lord from Mary was not a modicum of specialized spiritual substance, but was "a state,"-a perverted twist or gyre in the mind,-and that the retorsion or retroversion of this state was what was involved in the phrase that "the Lord put off all His maternal heredity."

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This, then, leads to the conclusion that the entire material body that hung upon the cross and was laid in the sepulchre was that "whole body" with which He rose, differently from any man. Mr. Iungerich repeats this pregnant phrase several times: The Lord's substantial body "has an associated strand of entities running the gamut of finite creation."

     This strand of finite entities, an Additamentum to the Lord by glorification, Mr. Iungerich conceives as being the ultimate instrumental by which the Lord elevates all the regenerate to heaven, and as being present in the Holy Supper. Thus it is a Divine Sphere which he identifies with the "flood of the Lamb,"-a sphere of finite things from His earth-body, in and with which is the life of the Infinite, adequate for the regeneration of man on all four planes of sensual, animus, mind, and soul. It is one of the "two arms for perennial redemption" with which the Lord regenerates man, the other arm being the whole body of revealed truth.

     But I commend the book to the thoughtful reader. It is a sober and learned effort at the development of vital doctrine concerning the Lord and the spiritual world. I know of no other book dealing in greater clearness with the matters of profound doctrine which the various theses present. It takes its place with the best literature of the Church, whether from point of composition or of English.
     GILBERT H. SMITH.

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SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE NEW CHURCH SERMON 1920

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE NEW CHURCH SERMON CHARLES FRANCIS BROWNE 1920

     BY A LAYMAN.

     Is there something needed to assist the theological teacher and the active men of the world to make the message more effective?

     We find that personality counts in our estimate of men in whatever activity we see, and that second-handed, warmed-over impressions, unfelt and unemphasized, do not penetrate the indifference of the party of the second part. Dare we suggest that a shorter and more incisive manner of exposition might help the hearer to take in fewer and more-demonstrated truths?-more speed and enthusiasm in delivery,-clearer ideas,-rather than a number of basic doctrines too much out of focus or expressed too generally and tranquilly?

     The Church service is for worship, and the sermon is for instruction in which we must be interested before we can be instructed. The service as a whole creates a religious mood; the sermon awakens also a keen intellectual activity. The state of mind of the preacher on the Sabbath, as (partly) a result of his continued weekly thought, is, naturally, very different from the (however) devout layman's, whose engrossing use plunges him into a worldly environment. This condition the service wishes to overcome, and the preacher, in his sermon, hopes to redirect these worldly tendencies by heavenly thought and inspiration.

     The sermon should include a certain magnetic interest, to overcome this tendency of the average layman, including the busy mother, with her monotony of duties, which results in an inactive mentality and a physical serenity. The sermon's use is to help in elevating the mind to more spirituality. More speed and enthusiasm in delivery would be an external means to keep awake the interest. We must overcome the physical languor by external means.

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     While we all are wishing that the state of worship may visit us oftener, and enrich us with a better mood, we too often realize that the atmosphere of the world, with its loves, interests, and cares, is not to be driven off at will; and while the spirits may want to rise, our moods remain below. Is it possible that the vigor and enthusiasm of the preacher will aid us and awaken us to a keen and receptive state of mind,-to a sharper perception of a new life?

     Is it possible we can learn anything from the pronounced and worldly-wise methods of a Billy Sunday, and introduce anything of his manner to animate the too usual soporific tendencies? The communicants live in the world six days a week, and the change to the Sabbath is very marked in various ways. We might wish, with the modern psalmist, that "every day will be Sunday bye and bye;" the tendency is rather that the mundane pressure will increasingly trespass on the (universally) weak Seventh day, than that the active, but too short, six days will be threatened.

     One can't help thinking that "worldly-wisdom" must in some modified degree be introduced into the Sabbath, at least until such a time as the Church better survives the Seventh day disinterestedness, and shows improvement. We need not mention the evident truth that we should not mix our new and old wine. We must be liberal, and read between the lines, and realize that, for the sake of brevity, much is omitted or merely suggested. We must be charitable to the writer, and not grab at some offending phrase while overlooking the general spirit and intent, which is one not of criticism but of suggestion of helpfulness. For the subject is a large one, and includes all the various points of view of all of us.

     Affection for the truth warms us to an understanding that might be only intellectually cold, dry, and uninteresting. Love is life, and enthusiasm is a means to help toward interest. Monotony, which creates a lack of interest and tames the spirit, helps to lull the mind to an intellectual lethargy. One of the great American preachers, whose personality still gives pleasure in the memory of the writer, and is one of its precious traditions, was the late Phillips Brooks, of Trinity Church in Boston. His characteristics of utterance were speed and enthusiasm, as well as elevated spirituality, enlivened with a love of humanity.

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     Are we so faithful and appreciative that we praise the sermon, when yet we realize its inadequacy of manner, its plethora of ideas, and its wealth of spirituality? We New Churchmen are so pleased, and enjoy so much the sphere of worship, that we take it all, and like it all. Many fail to hold and digest the various treasures of the sermons. Is it possible that the sermon tries to do too much-endeavors to touch on all or too many truths? The introduction of so many ideas and leading truths diverts the mind, resulting in great stimulation, but at the loss of clarity-of some simple truth.

     After years of public lecturing, it dawned upon me too late that I attempted too much, and that a simple idea repousse'd into shape by thorough treatment from all sides, would have resulted in actually completing something, and with more clarity.

     It is not for me to criticize or suggest any technique of the written sermon, but, at the risk of an impropriety, to suggest, after forty years of work in various creative lines, to make this observation: that, after all, simplicity is a great virtue. In discussing this subject with my friend, a preacher, we seemed to agree with this fundamental principle of simplicity, and that danger came to his work in not self-editing enough, cutting out the ideas which force the mind from the primary theme.

     The listener's mind loves to dwell on suggestions. The New Church watch-words,-like Conjugial Love, Providence, Proprium, and the future life,-draw like a magnet, and we meditate on the suggestions at the expense of the sermon. We find ourselves lost because we are shepherded. We need to be directed and guided through a sermon to its basic thought. Someone said, "If it is fat enough, one idea is enough to make a speech." Would that all speeches, sermons, and articles had one!

     When we returned from Paris after some years of study, and compared our experiences on what, we had learned from our professors, (in our case, Painting and Sculpture), we all agreed that the counsels of the masters might be crystallized into one phrase:-"Trop de choses"-"Too many things."

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So one of the basic principles in any art or activity is to guard against "too many things,"-which means ideas-forms-colors-details, according to the subject. It is just as true of landscape gardening, dress-making, architecture, education, or sermon writing.
CHARLES FRANCIS BROWNE. Glenview, Ill., September, 1919.
WHY BAPTISM? 1920

WHY BAPTISM? HAROLD F. PITCAIRN 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:
     I have already written more upon this subject than I had originally intended, but the Rev. L. G. Landenberger has brought up some points in his last communication which I think should not be passed by without comment, and I therefore take the privilege of writing again.

     In the seventh paragraph, he points out that if the parents of a child come into the New Church after it has been baptized into the Old Church, it need not be re-baptized, because we are taught that a child becomes ensphered by the kind of Christianity in which its parents are. Now, if the only reason it need not be re-baptized is because it is ensphered by its parents' Christianity, why should Mr. Landenberger consider it necessary for the child to be baptized at all, since it will be ensphered by its parents? Christianity without baptism?

     In the middle of the eighth paragraph, he says, "If one can be introduced as to his spirit into a New Church society in the other world without the external act of baptism, why do you insist upon re-baptism?" If having one's spirit introduced into a New Church society in the other world is all that Mr. Landenberger considers necessary, why should he require a Gentile to be baptized at all, since his spirit can be introduced into a New Church society in the other world without the external act of baptism?

     He concludes his article by emphasizing the doctrine of the "Universal New Church," as taught in A. R. 363, where the "sealed" and the "multitude" are described as representing the Lord's New Church, which is constituted as a body with all its members.

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All New Churchmen believe this, but I do not believe that it means the Old Church sects, (do the Writings indicate that it does?), but the simple good of both the Old Church and the Gentiles. Now since Mr. Landenberger holds that Christians need not be baptized into the New Church, because they belong to the "universal New Church," why should he believe it necessary for Gentiles belonging to the "universal New Church" to be baptized? A gentile must receive New Church baptism because he formerly did not acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ to be the One only God of heaven and earth, nor that He had made His Second Coming in the spiritual sense of the Word. Is not this also the very reason why an Old Churchman must receive New Church baptism?

We read in T. C. R. 680: "Furthermore, what is order without distinction? and what is distinction without evidence? and what are evidences without signs, by which qualities are recognized? For without knowledge of qualities, order is not recognized as order." Is it not clear from this that, unless the New Church is distinct, it is not an orderly organization? And how can an Old Church person become New Church without evidence? And what are his evidences but the sign of New Church baptism, by which his quality may be recognized? Is it not plain that entrance into the New Church through any other gate than New Church baptism is disorderly, and that the one so entering is a thief who tries to climb up by another way?

To quote Mr. Landenberger further: "In the second place, I do not think I would be justified in concluding that the condition of people in the Christian denominations about us is the same as the 'Old Church' was when Swedenborg wrote. I should hate to think that one hundred and fifty years of missionary work, during which the truths of the New Church have revolutionized Christian thinking and living, should have left Christians in 'statu quo.'" In the last hundred and fifty years, the New Church has certainly grown within itself, but is there any place in the Writings to indicate that the sects of the Old Church,-"that old serpent," and "the woman that sitteth upon the beast,"-will reform one whit?

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     For my part, I would hate to think that the New Church is in any way responsible for most of the revolutionized thinking and living of Christians. Take, for example, the trend of universities toward evolutionary theories, agnosticism and atheism. Then we have anarchy, bolshevism, communism, corrupt politics, prohibition, feminism, woman's suffrage, and finally, increasing interest in spiritism. This is the revolutionized thinking.

     And let us see how Christians live. They kill, they steal, they commit adultery; they covet their neighbor's house, his wife, and everything that is their neighbor's; and they break all the rest of the Ten Commandments. Our courts have many divorce cases; and what a large percentage of men are disgustingly immoral! There are constant murders and robberies in our streets; and lately an increased number of lynchings with their accompanying evils; the disorders of strikes, quelled only by outward pressure, but from no apparent spiritual motive on the part of either employers or strikers.

     Consider the conditions in Russia. Consider the atrocities of the Great War, greater than in all past wars. Consider Japan's inhuman treatment of her weaker neighbors, exceeding even the Inquisition in cruelty. And even if people were better, would it make them New Church now any more than it did good people living in the time of Swedenborg? But where are the signs of moral good which Mr. Landenberger hails as a token of how the New Church has revolutionized and permeated Christian living and thinking?

     Of course, we can judge only from appearances, but when men rush into every conceivable crime, they do not appear to be of the New Church prophesied in the Revelation. Consider the conditions even within the New Church itself, where its distinctiveness is not sufficiently recognized. Wherever individuals do not realize the importance of even distinctive New Church education and social life, whether they be of Convention, Conference, or the Academy itself, many marry Old Church partners. And this, in spite of the teaching in Conjugial Love that there cannot be conjugial love between two of different religions, and that the state of the Church with a man is as the state of conjugial love with him.

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The usual consequence is that most, if not all, of their children have no interest in the Church, which then dies in that family.

     We must I realize with our whole being that this is a NEW CHURCH, as its name implies, and that its Heavenly Doctrines have nothing in common with Protestantism or Catholicism,-the "Dragon" and the "Great Whore."

     While on earth, the Lord said, "No man putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old; if otherwise, then both the new maketh a rent, and the piece that was taken out of the new agreeth not with the old. And no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish. But new wine must be put into new bottles; and both are preserved." (Luke 5:36, 37, 38.)

     "As now we have one God in the Church, Who is God Man and Man God, this Church is called the crown of all the Churches." (Invitation to the New Church, 53e.)
     HAROLD F. PITCAIRN.
Crystal City, Mo.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     THE HAGUE, HOLLAND.-During the war, it was not possible for our Pastor, the Rev. Dr. Deltenre, of Brussels, to come over to see us. It was a great pleasure, therefore, to meet again when he came recently for a few days as the guest of Mr. and Mrs. Barger, and we had a general meeting of the friends on Sunday, November 23rd, 1919. Twenty persons were present at the morning service, ten being prevented from attending. The service opened with the baptism of two little children who had been born during the war. The sermon delivered by Dr. Deltenre explained the mystery of the incarnation of the Word. It was a very exhaustive treatment, and also explained the various scientific experiments on the subject of parthenogenesis. At the conclusion of the sermon, the Holy Supper was administered to seventeen persons.

     After the service, nearly all remained to join in a plain lunch. At 2:30, a meeting of all present was held for the discussion of various subjects. Miss Bertha Barger, who was home for a visit from London, together with her fianc?, Mr. Derick Elphick, and also Mr. W. Posthuma, of the London Society, added to the interest of the meetings by their presence. The day closed suitably with a dinner at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Engeltjes, (whose baby had been baptized in the morning), at which twelve persons sat down. G. BARGER.

     COLCHESTER, ENGLAND.-On September 7th, 1919, the new order of service, arranged by the Bishop, was introduced, Messrs. Cooper, Everett, Appleton, Jr., and Appleton, Sr., conducting in turn. In spite of many imperfections, the services are well attended and much appreciated by all. We trust, however, that the temporary arrangement will not be of long duration.

     Our first social was on October 9th, with Mr. and Mrs. Potter as host and hostess. It opened with an interesting lecture by Mr. Potter on "The Tides," after which there were competitions, etc., a very enjoyable evening being spent. The next social was on October 23rd, opening with singing practice, after which Mr. Motum and family provided competitions, etc., affording another pleasant occasion.

     On Sunday, November 2nd, we were glad to welcome Miss Barger and our old friend, Mr. Derick Elphick, of London, after his long service with the Army in the East. The next evening a social was held, at which Mr. Potter gave a lecture on "The Sun," presenting the latest scientific views, compared and contrasted with the truth as revealed through Swedenborg. Competitions, arranged by Mrs. Rey Gill and Miss Gill, afforded much amusement. We have also had the pleasure of week-end visits by Miss Rouillard, of the Mauritius Society, and Miss Olive Rose, about to leave for Bryn Athyn.

     After considerable delay, we have been able to purchase a piano, which will add much to the social life of the Society. Miss Gill has been treasurer and collector of this fund for the past two years, and her efforts have matured earlier than we expected. We are looking forward with much pleasure to the return visit of the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal. F. R. COOPER.

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     CHICAGO-SHARON CHURCH.- Our regular activities have been going on as usual during the fall months, but we have been favored with more social life than is customary with us.

     The children, under the charge of Miss Ellen Wallenberg, have had I several socials. The most enjoyable of these was on a bright Saturday in the late fall when they entertained a goodly number of their friends from the Immanuel Church School of Glenview. They enjoyed a trip through Lincoln Park, nearby, a visit to the Zoo with its marvels, and a dinner at the "Parish
House."

     A week later, our young people, some of whom have returned home from, Bryn Athyn, entertained an active contingent of the young folks from Glenview at a Hallowe'en party and dance social. More than fifty were present, and we began to feel that our cozy New Church home was coming more fully into its own as a center of social activity.

     At one of our Friday suppers we listened to speeches by those who had returned from the Assembly. Needless to say, these were eagerly attended to, and as each speaker in turn brought out some new phase of the memorable meeting, something of its sphere was brought home to us in a very living way. Another of our gatherings took the form of a literary and musical evening.

     On December 4th, the ladies gave a Cafeteria Dinner, and, in connection therewith, what was announced as a modest bazaar. Despite this unpretentious heralding, more than a hundred dollars was realized, all of which went to swell the fund which the ladies are husbanding for future uses.

      The Rev. W. L. Gladish preached for the society on October 19th, and the Rev. G. H. Smith, our former Pastor, recently paid us a most welcome visit. There have been three baptisms of late-two children and one adult.

     Our Christmas celebration was held in the late afternoon and evening of December 24th. This was different from our usual custom of having it on Christmas morning. It proved a very happy event; having the features both of a religious festival and of a home gathering.

     First, there were the religious exercises, held in the room devoted to worship. The services included the singing of Christmas songs, among which were several that were new to us. The address to the children was on the meaning of the names "Wonderful" and "Counselor, as applied to the Lord. After the children had brought forward their offerings, they retired, still in the sphere of quiet and reverence, to the adjoining room, where they saw the representation of the Nativity which had been prepared for the occasion. After this, each member of the Sunday School received a gift from the church. Among these were a number of Bibles and copies of Heaven and Hell for the older children.

     In a more informal sphere, the children opened their presents and gathered near the handsome Christmas tree. Then followed a merry luncheon, with all the children t seated at a large center table, and the equally happy parents and other grown-ups at the sides. It was all very grateful with the glow of a real Christmas-tide. D. H. K.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-December 6th to 14th, I visited MIDDLEPORT, OHIO. On the two Sundays, services were held morning and evening. During the week, there were two doctrinal classes, an education class, a men's meeting, and two children's services. The Middleport Society has suffered a great loss by the removal of Mr. and Mrs. Fred. Davis and family to Pasadena, Calif.

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Thus again there is an addition to the many families and individuals of this society that have been leaving one by one to make their homes elsewhere, in most cases in other General Church centers. There now remain but seven families, and two or three persons besides. Three of the families live out in the country. Still, seven families is not small circle of the New Church, especially so when, as at Middleport, there is a strong love for the Church and its heavenly doctrines.

     At CINCINNATI, the Christmas services of the Circle were held on Sunday, December 21st. The Sunday School, which numbers seven pupils, had its celebration on Christmas morning. Young and old were present, in all twenty-two persons. The Pastor's address was on the Lord's being laid in a manger, because there was no room in the inn, showing that if the Lord is to be born in our heart, this must be a manger and not an inn,-a place where there is love for the truth of the Word and the life it teaches, and not one in which falsity is loved and rules the life. In the course of the service, offerings were brought to the altar by all present. After the service, gifts, taken from a tree that adorned the room, were presented to the children. At services, on Sunday, December 28th, the Circle celebrated the Sacrament of the Holy Supper. F. E. WAELCHLI.

     KITCHENER, ONT.-After several months delay owing to the stress of building operations at present, our Pastor and his wife finally were able to settle down in their new home during the first week in December. Several days later, the society went en masse to call upon them, and to present them with a grocery "shower." Upon entering, we proceeded to the kitchen and deposited our treasures upon the table, around which, later in the evening, we had a jolly time watching them unwrap the parcels.

     On Wednesday of the week preceding Christmas, a number of our young folks presented Goldsmith's "She Stoops to Conquer" for the benefit of the society. The play was well prepared, and on the whole very well acted. Except for the occasional falling over of the fire-place, owing to the narrowness of the passageway behind it, and despite the occasional interruptions of the prompter, due no doubt to the fact that the play was gotten up in three weeks' time, the performance was a very laudable one, and we hope to hear before long of further efforts on the part of our budding artists.

     As usual, Christmas week was well filled with celebrations and activities of one kind and another. On the last afternoon of school, Miss Eva Campbell had a party for the children, to which their parents were also invited. The first part of the afternoon consisted of a more or less formal program of recitations, songs, and stories. This was followed by examples of what the dancing class is doing under the instruction of Miss Ruona Roschman. Light refreshments were served and games indulged in by the children. During the afternoon, the children presented Mr. Odhner with a pair of mahogany candle-sticks.

     On Sunday, December 21st, the Sunday School held its Christmas celebration, which was attended by a large number of visitors. The room was decorated, and this added much to the Christmas atmosphere of the occasion. The usual forms of the Sunday service were followed, the teachers taking up the Christmas story in place of the lessons. After the Pastor's address, gifts were presented to all the Sunday School scholars, the younger grades receiving a new book in which to paste their weekly picture, and the oldest grade, now consisting solely of boys, receiving a copy of Swedenborg's "Rules of Life."

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In addition, prizes were given as a reward for perfect recitations throughout the term, and the Pastor bestowed two special prizes for attendance and punctuality.

     The children's Christmas festival took place, as usual, on December 24th, at 7:30 in the evening. Two table representations had been prepared, and placed on either side of the chancel. The shepherds on the hillside, the town of Bethlehem, and the manger in which the Lord was born, were pictured on one table; the wise men journeying from the east, on the other. After the service, the children were presented with boxes containing nuts, fruit, and candy.

     On Christmas morning, at the usual, hour, a service was held in the church, and, on the following Sunday, Holy Communion was celebrated. F. V. S.

     PITTSBURGH.-The children's Christmas Festival, which in Pittsburgh is held on the morning of Christmas Day, was not distinguished this year by any very radical departure from our usual program, and yet it was different. While we were obliged to dispense with the well-staged and heart-moving series of tableaux usually given downstairs as a continuation of the services in the chapel, we were able to compensate for this by a greater simplicity and cohesion of the program upstairs. Moreover, we were reminded once more that it is the sensation of the nearness of the Lord, and the realization of what He has done for us, that produces the traditional happiness of these occasions, especially among the children, whose life is not yet so resistant to heavenly spheres. It is quite possible for each child in each center every year to have "the finest Christmas that ever was."

     Such is the overwhelming tide of happiness, that only the Divine Wisdom itself can moderate and adapt it to the meager measure of our capacity. As we read in the Arcana, the inmost happiness of a lower heaven scarcely touches the remotest fringe of the sensed delights of the next higher plane. If a little too much inflows, it hurts! It is a mistake, therefore, to seek for greater happiness or deeper delight by a mere elaboration of things that appeal to the senses. Even a hippodrome production soon becomes stale, and at last only stuns the wearied senses. What is really new and refreshing must come from within or above, and it never inflows except into a plane of use. In other words, it is what you put into your representations that counts, more than the mere perfection of outer forms.

     Perhaps a few definite details of our service would interest the friends elsewhere. As the children marched in, singing "From the Eastern Mountains" and bringing their offerings to the chancel, where the two priests awaited them, they enjoyed a surprise; for, in addition to the usual representation upon the left of the chancel, picturing the town of Bethlehem with the shepherds and their flocks in the fields round about, and the three wise men approaching upon their camels, there was, on the other side, most attractive straw-thatched stable, framed with neutral velvet curtains, like a painting by an old master. After the singing of the Christmas songs, interspersed with readings from the Word, the Pastor addressed the children, dwelling upon the pivotal importance of the Day, and afterwards calling their attention to the scene and what it represented, this closing the first part of the service.

     Part 2 opened with the reading of Luke 2:1-7, the children then reciting verses 8-12, at which point the curtains at the left parted as if of themselves, the star gleamed above the stable, and the exquisitely beautiful scene of the nativity was shown, while an invisible choir sang the Hymn, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty" (no. 7) After the children had recited verses 13-20, the scene was shown again, this time somewhat altered, while "Holy Night" was sung.

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     The gifts for the younger children were dainty, home-made paper baskets, filled with fruits and other goodies; to the older ones were given boxes, each with a tangerine attached. As each child's name was read out, he came forward to receive his gift-babies being carried. It was thought that this would make a stronger impression upon them, and it certainly did upon us older folks. The music was strengthened by the addition of so many fresh young voices, home for the holidays.

     At the Holy Supper service on the Sunday following, a quartet of young people contributed a Hebrew anthem and a beautiful hymn, both sung without accompaniment. With all this musical training at Bryn Athyn, past and present, we look to see our own choir activities spring into new life at any time now.

     Our holiday dance was a dream of lovely girls and gallant youths,-in equal number, an unusual happening here. Yet the floor was not too crowded for the best enjoyment of the exceptionally the four-piece orchestra, and the wee small hours seemed to produce no signs of weariness. Even the older friends, catching the spirit, stayed to the end.

     In addition to some fifteen members of our own society who came home for the holidays, our visitors have included Messrs. Donald Freeman, Aldwyn and Winfred Smith, of Bryn Athyn; Mr. Fred. Grant, of State College, and Miss Ware, of New York. H. S.

     PARIS, FRANCE.-In a letter to the Rev. W. H. Alden, dated December 11, 1919, the Rev. F. Hussenet writes: "I take pleasure in announcing the engagement of my son, Elisee, to Mademoiselle Marcelle Van der Zwalmen dite Due. The betrothal was celebrated at our Temple on Sunday, December 7th. Though the weather was stormy, our friends came in large numbers. Two musicians, one a flutist, members of our Society, played some lovely music during the service. Elisee is twenty-four years old, was in the war for four years, being badly gassed, and received the Croix de Guerre. The two young people belong to the Academy."

     BRYN ATHYN.-In our Christmas celebration this year, it was necessary to institute a number of changes from the customs of the past, in order to develop something better accommodated to the worship in the Cathedral. It was found impossible to have the usual tableaux in connection with the children's festival, but in place of these every effort was made to perfect the service itself, which was held at 4 o'clock in the afternoon of December 24th. Through the kindness of Mr. Raymond Pitcairn, the chancel was brilliantly lighted with candles and decorated with flowers and growing plants. The children, accompanied by their teachers and members of the choir carrying lighted candles, marched in procession from the choir rooms west along the north aisle, and thence up the center aisle to the chancel, where they made their offerings. The procession here divided into two columns, and passed to their pews by the north and south aisles.

     The children recited appropriate selections from the Word in Hebrew, Greek, and English; and sang the favorite Christmas songs. Bishop W. F. Pendleton delivered the address, telling a story which illustrated the power of song to bring the presence of angels and to arouse spiritual affections. The service was enriched by incidental music from wind instruments, played by members of the Philadelphia Orchestra.

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After the service, carols were alternately played by these musicians and sung by the children from the choir rooms, and each child, on departing, was presented with a gift from the Society.

     Mention should be made of the very beautiful representation of The Nativity, the artistic production of Mr. Winfred Hyatt, which was placed in the north transept, remaining there for the Christmas season. Another feature was the star suspended over the tower of the cathedral, which shone brilliantly at night, beautifully suggestive of the one that "came and stood over the place where the young child was."

     A general service was held on the morning of Christmas Day, the sermon being delivered by Bishop N. D. Pendleton-a profound exposition of the text, "That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." (Luke 1:35) On Sunday morning, December 28th, the regular quarterly administration of the Holy Supper took place; and, on the evening of the same day, a cantata, entitled "The Christ Child," was sung by the choir and congregation, being adapted for use as a service of worship, with lessons from the Gospel at intervals.

     By these four services, the celebration of that which is the central event of all history was made more complete. It seems to have been an improvement not to crowd everything desired as part of our observance into the limited time of a single day.

     On New Year's Day at 7:30 o'clock, a sunrise service was held in the cathedral. The sermon by the assistant Pastor was on the text, "So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom." (Psalm 90:12.) This year, the service was not followed by the customary society breakfast. In the evening, however, a very successful dance was given by the Civic and Social Club. G. DE C.

     CHICAGO.-The work of the Swedenborg New Church Society is still being carried on with an enthusiasm which guarantees a legitimate use of the poet's words, that it "gives proof through the night that our flag is still there." We cannot report any special external growth and progress, but we can give our testimony to the fact that we are "still there," doing our humble little "bit," and waiting patiently for the dawning of a more favorable day.

     The work has gone on steadily since the former report in the Life, except during the months of July and August, when the Pastor did missionary work. The great distances prevent us from all meeting in one hall, and consequently we are obliged to meet at two places in the city. That is a drawback, but we hope to have it amended some day. Our main work is being carried on in Englewood, where we meet on Sunday afternoons, at Barbee Hall, 150 W. 69th St. After the service we have a brief Sunday School service. Our Sunday School in Lake View meets every Sunday forenoon. The mid-week doctrinal class is kept up regularly at the homes of the members. We have gone through several works since we began, and now we are in the second volume of T. C. R. These classes serve as a bond of mutual interest, and they help largely to keep up the social sphere among those of the society. Besides, we have the monthly suppers, and these also are agents for external good in our group.

     The feminine element, under the name of "The Swedenborg New Church Society Auxiliary," has recently bestirred itself with the aim of raising money for the future uses of the society. The first effort was a cafeteria, which turned out to be a success, and stimulated the interest to try this again, and also other means for raising money in an equitable way.

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     The first of the year, two of our young people will make their home at Gorand Rapids, Mich. The Pastor's son and his wife, owing to business interests, will settle there. While this is not fully in keeping with the desire of the society, it is unavoidable, and our good wishes go with them. It may lead to a visit by the Pastor, and an effort publicly to make known the Glad Tidings of the Lord's Second Coming once again in that city.
     JOHN HEADSTEN.

     TORONTO, CANADA.-On September 27th, we had the pleasant task of welcoming all our returned soldiers at a supper and social held in the church. In the Divine Providence of the Lord, all who enlisted from our society returned home safely to Canada. They were: Messrs. Frank Wilson, Joseph Knight, Fred. Bellinger, Theodore Bellinger, S. D. Jessemain, and John Longstaff. There were 84 present at the gathering, and many were the sentiments of good-will and thankfulness expressed during the evening. Mr. Cronlund acted as toast- master, and our soldiers responded to the following toasts: 1. The New Church; 2. Freedom; 3. To the Spirit of Self-Sacrifice and Courage; 4. To those who have given their lives in the cause of Freedom; 5. To the Wives of the Soldiers; 6. Peace. After supper, the rest of the evening was devoted to dancing. For the first time in five years we could dance and be care-free.

     Our Thanksgiving Day coming on October 13th, Mr. Cronlund conducted a Thanksgiving Service on Sunday, October 12th. This year the main theme was thankfulness for Victory and Peace. The children had their little service in the afternoon.

     After the Wednesday evening supper on October 15th, Mr. Cronlund gave us an account of the Assembly at Bryn Athyn, the description of the dedication of the Cathedral being of particular interest to us all, especially to those not able to attend the Assembly. Dr. Richardson, Mrs. Frank Longstaff, and Miss Celia Bellinger added interesting details. On this occasion, that earnest New Church worker, Mrs. McQueen, of Glenview, was present with us. She made us feel more intimately acquainted with the Glenview Society while she was here.

     Some of the young people have felt that they would like to meet together to discuss general questions of interest. So last spring we formed a Young People's Forum, and the meetings are held every alternate Monday evening, when informal discussion of subjects chosen by the members themselves take place, followed by a social hour. Some of our subjects have been: "The Woman Labor Question," "Remains," "Is our Charity to be limited to our daily occupation?" "Spiritualism," "Christian Science," and "Missionary Effort." There is a freedom of discussion at these meetings which is refreshing, and no doubt useful, and, with Mr. Cronlund's aid, we try to view each subject in the light of New Church Truth.

     The younger people who have left the Church School for the city High Schools, or who have gone into business, meet for a doctrinal class on alternate Tuesdays. They meet regularly at the church; but are sometimes invited to meet at a member's home, when they finish the evening with games and refreshments.

     Miss Bellinger arranged a children's Hallowe'en masquerade party for the pupils and ex-pupils, and they all had a jolly afternoon and evening, going through the proverbial Hallowe'en stunts.

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     At a social held at the church on Friday, December 5th, part of the evening was occupied in surprising Mr. Cyril Bellinger and his bride with a miscellaneous "shower," to welcome them into our society.

     The children's Christmas Festival took place on the evening of Tuesday, December 23rd. The Pastor conducted a short service, in which he spoke to the children about the fact that when the Lord was born into the world His soul was Divine, which is not the case with any other infants. He also said that on Church festival occasions the angels meet at the same time in the other world and rejoice. The service closed with a series of four tableaux, prepared Mrs. Ray Brown and Mrs. F. Longstaff. The Pastor told the story of each tableau before the curtain was raised. Their subjects were: "The Finding of Moses, the Infant, by Pharaoh's Daughter;" "The Child Samuel, called by the Lord;" "The Youth David, playing before King Saul;" "The Wise Men worshiping before the Manger-bed of the Infant Jesus." 'The tableaux produced a delightful sphere for adults and children. The offering at this service was made a contribution to the scholarship fund.

     We then adjourned; to the basement, where a representation of the Shepherds, the Star, and the Manger, had been prepared. Mr. Cronlund and Miss Bellinger had arranged short exercises for the children, as they viewed the representation, after which screens were removed displaying a pretty Christmas tree, from which every child in the Society received a gift.

     On Christmas morning, a short service was held in the church, which was simply, but effectively decorated with holly. Cold weather, with snow that came the day before, gave us an ideal Christmas Day and brightened the festive season for old and young. B. S.

     PHILADELPHIA, PA-Christmas has come and gone. With it came the usual round of festivity and good cheer, and with it also came the reconsecration of our lives to the work of Him who was born as a babe in Bethlehem. As a city Society, we find it necessary to celebrate Christmas on the preceding Sunday. This year, the chapel was made beautiful with laurel and flowers, tastefully arranged by Mr. George B. Heaton, who has had charge of this world for the past three years. The first service of the day was at 10:30 a. m. The adults assembled in the chapel, while the children assembled in our new gymnasium, and from thence marched in procession to the chapel, singing "From the Eastern Mountains." It is always a pleasing sight to see children in procession, and one which is productive of profound emotions.

     In the service that followed, there was an even balance between songs which all sang and those for the children alone. One very beautiful part of the service was the interlude, wherein Mrs. Elizabeth Walker sang the verses to "Peace, Peace, On Earth," and the children responded with the chorus. The sermon dealt with "The Star," and pointed out that it represented the Divine Human of the Lord, which was given to guide us to true worship and the heavenly life. The service concluded with a recessional sung by the children, "The Voice of One Crying In the Wilderness." This was to foreshadow the work of the Lord's ministry following His childhood.

     Then came a banquet for all the teachers and workers in the Christmas Festival. It was wholly informal, and the toasts had to be drunk in coffee! However, it afforded a splendid social occasion for the workers to get together and have a good heart-to-heart talk.

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     The Festival took place at 4:30 p. m. All the representations were produced by the Sunday School staff and scholars, assisted by Mr. F. J. Cooper at the piano, and Mrs. Elizabeth Walker and Mrs. K. R. Alden, who rendered incidental music. The Drama that followed was prefaced by some remarks by the Minister and a song by a little three-year-old girl, which brought a truly childlike sphere that pervaded all that followed.

     The first Act included three scenes, as follows Scene 1. Zacharias recovering his speech. Scene 2. The annunciation to Mary. Scene 3. The meeting of Mary and Elizabeth. The Second Act was the manger scene. First, the angels entered (impersonated by little girls of the Sunday School and two of the teachers). Then entered the shepherds, consisting of the boys of the Sunday School. And, finally the three wise men. This Act closed: with the singing of "Come All Ye Faithful." After the Festival, the Christmas tree was lighted and there was a general distribution of presents.

     On New Year's eve, we held a watch meeting, the early part of the evening being taken up with dancing and a motion picture film. At 11:45, we repaired to the chapel, and there opened the New Year with short devotional service. After this, the young folks danced until the wee small hours. The affair was pronounced a great success, and much credit is due to the committee, consisting of Mrs. Soderberg and Mrs. Good. K. R. A.

     GLENVIEW.-Christmas and New Year's Festivities were carried out by the Immanuel Church in the customary manner. On Christmas morning, there was worship in the church at which both children and adults made their offerings, and this was followed by further exercises in the Assembly Hall, where the children received their gifts from the Church. On the Saturday after Christmas, there was a children's party, and on New Year's eve, the usual Social followed by Watch Night Service and concluding with dancing. Our Pastors address at the Watch Night Service was based upon the text in Exodus 23:16, "Ye shall keep the feast of Ingathering in the going out of the year. Its perfect adaptation to the occasion may be seen from the following quotations from the address:

     "The Jews, at the going out of the year, were commanded to celebrate the feast of Ingathering. They were to be 'altogether joyful.' They were to take the fruit from the tree of honor, branches from the palm, and from the thick-twisted trees, and from the willows by the brook, and use these in their jubilation. This was at the close of their year. To rejoice with the fruit of the 'tree of honor' meant to rejoice on account of the good which had been implanted. To rejoice with the boughs of the palm, and the thick tree, and the willow by the brook, meant to rejoice on account of the possession of truth, spiritual, rational, and scientific. For the only thing which can truly be said to crown the outgoing year with success is the truth of all three degrees and the good which has been implanted in the life and character of men and groups or men. So, while looking forward to the possibilities for the Church in the coming year, our attention is held to the thought of how the Church may progress in goodness and innocence, the tree of honor, and how she may progress in the three-fold order of truths, 'the boughs of the palm,' of the 'thick-twisted tree,' and the 'willow by the brook.' And whatever real progress the Church has made in the past year has been in regard to these things.

     "We can see the possibility of promoting the good of the Church in the coming year by a better attendance and greater constancy in worship.

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Attendance is the best practical means of increasing her good of innocence and her truth of faith. You may promote the Church with money, but money is the least of all the necessary means of promoting the Church to her greatest possible efficiency and perfection. Attendance is far more important, and leads to the adequate supply of all other needs. You can imagine the New Church succeeding with a full attendance and a poor support in money; but you cannot imagine it as anything but a failure with a full money-support and an insufficient attendance. Money is needed, but people are needed more,-people who attend however, from a love of the use of keeping alive the Divine among men, (the highest of all social uses), by continuous worship, and by instruction from the Word,-people who attend, not listlessly, not indifferently, not tardily, but punctually, interestingly, peacefully, humbly, and yet responsive and tuned to the occasion, entering into the ritual with spirit and life. Let us put emphasis upon this for the year soon to be born. In other words, let us realize the saying of the Lord, 'The zeal of Thy house hath eaten me up.'" G. A. MCQUEEN.

     ROSTHERN AND HAGUE, SASK., CAN.-The town of Rosthern, my former dwelling-place, still has an attraction for me, especially because several New Church families live there, among them that of Mr. John Hamm, who have recently returned from Argentina, S. A. I went there from Hague, where I now reside, on Wednesday, Christmas eve, to attend the Christmas festival, but, on arriving, learned that it would not be held until the following evening. So I spent two pleasant days with the friends there. The celebration, under the Christmas tree, in the Hamm residence, was most delightful. The parlor and dining room, were well filled, 54 persons, young and old, being present. Among these, only one person was not of the New Church. Addresses on the Christmas story and on the significance of the tree were made by the writer and by Mr. John Bech. Christmas songs were sung, and, appropriate poems recited by the children. A Spanish poem was given by the little Misses Adelina and Justina Hamm. We had a happy Christmas time, indeed. The writer had the pleasure of being remembered with gifts by some of the Rosthern members, and on Friday morning returned home.

     At Hague the celebration took place on Friday evening, at the John Heinrich's residence. Here, again, we had a beautiful tree. About seventy persons took part. Mr. C. P. Unruh opened the celebration with an address in English; and, later, the writer spoke concerning the Christmas tree. Along program was rendered by the choir and the children. It was evident that all had practiced their parts well; but credit must also be given the singing teacher, Mr. Unruh. The evening was most enjoyable, and all went home feeling they had had a happy Christmas time; but most of all the little ones, for whom it was a most delightful time,- and it is for the children, especially, that Christmas is the great festival, while those who are older rejoice with them.

     It is my belief that only Newchurchmen can celebrate Christmas "in spirit and in truth," for they alone know that the only God became man; and in their celebration, they worship the One God, the Lord Jesus Christ. This fundamental truth of the Doctrines of the New Church deeply moves the hearts and souls of all of the Church at Christmas time. P. CLAASEN.

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PASTORAL ADDRESS 1920

     ANNOUNCEMENTS.


NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL.          MARCH, 1920           No. 3
     At this first getting together of the pilgrims just returned from the great Assembly, with those who were not so fortunate as to attend, it seems fitting that we should indulge in a measure of self-examination, and "instruct one another in regard to the things of love and faith, thus the things of heaven," as the ancients were wont to do at their dinners and suppers. (A. C. 7996)

     The churches about us are suffering and struggling with death, because of the decreasing number of really zealous and conscientious members who are willing to obey the "first and great commandment," and who thus lack the true unifying and life-giving essence in their efforts to "love their neighbor as themselves."

     As to all the thought of the learned, there is nothing left but Nature; and so the old faith, not only as to its perversions, but even as to its foundation truths,-the belief in God, the Word, and the hereafter,-is perishing. Truly the "sun is darkened" and "the moon giveth not her light." The "stars have fallen" from the heaven of their interior thought, and the "powers" of that same heaven have "been shaken" to their very foundation. The result is a most alarming decrease in attendance at worship, and even in external membership.

     Our task-and it is a desperate one-is to deliver a remnant who have not yet lost their faith, and to keep them and their posterity from being swept away by this rising tide of skepticism, with its wreckage of undermined churches. In the face of the prevailing conditions, it is no easy matter to hold our own, to maintain the number of really zealous members who are willing to go to bed early enough on Saturday night to get up in time for church on Sunday morning, to say nothing of the doctrinal class and home worship.

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What, then, can we do to safeguard our Church from the impending wreckage of the former Church?

The Academy believes that we must obey the Divine injunction to "come out of her, my people, lest ye be partakers in her iniquity." The first step of deliverance is always repentance,-the stripping off of the hypocrisy of our age, the detection of the really infernal condition, not only of the world, but of ourselves. Unless we ourselves do this to begin with, and commence the development of some real Christian charity within ourselves, it is vain for us to snatch up our children and flee into the country, or anywhere else. Efforts toward the segregation of New Church families can only succeed in preserving the growth of the Church when they are dominated by a true humility and are indicated by the necessity of some use. In such case, the Church may be greatly helped by establishing homes in a neighborhood where the women can sustain and help each other in trying to lead a life of Christian charity and conjugial love, and in raising a family to inherit this, the greatest treasure in the world. Under such conditions, the tremendous power of environment is converted from a force opposing to a force promoting the preservation of whatever traditions have thus far been developed.

There must be no dangerous or fatal gaps in the circle of our church work. First, after drinking at the heavenly fountain and eating at the blessed board ourselves, we must educate our children- and this right up to the gates of Bryn Athyn. But what about them when they come back-during the trying years on the lower rounds of the business ladder, and before they are able to establish a home of their own? We say, "We have not enough for a social circle of our own." So we give it up. And, of course, at this rate we never will have any adequate social life of our own. This talk about not having enough young people is sometimes only an excuse. I know of a society where there were enough,-eight of each sex, and just the very best number for a cosy little social set,-but they didn't especially dare for each other!

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They had already found social connections outside; indeed, some of their parents had been very desirous that they should do this before going to Bryn Athyn to school.

     Remove that feeling, and substitute the ideal, both in thought and life,-the ideal of being satisfied with New Church social life, not being willing to dissipate time and strength on outside interests, and the problem will solve itself very quickly by the ten-fold influx of a new delight and a new spirit from heaven. This is poured out when there are so many leaks; our efforts do not blossom and flourish for the lack of sap. If our social tree is not flourishing, let us consider whether it is not in need of pruning. We can at least remove the parasites that are diverting its life forces into other channels, outside of the Church. Then the Church life will be full of sap, and push upward, to bud and blossom and bear fruit.

     Just think what an addition to our Church, thus to all our prospects of happiness in this world, to say nothing of the next, it would mean to have such a strong social sphere, into which we may from time to time bring the friends we meet in the world, giving them an opportunity to see and feel just what the New Church really is! "Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

     In a thought-provoking paper at the Teachers" Institute meeting, Miss Celia Bellinger pointed out how much better a school carries itself when it has enough pupils-beyond a score or so,-to play more games and have a stronger sphere. But, while we must admit that there is a great stimulus in numbers, we must not forget that the real strength comes by impletion, and that we must necessarily begin with a few. One family, strong in the spirit of the Church, is better than ten which add only numbers, and no strong zeal. For the latter keep dropping off, and attend very poorly. That their children go about spiritually underfed and in rags seems to worry them very little. So their moral support is weak, even though they contribute money.

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     In our little school, we believe that we are raising up a set of children who will gradually become the best of friends, and that, because of their common respect for the things of heaven, this friendship, in the course of years, (especially if they have the blessed privilege of the Bryn Athyn education), will grow stronger instead of weaker, and provide a bond within the Church that will be more satisfying and real than anything that is possible without such a bond of religion. Besides, if we do our work aright, both at home and at school, they will acquire the habit of confession and repentance, which is the Divine means of healing and restoring our charity,-the very fountain of eternal youth. Unless we get some such results from all our work with the children; unless they are more desirous and better able to live together in the sphere of our glorious new Christianity than we have been; then we must acknowledge defeat, and start over again.

     The children's Sunday Service is especially adapted to refresh and keep alive their love of the Lord and thought concerning Him and His laws. But this must be carried into practice, or it will fail of its purpose. Where the sphere of worship is disturbed by any of the children, it destroys the use of it for all, not to mention the danger of profanation. We cannot be too zealous in avoiding this.

     The chief lesson of the Assembly is the urgent need of strengthening our worship. We need a stronger sphere of reverence to implant the remains, both in ourselves and in our children,-the remains upon which heaven and the church principally rest. Is there anything that we can do, in keeping with our present circumstances, to improve and develop this phase of our uses?

     As the one appointed, according to the Divine law and order, to lead in matters of worship and instruction in spiritual things, I beg of you all to join me in a most humble searching of the heart, to uncover, each one in himself, the faults that are keeping us from entering into a fuller state of religious fervor, and also detracting from the power of the general sphere that would help others as well. The time has come for a serious repentance and a drastic reform in this field.

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We must take ourselves seriously in hand, and see that no excuse short of absolute impossibility keeps us away from the Sunday worship and the weekly instruction. Moreover, we must stop coming late to worship. If invited to court, would we arrive late? Would we so treat even an ordinary host, if we had any respect or manners? It is really a more serious disorder than we would like to be charged with in public, and yet it has grown so common that we have almost ceased to feel seriously apologetic.

I realize, of course, that the fault is very widespread. Hardly anyone at this day, among people of our sort, has enough of a realizing sense of the Divine presence in worship to be seriously shocked at such laxity,-except, perhaps, on reflection. But this recent Assembly has been an eye opener to us, as it has to many others: We have all believed in the power and use of representatives, and acknowledged our need of greater reverence; but never before has the Church as a whole experienced it. It was like a baptism of the spirit. And when this comes to any man or woman, the time for argument is past. It is no longer a question of whether we shall develop our external worship, and by it get ourselves into a proper attitude to receive the Divine instruction in heart as well as in the intellect. The only question with us now is home, to do this.

It is not that we need to extend and elaborate the already beautiful externals of our worship, but to revive and make really effective what we have. If we can only bring ourselves really to pray to the Lord in humble adoration of heart-at home, at meals, in Sunday School, in church-we shall have accomplished the greatest good to ourselves and to the Church that can come in one generation. We do not pray. We only repeat our prayers, as a usual thing. Yet it is this matter of the heart's attitude that counts as much as the intellectual insight, which has hitherto been our chief concern, and which, of course, will ever remain the central gem of our service. But the time has come for us to cast our net on the right side of the ship, to make a more definite and powerful appeal to the affections, so that the precious seeds of the instruction given may be warmed into life, and the present famine of real delight and sustentation with many be relieved.

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FORGIVENESS 1920

FORGIVENESS Rev. HUGO LJ. ODHNER 1920

     "And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors." (Matthew 6:12.)

     "And forgive us our sills, for we ourselves also forgive all who are debtors unto us." (Luke 11:4.)

     The Prayer which the Lord taught His disciples is a summary of all His teachings. It comprises the very essence of all Theology and all Religion, and is in its form an epitome of the whole Divine Word. All things of faith and all things of charity are contained therein. Thus all things of that new life which is called the regenerate life are present in the Lord's Prayer, with all the power of salvation. And this is so because the very spirit of the Lord Himself breathes forth in the words of that Prayer,-the spirit of Divine Wisdom and Mercy; not a spirit of condemnation or reproach, but of forgiveness and consolation.

     This spirit is seen as the marking feature of a marvelous life. The governing idea of the Sermon on the Mount, which opened the Lord's period of public teaching, was "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy;" and before He breathed His last upon the cross, after a life of mercy and compassion, He said of His persecutors, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do."

     Forgiveness was the doctrine of charity which the Lord brought back into a wasted world, and this was done at the close of a dispensation which, founded on the retaliative law of "an eye for an eye" and "a tooth for a tooth," ended with the greatest act of intolerance against what is true and noble that can be conceived. And after the Lord had ascended unto His Father, the record of His spirit of forgiveness still remains as an ennobling heritage to human history, and as the Divine basis in the regeneration of men and hearts.

     The kernel of the doctrine of charity is therefore carried over into the Lord's Prayer.

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For we are to implore our Heavenly Father to forgive us as far as we can be forgiven, acknowledging that those only can obtain mercy who are themselves merciful. Involved in that prayer is the acknowledgment that we; are steeped in iniquities and sins; that we cannot in any wise be saved from pure mercy; that we do not merit heaven or even life itself. Nay, we at the same time confess that we cannot ask even for forgiveness, but only for the power to repent; i. e., for the ability to receive the Lord's influx of love, whereby we may be endowed with charity towards our fellowmen. There is utter humiliation in the prayer,-confession of sins, and a pleading for mercy and for the heavenly delight in willing and doing well towards our neighbor. The whole of repentance and the whole of regeneration is what is the subject in this prayer for forgiveness.

The truth must be stated once and for all that the Lord never ceases to forgive. Love always forgives. It reckons not with the past. It only desires to be received. It is so exalted and sublime that pride has no communion with it. It continually excuses, continually intercedes, continually forgives, and abundantly pardons. When we ask the Lord to forgive us for the transgressions of the past, that prayer is immediately fulfilled; and as far as the Lord's compassion is concerned, the plea for forgiveness is fulfilled unconditionally. The Lord's mercy does not cease, even towards the devils in hell; their past is forgiven them; their future is provided for from, Divine love, which guards their freedom, and grants them life, even amidst the valley of death.

The Lord continually forgives. Yet, in the language of appearances, we speak of His not forgiving, and pray that, in as far as we forgive, He may forgive; as if His wrath were more severe than ours. It is necessary to speak in such a way, because the constant appearance is such. The appearance is that with the merciful He is merciful, that with the perfect He is perfect, that with the pure He is pure, but that with the perverse He contendeth. (Psalm 18:25-27.) Within the range of these appearances human life is laid. For these appearances are what condition our life, and make it finite and human.

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We cannot see God as He is outside of these conditionments,-as He is in His own Essence; but we do see Him, and meet with Him, as He comes to us in terms of human life,-in the conditions and states that compose our minds, and that make up our own selves. And viewed from this angle, the Lord appears as wise and loving only as we human beings receive the treasures of His Wisdom and Love. A stupid man sees no wisdom in the laws of His universe, but only mistakes and haphazard performances without connection or purpose. An evil man feels no love in the administrations of Providence, but only tyranny and malignity. Merciful to the merciful, pure to the pure; but perverse to the man of folly and iniquity,-so the Lord appears in human life. So man senses His presence and His operation, for so man receives Him.

This is the reason, then, why man must pray "Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors." This is the reason, also, why man must undergo the change called repentance and regeneration, in order to receive the Lord's life more and more fully, and become the plane for the many miracles of His Divine Love and Wisdom, and of His Divine forgiveness. The influx is limited to what the vessel can hold; and the effect of the influx is according to the character of the vessel, pure with the pure, but impure with those who are themselves impure.

We are to be in the desire to become pure and forgiving, therefore, that the water of life may be poured into our minds as into a cup of crystal; and that Our daily bread,-the heavenly manna for which we pray,-may not breed evil things before the day is done. Life on earth is meant to be a process of purification, an ennobling process whereby the dress of earth is refined and put aside, and the spirit of the soul comes forth and makes itself felt. But, because of evils of heredity and actuality, there must be repentance first of all, as an introductory step to the regeneration of the spirit. No man, of his own power, can repent, for repentance means the breaking away from the very ties that bind his heart. It means even more,-the removal and judgment of the spirits from hell that are present within his mind. It is the Divine work of redemption, which the Lord continually performs, that enables man to shun evils as sins against God.

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But the Lord does this work, and therefore man also can do his part. For man, too, has a part, which he must perform as of himself, and this is the endeavor to "cease to do evil and learn to do well." During his life in the world, he must read and hear the Word, learn what is evil and what is good, shun all things of evil delight as accursed, and strive to turn away from them, even in thought and intention.

     The Lord forgives our evils if we repent of them. He judges not by the past, but by the present. What man leaves behind is not his any more. The Lord pardons man whenever he repents of any evil. For repentance means the removal and putting away of the evil,-the renunciation of the delight which pertains to that evil. And so far as evils are shunned, the foods opposite to those evils are appropriated; so far as thefts are resisted, a love of honesty is instilled; so far as slander is resisted, a love of truthfulness; so far as laziness is overcome, man grows industrious; so far as obscenities of speech, act, or thought are shunned, so far man comes into chastity; so far as self-conceit is removed, there comes humility to take its place. In other words, charity comes to us by our shunning evils as sins against God.

     Only if we repent can we ask the Lord to forgive us. For to ask forgiveness for an evil means to be of a repentant frame of mind. It were vain to ask pardon for faults we do not acknowledge or wish to be rid of. To ask pardon for an evil means to ask that it be taken away-removed! Removed from our very life and will!

     We emphasize this because, simple as the law is, it is not always understood. In the old Christian Church, the idea prevails that God forgives sinners by an immediate act of mercy, blotting out their iniquities in a moment. For God to do this with an evil man would not be mercy, but doom. It would mean the sudden and forcible taking away of that man's whole life, for his delights of love and will are his life. It would mean his annihilation. But happily the Lord does not proceed to forgive in such a way.

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He leaves it to man, instead, to repent of his own free will, to curb his disorderly desires one by one, and to receive forgiveness day by day and year by year. This is the mercy of Divine Wisdom.

     Let us now consider why the prayer is not worded, as might be expected, "Forgive us our debts as we repent of them," but, "Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors."

     The general reason is that what we pray for, in the internal spirit of the words, is that we may be endowed with the will of good, or charity; that we may have love in our heart for others, even as the Lord loves us. Repentance, it is true, is the road to charity. But charity is the goal. When our evils are removed, so that the Lord's love may be received by us, and our sins are forgiven and forgotten, then we also have love for our fellow men; and forgive them their trespasses. To forgive others is the great Christian virtue,-the sign of charity. Forgiveness is the sign that we have, at least in part, the spirit of repentance. If forgiveness is lacking in us, our repentance may be likened to that of the pardoned servant who threw his fellow-servant into prison for a debt of a hundred pence, when he himself had been forgiven of ten thousand talents. (Matthew 18:23-35) It is against such mock repentance that the Lord warns us, in the saying, "When ye stand praying, forgive if ye have ought against any; that your heavenly Father also may forgive you your trespasses." "If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift." Yet such is the perversity of human scruples, that it sometimes seems easier to offer peace-offerings to a God when; one cannot meet face to face than to do a simple act of restitution toward a neighbor against whom one has offended. Albeit, in their souls men know that repentance must come first, lest worship proceed from a profane heart.

     And in a world such as ours, what form should repentance take if not forgiveness! For we have much to be forgiven and much to forgive, We are all bound in the evils of heredity, which differ very little among individuals.

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Our hearts all tend towards what is disorderly, rash, hurtful we are not naturally sincere, humble, or pure in mind; envy, lust, impatience, and conceit of opinion, are no strangers within our minds. But man thinks not so much of his own faults, but searches for those of others. He justifies himself, but he finds no excuse for his brother. He is anxious to pull out the mote from another's eye, but sees not to remove the beam from his own.

     It is said that the Lord left the ninety-nine sheep in the mountains, and went to search for the one that was lost. It is said that the Lord hurled his "woes" upon the Pharisees and scribes, while visiting His mercies upon the publicans and the outcasts. It is told how He rebuked the self-appointed judges of a harlot; how, when His word, written in the earth, had sent them away, He turned to the woman and said, "Woman, where are those thine accusers? Hath no man condemned thee?'" And when she replied, "No man, Lord," He said, "Neither do I condemn thee; go, and sin no more."

     Even these words and acts too often stir us only for a moment, after which they leave the mind complacent and self-satisfied. And when forgiveness is needed, we are slow to grant it. Or we grant it in words, but not in spirit. It is the human tendency to nurse the wrongs that we may have suffered until they grow out of all proportion to reality; to conjure up from our minds the possible motives which might have inspired those acts or words which trouble us; until finally-though perhaps far too late-we are startled with repulsion when we look upon the horrible imagery that our fancy has built up.

     Every truth, indeed, has a perversion. A semblance of forgiveness may come from evil. The words, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her," are often turned to mean that evil is so universal that it is unavoidable and not a sin. Forgiveness may thus spring from our own indifference to sin, our lack of love for that principle of life or that commandment which the sin assails. This is not forgiveness of sin, but a partaking in the sin. For what we hold to be allowable, that we do in our spirit, and if opportunity offers we also do it in act.

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     The duty of forgiveness is made an excuse for evil. But the duty of forgiveness is none the less a duty. It stands against all assaults. It is not a forgiveness that is exhausted if abused. It is to be exercised toward our brethren without stint,-not seven times, but seventy times seven.

     We must forgive, and not condemn. But this means that we shall forgive the man who sins, not the evil itself; and that we shall not condemn the man, but abhor the evil. In our thought we must separate the man from the evil which, infests the man. We must love the one and abhor the other. We must aid the man, and oppose the evil which we think he has. We must forgive the man, but condemn the evil. Nor can we help him to overcome his faults if we condemn him: and withdraw from him that sympathetic encouragement of companionship which is the sustaining thing in the life of every human being. It is true that we must guard against companionship with those who appear to be confirmed in evils of life, and in falsities from such evil. We must guard first of all our own souls. But we must also watch lest we hurt the souls of others by withdrawing our love from them when they may need it most.

     Intolerance breeds intolerance; and it is the enemy of civilization, for it strikes at the roots of human freedom. For all freedom is rooted in charity. Intolerance which condemns first and inquires afterwards tends to the destruction of all mutual life, and of all that is precious in human society. And the efforts of the devils of hell center in such a destruction. The Writings tell of their efforts, so that we may know and beware. Evil spirits excite the mind of a man to hate his neighbor's person but to love and applaud his evils, so far as they do no harm to himself. But the angels love man as a brother, and strive to bend his affections away from evil, leading him in freedom according to the reason and knowledge he has. Evil spirits hate man, and continually stir up whatever evil he has done or thought. At the same time they instil their own evil affections with him, and then accuse him of these evils, tormenting him until he believes that he is utterly lost; and thus they strive to extinguish all encouragement, and cause him to be even like unto themselves.

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Even what is good they turn into evil, by perverting it a thousand ways, and then condemning him for it.

     But, it is different with the angels. They continually avert the evils of hell from man, encouraging him, and even, if necessary, defending and excusing his evils and falsities, so far as these are not appropriated or confirmed by man; and thus, as far as they can, they try to amend what is not good in him. Even as the Lord, who bends all evil into good.

     And men who are in charity are as the angels. For they, too, are forgiving. They look not for the evil of another, but for the goods and truths, and put the best possible interpretation on what is evil and false. Nor do they deride another, or publish his errors on every occasion. And if they are instructed, they allow for the fact that the evils and falsities which adhere to others may not be theirs-may only adhere as a sphere of temptation rather than as confirmed evil; or be excusable on account of ignorance or simplicity, wherein something of innocence may abide. And above all, they will seek to avoid identifying the man with the evil, or making him feel that the evil is his. The truth is, that so long as man regards an evil or a falsity of his as coming from hell, and as a thing not his own, so long it is not appropriated, but can be forgiven. But woe to him who perverts this truth into an excuse for delaying repentance.

     Thus we pray, "Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors." We owe so much. We have nothing from ourselves. Lift, freedom, possessions, happiness,-all is a debt to God and to the neighbor. And there may be those who are debtors to us, who depend upon us for their happiness. Love makes debtors. What love gives is forever a debt that cannot be repaid. The bond of love is a bond of mutual debts and the greater the debts, the stronger is the love-and the more perfect. But love "forgives the debt," cancels it. Love says, "No, you owe me nothing, nothing, in return." Love-if it be truly love-does not clamor for payment. It foregoes the debt. And if the debt is acknowledged, and there is a response,-a return gift,-then again love does not count it as a payment, but as a new debt into which it has entered,-for which, in turn, it asks and receives forgiveness.

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And thus the bond of love grows into a more and more complete reciprocal conjunction.

     This conjunction, with its continual forgiveness of debts, is best seen in the love called truly conjugial-the love that rules in the heaven of innocence. There the debts-man's to woman, and woman's to man,-balance, as love and wisdom are balanced in their angelic minds. But it is also present in the whole of the Divine economy. There is no charity, no love, anywhere, which does not create its obligations, its debts. They are truly debts. We cannot but acknowledge that we should return charity for charity, love for love, friendship for friendship. At times we find that we are unable to give this return. For all do not love alike. All do not rise to an equal purity of love. We may feel overwhelmed with debts we cannot return. So we ask forgiveness; and charity, being charity, forgives.

     Thus all in this wide world who perform uses are debtors to each other; and in the consciousness of this common bond they should aid in the world's work. The Church is another more interior, more closely knit, circle; for the loves and uses there are spiritual. Heaven is the most perfect communion of all, for all there regard themselves as servants and debtors.

     The giving and the return seem at times unequal. But the Lord knows otherwise. The internal reception of love is only according to the return. Only when we return love for love do we really receive love. Only as we forgive are we forgiven. Amen.

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NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL 1920

NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL W. F. PENDLETON 1920

     X. (Part 2.)

     SACRAMENTS AND RITES.

     MARRIAGE.

     There are three general requirements or conditions to be met and observed in connection with the marriage ceremony, in order to make it of use as a complete form of service and ritual. These have respect to the civil law, to the social life, and to worship.

     The Civil Law.

     The first is an absolute requirement, and no marriage can now take place without the permission and license of the civil authorities. In this manner, the state puts itself in a position to protect the civil rights of the married parties, especially of the woman, and guard the married state from injury by the outer world. All this was formerly done by the church, but on account of abuse, the right of civil control was taken from the church and assumed by the state; but the church was left free to continue the marriage ceremony as a religious rite, the priest being recognized at the same time as an officer of the law; and as such, he is required to report to the state every administration of the rite of marriage, that it may become a matter of official record, in case of any future legal complications.

     The Social Life.

     One of the things into which the marriage ceremony introduces is a new condition of social life. It is for this, reason that "the nuptials should be celebrated with festivity." (C. L. 306.) Hence, unless unusual circumstances intervene, something of the pleasures of social life ought to follow the marriage ceremony, as an introduction to what is to come in the new social relations of the married partners, with each other and with their friends and neighbors.

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There is, indeed, a natural tendency the world over to do just this thing at such a time. But it is well to understand that there is a reason for it.

     Festivity is defined to be "social joy or exhilaration of spirits at an entertainment," From the derivation of the word, the prime idea is that of eating and drinking together. But festivity may take other forms, and hence we read in the Spiritual Diary that "festivities take place, but with a difference according to the societies." (no. 6110:33.) The reference here is to the heavenly societies, and the same variety may exist on earth.

     But the propensity to loose and cheap mirth and levity, common at weddings, is to be guarded against. A marriage service is a serious and solemn occasion, in which the worship of the Lord is the leading feature, and nothing should occur, before or after, that would mar its solemnity. Let the festivity follow, but let it be such as is appropriate and becoming, unattended by a frivolous and trifling levity, which has in it, consciously or unconsciously, that which amounts to a ridicule or contempt of the married relation.

     Worship.

     In the merely civil rite of marriage there is an absence of worship, and hence an absence of the acknowledgment of the Lord, and of His Providence over marriage; nor is there in it, a recognition of the life after death, and the eternity of marriage. These things are in a church ceremony, dimly and remotely present in the ordinary religious celebration of marriages in the Christian world, but clearly and distinctly present in the marriage service of the New Church. In that service, the Lord and the eternity of marriage are present throughout,-in the instruction given, in the questions and answers, in the prayers, and in the songs of praise. Where these are, and are sincerely believed and loved, there is true worship. If the Lord God our Savior be not acknowledged and worshiped in any ceremony, it is not a true religious ceremony or a rite of His church.

     The Communion.

     Wherever worship is, it may be made more full and complete by the administration of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. This is especially of use where it is important to increase and intensify the sphere of worship.

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In the marriage service, the Holy Supper administered at its close brings into the ceremony more of worship, and introduces more fully the idea of God and eternal life. At the same time, it draws the service farther away from the mere civil and natural element that adjoins itself from the world, and introduces to a more interior heavenly consociation. Such a consociation at the inauguration of married life, more deeply entered by the Holy Supper, is a thing of value to those who wish for an eternity of marriage.

     Historically Considered.

     We have before alluded to the fact that the particulars of Christian ritual have for the most part come down to us, through Jewish or Gentile sources, from the Ancient Church itself; and if it should appear that any ritualistic custom can be traced back to the Primitive Christian Church, there is in this fact presumptive evidence that the root of it existed in the ancient representative worship, in which every form had a spiritual origin and significance.

     In respect to the communion, ecclesiastical writers have stated that in the Christian Church from the earliest times the Holy Supper has been administered in marriages. It is required in the Catholic Church, and formerly in the Church of England; but in the latter, it began to fall into disuse under Puritan influence. The Puritans "had a morbid fear of attaching too much importance to the religious rite with which marriage is celebrated by the Church." (Blunt 274.) Thus the Puritan tendency was to secularize marriage by dissociating it from the holier things of worship; and as a result, the marriage service became cold and formal, or a merely civil affair, attended with an increasing disposition to rude jest and frivolity in this most serious step in the life of two individuals.

     The things of ritual that have come down to us from primitive times have home the test of experience; and while anything of ritual adopted in the New Church should pass through a rigid scrutiny in the light of revealed doctrine, yet, as the New Church is almost without experience in ritual, it behooves us to give proper heed to those things which have been done in the past, in order to see if a jewel may not lie buried in what may be looked upon as an unnecessary form to be lightly done away with.

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     The historical reason for the communion in the marriage ceremony has weight, inasmuch as it has persisted from the beginning through the centuries; but the internal or spiritual reason for it has greater weight, in that it introduces more fully into the angelic presence than any other rite of the Church. All ceremony introduces in both worlds into the sphere of those who are already in the thing itself. Yea, in every prayer, delivered sincerely from the heart, there is a presence of the Lord and His angels. If co-operation follows, and the effort to do as of oneself, the fruits of love and charity will be the reward. Thought brings presence, but the will to do establishes conjunction and introduces to eternal life.

     All ceremony introduces, and the marriage ceremony does this, even without the communion; but the addition of the most holy act of worship in the Church not only adds a certain beauty and solemnity to the occasion, but tends to confirm and establish that wonderful presence, of which we read in the True Christian Religion, where we are told that "the Lord is present and opens heaven to those who come worthily to the Holy Supper, and He is also present with those who come unworthily, but He does not open heaven to them; consequently, as Baptism is introduction into the Church, so the Holy Supper is introduction into heaven." (no. 719:)

     It follows that the partaking of the bread and wine of the Holy Supper by the newly wedded pair, after the pronouncement that they are now husband and wife, after they have knelt in worship, and before they have received the final blessing, is most fitting and appropriate as the first art of their married life.

     (To be continued.)

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CARL THEOPHILUS ODHNER 1920

     AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

     (The first and second instalments of this Autobiography appeared in New Church Life for January and February, 1920.)

     1883.-Arriving in Chicago, I found lodgings in a cheap hotel, and forthwith hunted up the "Swedenborgian" Temple on Van Buren Street, where I found the Pastor, the Rev. L. P. Mercer,-spare, dark, having the manner and appearance of Edwin Booth, eloquent and fiery, ever starting up something new in the Church, but never able to carry it through. Well, he read my letter of introduction, and proposed writing to the Rev. Frank Sewall, of Urbana University, to arrange for my entering upon a preparation for the ministry. He was quite kind to me, but his greatest act of kindness was to lend me a volume of NEW CHURCH LIFE, which I had seen in the library, and which contained a story by Mr. E. P. Anshutz, entitled "Jim Bronson," in which I had become interested. I took the volume with me to the hotel, and sat up until late in the night reading this story. I will never forget the wonderful impression it made upon me, presenting to me for the first time the idea of the Divine Authority and Infallibility of the Writings, as a direct and inspired Revelation from the Lord Himself. This was what I had been in need of during my whole life,-an absolute certainty of the truth of the New Doctrine, in particular, as well as in general; an assurance that they were of God, and not of man. The Truth, which from that moment became the guiding star of my life, flashed into my mind in an instant, and revolutionized, as it were, my entire understanding. I began to think from faith in the Lord as a center,-from within outward, instead of vice versa, as before. The natural-rational "wild ass" which I had been riding, (a very asinine beast indeed), and which had well-nigh brought me to destruction, began to be changed into an animal of a higher and more docile kind. It was, I may say, the supreme moment in my spiritual history.

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Never, to all eternity, can I become sufficiently thankful to the Lord for His mercy shown in that night,-a night which became dawn indeed, when for the first time in my life, I caught sight of Him as the Divine Truth in the Writings of the New Church.

     In these same copies of the LIFE, I read a good deal about that "strange" and "awful" body, known as the "Academy," and soon gained a general idea of its platform, with which I could not but most heartily agree. The various teachings of this "Academy" were like so many revelations to me, and just what I had needed to explain the many puzzling problems of life. I soon began to inquire about the Academy from various persons in Van Buren Street, but they only wagged their heads, and told me all sorts of dreadful things about this new and hated institution,-stories so absurd that I made up my mind they were untrue. The reading of "Jim Bronson" had rather caused me to expect that I would hear such stuff.

     One day I was told about a Swedish New Churchman in Chicago, a Mr. Leonard Gyllenhaal, editor of a Swedish-American paper, and a member of the Academy, though "otherwise a very nice gentleman.' I quickly hunted him up in his office, and was most Cordially received. He invited me to his home in the evening, and we had a long conversation about the Church, the Academy, and my desire to enter the ministry. He told me about the theological difference between the schools in Urbana and Philadelphia, and strongly recommended me to choose the latter. In the meantime I had received an invitation to go to Urbana, and to complete my theological course there within one year, after which I would be ordained!

     The next Sunday, I attended the services of the "Academy people" in the chapel on the West Side, and heard the preaching of the Rev. (now Bishop) W. F. Pendleton. That settled my choice of school and of Church affiliation. A small, plain chapel, and a small plain set of people, and a plain preacher, sympathetic, affectionate, earnestly convinced, and devoted. Here I found friends. Here I found light, and heat, and life a spiritual home, and spiritual brethren for this poor, forlorn, homeless, and friendless wanderer!

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     Mr. Pendleton and his warm-hearted people soon began to take great interest in the young stranger, who looked indeed most suspiciously like a tramp, though he talked decidedly like a Newchurchman. My resources having come to an end, Mr. Gyllenhaal most kindly received me into his home until Mr. Pendleton could receive answer from Philadelphia in regard to my reception as a theological student there. This came in due time, and in favor of my going. And so, one day at the close of September, and with the financial assistance of the friends in Chicago, I set out upon my journey to the "city of brotherly love,"- the haven of rest and of work, the goal of use, toward which Divine Providence had directed my life.

     After two days' travel, which I spent chiefly in controversy with a Presbyterian clergyman, I finally reached Philadelphia, and set out to find the Rev. L. H. Tafel, who had moved from the address which had been given me. But a stranger informed me of the address of a member of Mr. Tafel's congregation,-a Mr. Walker, who lived on Market Street, where he kept a dry-goods store. So I went to look for him, and found in him a hearty, jovial Englishman, the possessor of a quaint old shop in Dickens' style, and of a kind, motherly wife, who immediately sent me out for a good wash at the pump, and, then provided me with a hearty breakfast. (I was quite "busted" financially, though not entirely penniless, my remaining capital amounting to exactly one cent!) Being thus revived, I was sent to the Treasurer of the Academy, Dr. F. E. Boericke, a venerable and refined German gentleman, who informed me of the terms upon which I had been received as a student by the Academy, and furnished me with my first weekly allowance of eight dollars,-a princely stipend indeed, as I thought, and more than was really good for my natural man.

     I was then forwarded to Mrs. Aitken's "Mew Church Boardinghouse," at 1718 Green Street,-a brown-stone neighborhood,-where I was most kindly received by that true-hearted; motherly New Church woman, Mrs. Aitken, and introduced to my future comrades and campaigners. Ah, me! Those boys! Has any such comradeship ever before existed in the history of the world? Thoroughly religious, spiritual-minded, New Church from the bottom of their boots, clean-minded, manly, earnest, yet genial to a degree never surpassed!

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A most remarkable "gathering of the clans" was this, and the beginning of a spiritual and natural friendship which has never wavered to this day.

     There, in that blessed boarding-house, were: 1. Enoch S. Price, (he is reticent about the name that "S" stands for, but I believe it is "Spradling," or some such misnomer),* a great big hulk of a fellow from the West, heavy in body, but lively in mind, good-natured, a little over-positive, but with a loyal heart that is even bigger than his body. 2. "Dan,"-N. Dandridge Pendleton, whom I will not dwell upon long, as he, no doubt, will go "rattling through the ages." He and I have been Castor and Pollux, Aeneas and "fidus Achates," or whatever you may please, for all these years. Yet, for the benefit of future historians, I may say this, that the younger brother of Bishop Pendleton was the latest scion of an "F. F. V.," spare of body, very "deep" and theological, loving profound speculation. 3. "Fritz,"-Fred. E. Waelchli, of Swiss parentage, from Allentown. He came about a week after I did. Great old boy he ever was, and will remain, "though now he's a happy papa." 4. "Charlie,"-Charles Francis Browne, a warm-hearted young artist from Yankeedom, who became a New Churchman from his association with us, and a faithful, important member of the "inner circle." 5. Percy Billings, a young Englishman with a remarkably perceptive intellect, but who had "revelation" and "celestial teachers," which finally got him into trouble, and caused his exit from the School.
     * Mr. Price's uncle namesake, Enoch Spradling; of an old slaveholding southern family, hardly considered that name a "misnomer."-E. S. P.

     Now as to, the School, my beloved "Alma Mater." I can't say that I was much impressed with her external grandeur, at first sight,-a small two-story house on Friedlander Street, two schoolrooms, four or five students, three Professors. Of these, I refrain from describing the Chancellor, Bishop Benade, and the Rev. Louis H. Tafel, the Professor of Systematic Theology, both of whom are historical personages. The third, however, Professor Simons, will become historical only through these pages. He was our teacher in Greek, Latin, Arabic, etc.; at least, he was supposed to teach these subjects, but did not often get an opportunity, as there was generally too much of a racket among the boys.

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He was really a learned man, but utterly lacking in discipline. We learned but little under him, and the students finally got rid of him by protesting to the Faculty.

Insignificant as this School was externally, it was heaven itself to me, nevertheless; for in it I breathed the air of freedom, of rationality, of the Divine Truth; and under these influences my mind rapidly expanded. I particularly enjoyed the instruction in Theology and Hebrew, and began to develop a decided love and faculty for philology, which before had been very uninteresting to me. But, as a fish takes to water, so did I take to the history of the New Church, which had deeply interested me even while in Stockholm, and for the study of which the excellent collection in the Academy's Library afforded unequaled opportunities. I fell upon that Library with the rapacity of a hungry bookworm, and, first of all, dusted and, arranged the books, which had never been done before. How I enjoyed finding some books bearing the signature of my grandfather among the original editions of the Writings in that Library!

Here, now, I found my right atmosphere, and a great contentment of mind fell upon me, which, as to its essential duality, has continued even to the present day. Here a blessed usefulness had been opened before me, and here I first met her who, several years later, was to become the beloved and faithful friend, and the partner of my life. It is to me a sign of the wonderful dispensations of the Divine Providence that a Girl's School had been opened by the Academy at the very time of my own arrival, and that one of the first pupils of that School was an orphan girl, twelve years old, by the name of Lulu Xandry. How well I remember the slender, flaxen-haired little maiden, who introduced herself by asking me the Swedish word for "scrubbing- brush,"-significant indeed of our future domestic relations! I did not then dream of her as my future wife, but-more of her anon. Girls were not much in my mind just then, only a feverish anxiety to work, and the cultivation of the social life with my comrades.

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     Long live the memory of "the fourth story" at Mother Aitken's! A lively set of boys we were, ever ready for deep theological discussion, or for a song and a good time. We used to meet on Friday nights especially, our conclaves generally lasting until long after midnight. Seldom do a number of such homogeneous fellows meet, so similar in tastes, so overflowing with animal spirits, so fired with love of spiritual things-a love then largely mixed with "faith alone," I fear. And what good times, what endless fun, we did have! Alas! no record has been kept of them.

     However, these meetings of the boys did not constitute our entire social life, for we took a very active part in the Young Folks' Club, were the editors of a monthly MS. paper, called the "Budget," and were very much in evidence at all social gatherings of the Advent Society.

     The worship of that Society was a new thing upon earth,-so spiritual, so impressive, orderly, and representative. In its sphere, I soon overcame my repugnance to New Church Baptism, and, one Sunday in October, I received the inestimable benefit of that Baptism at the hands of Bishop Benade. Deo Gratias Ago!

     Soon after my arrival in Philadelphia, I was instrumental in adding two valuable members to the Society. One Sunday evening, I visited Mr. Giles' Church on Chestnut Street, and on going out, who should I meet but my old friend, Mr. Carl Hjalmar Asplundh, of Stockholm, who had now settled in Philadelphia. He was in company with another Swedish New Churchman, Mr. Forsberg, and both soon joined the Advent Society. Through my influence, Mr. Asplundh obtained a position at Boericke & Tafel's, and subsequently developed into a very useful member of the Church.

     (To be continued.)

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HOW SWEDENBORG VISITED THE OTHER PLANETS 1920

HOW SWEDENBORG VISITED THE OTHER PLANETS Rev. THEODORE PITCAIRN 1920

     One day I met an intelligent Basuto chief, with whom I had before conversed, and to whom I had given a number of the Writings. He said he had been reading the books I had given him, and that they appeared rational; and he also expressed his surprise and great pleasure at meeting a minister who invited questions. There was one thing, however, that was beyond his belief, namely, that Swedenborg claimed to have seen men and things on other earths, millions of miles distant.

     The New Church missionary seldom advertises the fact that Swedenborg claimed to have visited the heavens of other earths, and to have seen the earths themselves through the eyes of their inhabitants. It is a subject that the New Church missionary seems afraid to mention, and I have never seen a missionary tract dealing with it. New Churchmen believe Swedenborg's claim, but they usually do so on blind faith, accepting what he wrote as true without understanding how it was effected. I did not answer the chief at once, but thought the matter over, and the next day spoke to him somewhat as follows:

     "You say that it seems impossible for a man to talk with the angels who are around another earth. Let us suppose you had never heard of an aeroplane, or of wireless communication, and that I should point to a little speck up in the sky, and say to you that there was a man up there with whom I was conversing by means of a little instrument. You wouldn't believe me, and might even doubt my sanity." He admitted this. I then asked him if he believed there was such a thing as mental telepathy, and he replied that he did. Continuing, I said: "The communication of thought cannot take place in a vacuum, but must be through some medium,-the only kind of medium that will carry vibrations of the higher order. Thought, therefore, must be communicated by means of an atmosphere; and this applies not only to mental telepathy, but to all thoughts.

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They must all go somewhere." To this also he agreed.

     "Well," said I, "you know nothing about the nature of this atmosphere; is it reasonable to deny the possibility of communication by means of it? Consider the difference between the two atmospheres we do know something about,-the air and the ether. Light and electricity travel with more than a million times the speed of sound. Sounds become confused, but there is scarcely any confusion of light rays, no matter how many millions of them cross. Sound soon disperses, but light travels in a perfectly straight line. Sound will only carry a few miles, but light travels from the furthest sun.

     "Now there is a greater difference between light and thought than there is between sound and light, and we might expect, therefore, a greater difference between the ether and the atmosphere in which thought travels than between the air and the ether. Suppose, then, that thought travels with one million times the speed, one million times the distance, and with one million times the accuracy of light; that there is as much less confusion of thought-waves in comparison with light-waves as of the latter in comparison with sound-waves. Grant this, and the difficulty of thought communication with the farthest planet vanishes."

     (Let me here interpose some observations: The Principia seems to indicate that the atmospheres, as they ascend in order and degree, increase in difference as the cube, which would mean that the vibrations in the atmosphere next above the ether would travel at a million cubed times the speed of light, which would make communication with the farthest star practically instantaneous. Some have claimed that interstellar communication is effected by the rays of thought traveling in parallel lines, not radiating in every direction, as is the case with sound, light, and wireless vibrations. This seems highly improbable to me, and contrary to the law that nature is the same in greatest and least things. In the spiritual world, the whole is in every part; that is, if there is the least communication of a thought, the whole man is present in it. I believe, therefore, that thought is communicated by radiation, and not according to the parallel line theory.)

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     But to return to my conversation with the chief. Pursuing the line of reasoning, I said: "In the spiritual world, communication is effected by means of thought and affection, and when two minds come into a similar thought and affection, they are like two wireless instruments attuned to each other, which therefore communicate. When two such minds are in communication in the spiritual world, the spirits appear to each other, and speak as man to man."

     "In visiting other planets, Swedenborg did not usually see the earth itself, but the spiritual world around it, in which (especially in the world of spirits) everything would have exactly the same appearance as on the planet itself. On occasion, he did see the earth itself, but this was always through the eyes of an inhabitant. Seeing through the eyes of another meant, I believe, that the sensation of the man, as it was in his brain, was so powerfully communicated that it appeared to Swedenborg as his own sensation."

     The chief seemed quite satisfied with my explanation, and the discussion led me to some reflections which I shall briefly mention: That the prime use of mechanical inventions is not for their practical purposes but to illustrate spiritual laws, to the end that the New Church may not be compelled to accept the laws of the spiritual world, as now revealed, without some illustration and understanding of their nature. For example, we are taught that all things of a man's thought and affection are fixed in the finest things of nature in his brain. This at first appears incredible; but when we consider that, in the case of the phonograph, the sound of the voice, and thus the affection of the singer-an affection which can stir, and even produce weeping-is written upon the very grossest and dead things of nature, it need no longer be surprising that our loves and thoughts are recorded upon the highest and most living things of nature in the brain.

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NEW CHURCH SOCIAL EXPERIMENT 1920

NEW CHURCH SOCIAL EXPERIMENT CHARLES FRANCIS BROWNE 1920

     WITH AN UNFINANCIAL AND OPTIMISTIC THEORY FOR ITS BOOKKEEPING.

     No one seems to like to "pay the fiddler." The New Churchman, as well as most everyone else, thinks paying bills is in the nature of a major operation which, even if it becomes chronic, never proves fatal. This article is written in the hope that it will serve as a soothing syrup, a healing salve, or a cooling lotion, to the one who pays. It guarantees to take the pain out of paying!

     We find the location of this very successful social experiment on the broad, fertile, and wind-swept prairie of Illinois, less than twenty miles from Chicago,-one of the big cities of the world. So it is a suburb, with its specialty of commuting, and has the advantages of a country environment and of a city with its markets and culture.

     The Church society had its birth in Chicago, but some of the members decided to live in the country, where they would have room and fresh air for themselves and their children, and in time construct a church edifice, a school, homes, gardens, and a generous park for a picnic ground and Sports. So, about twenty years ago, they decided to make the venture. Soon, forty flat acres were bought in common, laid out by a landscape gardener, and planted generously with trees and bushes. Originally a cornfield, it was graded, and a "practical" lake made a landscape detail of refreshing beauty, and which the children think much of. We remember the famous basin in the Jardih of the Luxembourg in Paris.

     The situation was this: The lot was a large rectangle, with public streets on the south and east edges. A private oval road now encloses the central region, the park, and its highest part serves for the site of the buildings, which were well grouped and architecturally designed. They include the church, at the eastern end, the school at the west, and the community house in the center. These buildings, as you may see in your mind's eye, are surrounded by lawns and shade trees.

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Between the made road and the outer edge of the main rectangle are the spaces for the residences and private grounds-some twenty in number-with no dividing fences, but with plenty of shade trees of elm, poplar, and maple predominating

     So, with a population of two hundred and fifty people of all ages, and children enough to please our late President Roosevelt, we can well understand their comfort and independence. The uses of the Church, the school, and the parish are most practically, economically, and suitably taken care of. This has all been done by individual and community enterprise, and is now very well in hand. Its financial obligations are growing beautifully less, and the personal ownership independently more.

     One Friday evening, a conversation on the subject of the finances took place between one of the original family pioneers and one who remained in the city of original source,-between a lawyer and an artist; representing expertness, on the part of the Law, and ignorance and bliss, on the part of the artist; the love of practical exactness and business vs. imagination and theory. But I must tell you first about our Friday Supper. It originated with the beginning of the Church in Chicago, and the present Bishop Emeritus bought the first teapot (still, I believe, extant), which has developed to a weekly banquet. Its adequate dimensions and satisfactory bill of fare, with tea and coffee, and with its weekly guests, make it a real feast of charity.

     This weekly supper is technically interesting; for the ladies' committees alternate in its management, and tell the ladies of the families what, and for how many, they shall provide, estimating each individual at to cents per mouth (irrespective of size of appetite), and the otherwise unattached consumer pays to cents in cash to the particular treasurer. This system works well, and sometimes there is a little cash over, which, goes to help in buying the material for the next week. It is a weekly wonder that such a supper can be prepared for such a price. The Society contributes the room, light, heat, etc., which is a way of making one hand wash the other!

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     This is the program: We are supposed to sit down at seven, or thereabouts. Then, at eight, the dining hall is cleared by the many waiters and volunteer young men, who put the tables away and rearrange the chairs for the doctrinal class,-followed by a singing class, which is enjoyable, and helps the congregation to familiarize itself with the music for regular Church service and special occasions,-while the men-folk retire to the billiard-room to chat, and to compare weed and cigar with cigarette and pipe. The conversation between the lawyer and the artist most amiably took place here, between the supper hour and the doctrinal class and singing.

     So our layman lawyer began by telling about the awful total of the budget for the coming year, and asked with much emotion, "What do you think the Society plans to raise this year to meet expenses?" The artist, who faces deficits so regularly and for so long a period, was not alarmed at all by this query. "That doesn't interest me, because I know you will raise it, as you always have done." This suggested my uncommercial, sentimental theory of bookkeeping. . . . "Why do you always make so cheerless a document of your budget? Why don't you put something down that shows the assets,-that will represent the joy items?" He was amazed. "What do you mean?"

     "Let me tell you. Why am I here? To enjoy some of the assets, and perhaps make a contribution to the budget"-which latter made his eyes shine. That he expected an artist just freed from a city hospital to have anything left, shows how business men catch at straws, and how every hope is sanguine. When reason was back upon her throne after its hope-dream, I continued, "Bookkeeping has two sides or pages, one the Credit, the other the Debit side."

     "Yes," said he.

     "Well," said I, "what have you put down on the Credit side?"

     "Nothing," said he.

     "Let me suggest something," said the poetic and uncommercial artist. "When I was strong enough to get out from my sick chamber, I visited a ball game in the Park, to the maintenance of which we had contributed in many ways all this time-over twenty years.

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There were perhaps seventy-five or more people, in pleasant shade and genial sunlight, players and lookers-on, many grown-ups, various groups of children, arranged naturally according to their ages and sex," When I recalled a row of young ladies of marriageable age-and they were good to look at-I immediately waxed sentimental. "Let's see, what are children quoted at? And do you appreciate the value of such a ball field, with only New Church visitors, including these children, trained in a New Church school, and grown girls who beautifully suggest the possibility of future wives, and dwellings about, which make it ideal for our families? My man, what are these assets entered at, and at what reasonable valuation? We have the accounts all leaning over, with the weight on what we are getting on the joy side, instead of being on the pay side! If it was a business, it would be called a going concern! And one would think from the sad song you all sing that you are on the eve of bankruptcy! And we are New Churchmen, who are supposed to give spiritual values to things. Moreover, dear sir, all these boys-young men-will soon be contributing members and every year will make it easier. The tide has turned now. When you came out here to this field of some forty acres of corn stubs and dirt, you were a possible one hundred souls, all told, in the Society, with a nucleus left in Chicago. Now you notice an adequate group of buildings,-church, community house, school,-a park with beautiful trees, a nice gravel road all around, and over twenty good homes, trim and neat; and, withal, a population much increased, even though many of the original settlers, and some of your children, have gone to other centers. You make out an account like this, showing how you have succeeded, and you will never worry about the cost."

We now adjourned to the floor below, where the doctrinal class is held, usually conducted by the Pastor, but sometimes by a visiting speaker. There has always been an interest in the doctrinal class, and for over twenty-five years the evolution of this social institution, from the original teapot at the Ogden Avenue rooms in Chicago to the present more elaborate meat supper with coffee and tea, marks growth!

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The Bishop Emeritus, the Rev. W. F. Pendleton, was the guiding spirit; and how many of us now realize, each in his own way, what a social use lit has been to us all! It has been a great factor in our true and genuine social life within the Church. A serious problem has been pleasantly solved, and this one of the great assets of the Church must not be forgotten.

     As we walked down the stairs, I had my last word. "What do you think of my system' Don't you think that people who put their ideas-everything-into dollars an d cents should feel ashamed of so material a point of view? Never mind the cost! We have more than the equivalent in our daily joy and the assets of our Glorious Church. We know this; but we think too much in dollars, and not of what the dollars do or get for us. What did we come out here to establish this community for? To make a real estate investment, or to build homes and make it possible to live a better New Church life? Have you done it? Yes, a thousand times better than you realize. I have been away, and I can see how successful it is. Perhaps in the world is not its equal! I spent last winter in one of the most attractive places anywhere for the beauty of landscape, climate, wealth, exclusiveness, and-lack of happiness. I came back to Glenview, and here I rejoice in the intimacy of the New Church life and find happiness the coin of general exchange."

     "Then we think of the monetary cost! It is the physical basis, of course., and an important consideration, but we must not forget the assets. Let us not consider the material only, and forget the spirit. Let us balance our cost with what we get. Let us remember, too, we have perhaps an eternal account, not kept in items of dollars and cents. Our dear ones have already left us, and don't you call their addition to the spiritual world an asset?-to them and to us? Everyone spoke of the sphere at the Dedication of the Cathedral. What was it? Was it not our dear graduates of the earthly school, revisiting us, and enjoying the wonders of the occasion?"
     CHARLES FRANCIS BROWNE.

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ELEANOR 1920

ELEANOR EDWARD POLLOCK ANSHUTZ 1920

     CHAPTER IX.

     Phil as a comforter.

     Shortly after his interview with Eleanor, Phil returned to the city. He and Dick had planned a three weeks' "time" together in the country, and the latter's return on business need not have interfered beyond a few days. But Eleanor's interference was something different, and of a nature to put a stop to all fun.

     "No," said Phil, as he thought the matter over, "there is no use kicking against fate. If Dick were here, he would be about as cheerful as a professional pall-bearer. I will not stay here alone; I'm a gregarious animal, and must herd with my kind."

     So he hied himself home, or at least to the rooms he called by that name. These were in a quarter of the city that had once been fashionable, but was now given over to office renters and lodgers, who form the connecting link between the period when a neighborhood is exclusively used for dwellings and the time when the old houses are torn down to give place to huge six or tell story business blocks. His two rooms were large and comfortable, overlooking what had once been a well-kept garden, and which even now, in summer-time, was a delicious bit of green, surrounded no longer, as in years past, by neat fences, but by towering walls of adjoining buildings. This was his castle, whence, as he was fond of saying, though it wasn't strictly true, he only sallied forth when driven thereto by hunger or lack of supplies; for when the whim possessed him, he often did his own cooking, having the appliances for "turning out as well-cooked a chop and pot of coffee as can be had in town, sir."

     He had only been home long enough to change his clothes when he heard a vigorous rapping at his door.

     "That's Dick," said he, as he walked across the floor and opened the door.

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     Sure enough, that personage burst into the room, and without preliminary, said: "Did you see her, Phil?"

     "How are you, lad?" was his response. "Got safely home, I see. How's Sam?"

     "There's nothing the matter with Sam."

     "Don't talk to me of your romantic young heroes! Give me a solid man like Sam; then you know where you are," taking up his pipe, and filling and lighting it as he talked. "Young, and even old heroes, like certain ones I could mention but will not, go gallivanting around the country getting themselves or others into mischief, and thinking themselves 'some,' as they say down where we've just been, but Sam "

     "Yes, yes, I know all that," said Dick, impatiently. "Sam's worth both of us. But did you see her?"

     "Indeed he is, and the more I see of the world, the more I can appreciate men like him. How did you know I had arrived? Haven't been here more than an hour."

     "I met a fellow down street who saw you. But say, Phil, did you see her?"

     At this oft-repeated question, Phil dropped into a rocking-chair, and getting his feet at a comfortable elevation, after a few puffs replied: "See whom?"

     "You know who I mean-Nellie!"

     "Yes, I saw her."

     "Did you?" very eagerly.

     "I did, and, in the language of Sairy Gamp, I will not denige it."

     "How did she look? What did she say?"

     "She looked rather pretty," critically considering "Yes, quite pretty. I had the fortune to meet her down by a clump of maples that stand by a stream of water; perhaps you remember the place?"

     Dick groaned at this question.

     "Well, I must confess that as she stood there that cold autumn day-by the way, it began to rain before I got back to Kate's, and that gave me the hypos and sent me home. What was I saying? Oh! yes, she looked quite pretty."

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     Dick impatiently flung himself on the bed that stood at one side of the room. "Don't hesitate to make yourself at home," said Phil, calmly watching his pillows being pulled about. Unheeding this bit of irony, Dick asked:

     "What did she say?"

     "Let me see," replied Phil, closing his eyes. "She said-I cannot recollect the exact words, but the effect was that she did not think that her father would object to my hunting on his 'place.' 'Place,' you know, is what they call a farm down there. I must look that word up. Well, notwithstanding this permission, I did not shoot a single bird or squirrel on Mr. Mayburn's place-in fact, it's not a good season for game. I never knew it to be so scarce. The season for "

     "Phil, do for pity's sake talk like a man of sense. What do I care for the game? You know what I am dying to know."

     "What she said about yourself?"

     "Yes, of course."

     Tilting his chair a little farther, and clasping his hands back of his head, he replied: "Exactly; we're all chiefly interested in that personage-'ourselves,' you know. Well, when I mentioned, in that easy, yet highbred way that distinguishes me, that I should like to know where Mr. Mayburn lived, she told me that he lived there. Not, of course, in that exact spot, but that I was then on his farm. Well, after getting on so far, I casually let drop the news, the startling news, that R. Gray, Esq., had gone home."

     "Yes! Yes!"

     "Now, let me recall her exact words; they were: 'Has Dick gone?' "this spoken colloquially.

     "She said, 'Dick?'"

     "Yes, she did. I'm sorry that it's such a short, undignified name; sounds sort of pert, but that's not her fault. Well, in response to her question, I repeated my information,-tautological, you know, but polite,-and then she asked me the time of your going, and I told her, and I also mentioned the letter you had received, and, let me see-I want to get this thing in shape-yes, I conveyed-or at least she got the notion that you were not coming back."

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     "Well, go on; go on!" as Phil seemed disposed to go off into a reverie.

     "Don't hurry me. I must smoke and think and talk at the same time. But to continue. After the ice was broken, we talked about you, as friends will of the absent. We frankly stated your weak points, or at least I did, for she was rather inclined to defend you. By the way, Dick, she is exceedingly pretty when she smiles. Well, she seemed to think that you were, all things considered, a pretty good sort of a boy."

     During this rambling talk, Dick stared at the speaker in a dazed sort of way. Phil continued, calmly: "Yes, she seemed to have a right good opinion of you, and when I, in my playful way, hinted at some of your traits that I thought should be condemned-you see I was trying to get you out of your scrape, and so spoke freely-she said that I was 'old,' just as though that was any argument. But then that was one of her pretty little jokes, for after quite a long chat, we shook hands and parted good friends."

     "Was that all!" exclaimed Dick, and there was dismay, disappointment, and anguish in his voice.

     "All! What more do you want?"

     "Nothing," burying his head in the pillows, "only it seems so dreary."

     "That depends on how you look at it," replied Phil, closing one eye as a stray curl of smoke floated up. "I should prefer the word 'cheerful' under the circumstances, for look you, a few days ago you said that your state was hard enough to bear in itself, but nothing in comparison to the thoughts of how she would feel in regard to your conduct. Now, when you find that she-hum! I say, I believe you're sorry, in spite of all you said then, that she isn't as much in love with you as you are with her."

     "So I am," said Dick, getting off the bed and striding about the room.

     "For genuine consistency, go to the lover!" replied Phil.

     "Right or wrong, it's the truth; I am almost sick to think that, after all, she didn't care a straw for me." Phil hid a guilty look behind a dense cloud of smoke.

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"I know I ought to be glad for her sake, but I'm not, and that is the plain truth. I'd be happier if I knew that she was as broken-hearted as I am. You needn't preach--"

     "Ain't a-going to."

     --"For I can't help feeling as I do; and saying that I'm glad she doesn't care for me would: be a lie." He paced the room awhile, and then said, "I'm glad the little darling wasn't hurt by my--"

     "Thought you were sorry?" said the imperturbable Phil.

     Dick gave a short laugh at this. "I know I am a fool--"

     "No you don't; you aren't old enough yet."

     "I'm going to forget that girl."

     "Perhaps you had better see her again."

     "No; it would only use me up. I'm going to quit talking about her, too."

     "Good! for if there's one nuisance bigger than another, it's a disappointed lover."

     Dick was used to this style of talk from his cousin, and well knew just what it meant. He paced the floor silently for a while, and his young face wore a pained look. Stopping at last, he said, almost pleadingly: "Phil, didn't she look at all hurt, or angry, or grieved, or anything but just commonplace?"

     "Catch me saying that a young lady looks commonplace. I'm too old for that. She would hear of it some day, though she lived in Siberia."

     "But, Phil, tell me."

     "All right, then; she leaned her head against the tree and cried as though her heart would break, and upbraided me and-and made things lively generally."

     "You are the most provoking man I ever met in my life, and if ever you get into the condition that I am-"

     "You'll see me through," said Phil, concluding for him. "And now get out of here; I've had enough of you far one day. I'm going to work."

     Dick took himself off, and Phil slowly rocked himself in his chair, while his face assumed a rather anxious look.

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"Literally speaking, I have told the boy no lie, yet he hasn't the facts of the case by any means. Yet, it would not have done for me to have revealed the true state of her mind, for I promised that I wouldn't, and even if I hadn't, I question if I should be right in doing so. At any rate, it won't hurt to let the matter rest a bit, for he's too hard hit to go off after anyone else, and it will give her time to find out the full meaning of changing front, especially when surrounded as she is. Next summer, I'll resort to diplomacy to bring them together, and if-oh! bother!" He broke off his reflections and picked up a novel.

     Dick walked moodily back to his place of business, and entering the office, threw himself into a chair. His brother, who was busily at work, looked up after a moment, and asked, "Did you see him?"

     "What did he have to say?"

     "Sam, she doesn't care for me in the least, after all. She took my departure just as she would any other person's."

     "Indeed! I thought from what you told me, and from the opinions my wife had advanced, that it would be quite different."

     "So did I."

     "Perhaps she concealed the true state of her feelings from David; girls are not apt to be frank in such matters."

     But at this Dick merely shook his head.

     "I'm glad there was no harm done after all."

     "I ought to be, too, but somehow I'm not."

     The elder brother, after slowly drawing lines with his pen on the blotting-sheet that lay on his desk, said, "I thought you were chiefly concerned about the way she would view your departure?"

     "I thought so once, but now it seems worse than ever."

     "Well, everything will come out right after awhile."

     "Yes, I suppose," replied Dick, with a sigh. "Sam, I'll not bother you with my troubles any more. You are good to have stood it as you have. I've made a nuisance of myself during the past week. Phil says so, and I guess he's right."

     "If it does you any good to talk of your troubles, don't stop on my account," was Sam's simple reply, as he resumed his writing.

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     CHAPTER X.

     Seemingly alone.

     When Eleanor turned the corner in the lane that hid her from Phil, she stopped and had a quiet cry. There was no apparent call for this, and she had just dried her eyes, and was walking toward the house, when her father overtook her. The traces of tears were too plain to be concealed; and, after walking a few paces by her side, Mr. Mayburn asked:

     "Eleanor, what is the matter?'

     "Nothing, father."

     "Are you in the habit of crying for nothing?"

     "Sometimes." This very meekly.

     "Who was that man I saw going toward the road a few minutes age?"

     "He was a stranger who asked if you would object to his hunting on your land. I think he is a kinsman of Sister Gray's."

     She increased her pace slightly, hoping to escape, but her father kept by her side, and asked, "What has become of Richard? I have not seen him for several days."

     "He has gone home, father."

     "Is that the cause of your tears?"

     There was a latent sternness in his voice that caused her to keep silent.

     "He did us a great service once," continued Mr. Mayburn, "and I have liked the lad, though he was somewhat too light and worldly at times, I thought, but if he has been trifling with you--"

     "No," she hastily interrupted him, "he has never been to me anything but what was noble and true."

     "Why did he leave so suddenly? It would surely have been proper for him, after his intimacy with us, to come and bid us farewell."

     "He was called home very suddenly by his brother. He got the message while in the village, and took the train at once without even saying good-bye to his sister."

     They had reached the door of the house now, and paused.

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The stern look left Mr. Mayburn's face, and he said a little sadly, "He was a comely lad, and, I am willing to believe, a good one, yet I fear he may have harmed you through thoughtlessness. Child, I have not been blind all these days. I was led to suspect, from seeing you two together so often and so happily something very different from this. Do you love him, Eleanor?"

     To this point-blank question she gave a hesitating reply, "I don't know."

     Perhaps there was a vein of humor in this grave man's character, for he replied, "No, I suppose not; does he love you?"

     She paused a moment, and then replied, "Yes."

     "What is there in that to cause you to weep?" asked Mr. Mayburn, non-plussed.

     "Think a moment, father; though we may regard him as honest and good, he is not a Christian, and so you know he is full of all manner of sin and guilt and wickedness." Saying this, she put her handkerchief to her eyes, and hastily entered the house. In this manner, she shielded Dick from reproach.

     This was a new view to Mr. Mayburn, for while he would have desired his daughter's husband to be a Christian, he was not averse to a respectable suitor who was not; for, as he reasoned to himself, "The lad's sin is not his, but Adam's." He felt now that he could do nothing, and so, like a wise man, determined to keep quiet. He felt a secret surprise at Eleanor's religious scruples, but to combat them would not be consistent.

     Soon after Phil's departure, sundry books and papers for Eleanor began to arrive. Her father was not troubled with curiosity, and generally gave these to her without question, or, if he did ask about them, a simple evasive reply satisfied him.

     This mail consisted of copies of the Writings, or of New Church periodicals. She read these with eagerness, for almost every Page brought to her mind the things that Dick used to talk about. This was one great incentive, but there was another. In this, her first affliction, she had found her religion powerless to comfort her. All it could say was: "Your soul is saved from hell. After the resurrection you will go to heaven, and there pass your time in thanksgiving over your escape from eternal suffering." But where was that heaven? What was it? Would not constant songs of praise become tiresome?

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Would not heaven be a dreary place without Dick?

     Before these questions, her old religion was silent, or at best could only reply, "Have faith." But the books and papers she now read answered them all. Perhaps she did not comprehend very fully the scope of what she read. It could hardly be otherwise, for she was surrounded by strong opposing spheres, even though there was as yet no active opposition. Among the papers sent her was one on marriage, and in reading it, the motives for Dick's conduct and the force of many things he had said, stood out in clear light.

     She recalled that happy Sunday afternoon when she pretended to read her book of sermons; with what earnestness he had told her that some day she would be called upon to decide between that book and the one he had given her. The cause for this was plain now, and with sadness she recalled the light words, the last she had ever spoken to him. Long and vainly had he urged her to make the decision without which true marriage is impossible, and she had at last replied. To her they were lightly spoken words, but to him they were frought with bitterness, and she knew it now.

     She was much changed, but really unhappy she could not be, for day by day the clear truths were gathered unto her, and abode with her, a mighty protection, and a needed one; for in time it became known what manner of books she was reading. Then came the assault; and were it not for the Truth, and her love for Dick, she would have fallen, perhaps hopelessly.

     What her parents said to her was hardest of all to resist, for it was spoken in sorrow. They loved their child, and could not speak harshly to her, even about her apostasy, as they regarded it.

     The strongest opposition came from the Rev. Mr. Helfir, who, urged on by the merciless sisters of his flock, exhorted, prayed to, and threatened the girl, but with no avail. She attempted no arguments, but simply remained "wickedly and willfully stubborn," as he expressed it. As a last resort, he threatened to "turn her out of church." But even this had no effect, though it was a terrible ordeal for one so young.

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But, out of respect for her parents, she was allowed to resign, and after she had done so was left in peace, though very much alone. During these trials, she was upheld by the secret and almost unconscious hope that some day she and Dick would meet again. In this hour, also, came a copy of Divine Providence, a deep book for one so young, but under its influence, her secret hope grew. While in the invisible halo of this spiritual light, summer came again, and with it the news that "Sister Davis is very ill."

(To be concluded.)
SPEED IN THE HIGHER ATMOSPHERES 1920

SPEED IN THE HIGHER ATMOSPHERES 1920

"The tremulatory circle moves slowly in the water; in the air it moves more quickly; in the finer air, which is called the ether, it is still swifter; in the solar substance it moves from the sun to us in an instant; in the very finest atmosphere there is probably no time which can correspond to the undulation." (Swedenborg's work, On Tremulation, p. 3, written in 1719)

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, Pa.
Editor                    Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager          Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager.

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     SIMPLICITY.

     Somewhere in his philosophy, Swedenborg declares it to be the aim of his writing to "make profound things simple rather than simple things profound." He speaks to this effect in the Preface of the work on the Infinite: "Here you see philosophy reasoning about the Infinite and the soul, yet using most familiar words and a humble style, divested of metaphysical terms; and this, lest anything unknown or sublime in the words should retard the mind, in its thought upon the subject, or divert it from the thing treated of." In the Writings, he praises Aristotle because the terms he invented were formulas descriptive of interior things, and because he proceeded from thoughts to terms, not as the Scholastics who came after him, who followed the contrary method, from terms to thoughts, many of them never attaining to thoughts, but sticking in the terms, and thus abiding in darkness. And further, he was given to say to Aristotle that "a little child, in the space of half an hour, speaks more philosophically, analytically, and logically, than he could describe by volumes, because all things of thought, and of human speech thence, are analytical, the laws of which are from the spiritual world; and that one who wishes to think artificially from terms is not unlike a dancer who would learn to dance by acquiring a knowledge of the motor fibers and the muscles, when yet, if his mind dwelt upon such things while he is dancing, he would be scarcely able to move a foot.

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Without that knowledge, he is able to move the motor fibers of the whole body, a description of which would require volumes." (A. C. 4658.)

     In all of his writing, Swedenborg exemplifies the principle here set forth. Though he entered analytically into the interior realms of science and philosophy, and sounded all the depths of learning, he ever wrote in a simple style, devoid of obscuring verbiage. For he chose terms adapted to convey thoughts, and sought to "make profound things simple rather than simple things profound,"-a principle that is essential to all effective teaching, whether it be of science, philosophy, or doctrine.

     Swedenborg was a teacher. Nearly all of his writings are in the didactic or instructional form. In this style he was schooled from early life, of a Divine leading, that he might be prepared to write the Books of Divine Revelation, wherein the style of his earlier writing is clearly manifest. In the Theological Works, it becomes the Divine style itself, teaching Divine Doctrine, clothing the infinities of Divine Wisdom in language comprehensive to the rational minds of men in the world,-making profound things simple. For so it was with: former Revelations,-the Scriptures,-which are "an abyss of truths," yet accommodated to reception by the natural and sensual planes of the human mind,-even of children. Thus our Lord Himself has shown men how they are to teach His Word and communicate the truths of His Wisdom to minds of every degree.

     On this subject we have explicit instruction in the Writings, as where we read: "The order of teaching and of learning in the Word is from most general things; wherefore the sense of the letter abounds in such most general things." (A. C. 245) These most general things may also be called "simple" truths, yet involving infinite ideas in the internal sense.

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Hence the holy mystery of the Word, in all its simplicity.

The principle we are considering is very directly set forth in the following: "Although the doctrine of faith in itself is Divine, and this above all human grasp, even the angelic, still, it has been dictated in the Word according to the grasp of man in a rational manner. The case herein is like that of a parent who teaches his infant boys and girls. While teaching, he sets forth in and single things according to their genius, although he himself thinks from an interior and deeper ground; otherwise it could be teaching what is not learned, or like casting seed upon a rock. The case herein is also like that of the angels who instruct the simple in heart in the other life. Although the angels are in celestial and spiritual wisdom, yet they do not elevate themselves above the grasp of those whom they teach, but speak simply with them, rising up by degrees as the instruction proceeds. For if they were to speak from angelic wisdom, the simple would grasp nothing at all, and so would not be led to the truths and goods of faith. It would be similar if the Lord had not taught in the Word according to the grasp of man in a rational manner." (A. C. 2533.)

Underlying this statement is another important principle, that in all teaching there must be leading, which essentially is a kindling of affection in the mind of one we would instruct, whereby a favorable will and attitude is secured, and thus a receptive state. Profound truths stated simply should have this effect, exciting interest and desire, and thus causing appropriation presented one at a time, in orderly sequence, they guide the mind of another by successive stages until finally if sees what the teacher sees, and receives in some measure the wealth of knowledge he would impart. Such a course also recognizes the fact that nothing enters and remains in a mind that is not in freedom, that is not moved by some responsive interest and affection. The learning mind must have latitude for imagination and perception, for reflection, rumination, and digestion-a form of mental freedom that is to be respected even in children from an early age.

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     But, in his anxiety to impart all he knows, the teacher may overwhelm the receptive mind with a torrent of learning, or defeat his own ends by a complexity of expression that will be as confusing and tiring to the mind of the listener as a babel of sounds to the ear. However vast the comprehension of the instructor himself, however deep his own ground of thinking, he must wrap up his ideas in small bundles if he would deliver them to minds of lesser growth, granting them opportunity to unwrap the package at leisure; to have the joy of finding its contents by themselves. To inhibit the sense of discovery with the young injures the affection of truth in its bud, quenches the fires of enthusiasm, and spoils individuality. A simple explanation of great truths awakens that curiosity in the child which is the beginning of the love of knowing, understanding, and growing wise,-a love, the fire of which may be kindled or smothered by the fuel of knowledge. A timely epigram conveys a world of meaning.

     It is a well-known fact that children are content with a very simple answer to their questions, and would not comprehend an exhaustive reply. It is of the innocence of their early years to be content with few things,-a state of simplicity that soon enough, and usually without stimulus, gives place to the restless aspirations of youth-the passion for hunting and a reaching out for the riches of knowledge.

"Blest babe, a boundless world this bed so narrow seems to thee;
Grow man, and narrower than this bed the boundless world shall be."

     The expanding faculties are no longer satisfied with few and simple things, but crave variety and quantity,-a state that needs, more than before, the guidance of simple, general truths, to restrain the mind from a dissipation of its energies. Yet the roaming age must have its day, else the mind atrophies, is arrested in its development, and remains simple without deepening. We would not place a premium upon mere simplicity, which is a companion vice to mental indolence.

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The pathway from ignorance to wisdom lies through the domain of learning, acquired only by extensive journeys into the realms of knowledge. But the simplicity of early faith and innocence should accompany the traveler in his quest, if he is to attain the goal of a wise simplicity.

Though the Writings of the New Church are an adaptation of Divine Wisdom to the rational grasp of man in the world, and thus "make profound things simple," they are addressed chiefly to the learned and intelligent, and lead the mind into the inner depths of the Scriptures, into the mysteries of creation and Divine things. And this wealth of spiritual learning is given to "make wise the simple," whom we may exhort not to be content with the simplicity of ignorance. Too much of the present day, instruction in the name of the New Church cultivates this content, veiling the interiors of truth by an over-adaptation; not alluring to the sublime mysteries within, but "hiding the light under a bushel." In such teaching there is no leading. The wonders of the Writings, in all their vastness, then remain untouched, and profound truths are made so simple that their interior greatness is never seen. A wise adaptation veils, but also allures to the interior depths, and eventually reveals them to the lover of truth.
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

We have recently discovered how excellent a translation, both in point of English and of fidelity to the original, is the edition of Divine Providence published in the year 1907 by the Swedenborg Society, London. We are informed that this translation was made by the late Arthur Hodson Searle, the compiler of the General Index to Swedenborg's Scripture Quotations.

In a letter published in the New Church Messenger for December 31, 1919, Miss Helen Keller states that she now possesses a number of Swedenborg's theological works in European Braille (the system of writing or printing for the blind), and that, through the kindness of Sir Arthur Pearson, she is having others embossed at the National Institute for the Blind in England, including True Christian Religion, Divine Love and Wisdom, Divine Providence, and others. She adds: "I yearn to share my dearest treasures with others.

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If you ever find a blind person who wants to read any of Swedenborg's works through, will you kindly let me know, so that I may lend him or her some of my books?"

     The advance notice of the forthcoming book by the Rev. J. F. Buss, entitled The Criterion of Divine Authorship, informs us that the volume describes the present attitude towards the Bible, deals with the necessity of Divine Revelation, shows how the recognition of Divine Authorship, lifts it above the level of modern Biblical criticism, explains how the inner meaning is arrived at, what are the laws governing the relation of the letter and the spirit, and the nature and modus operandi of the inspiration of the Scriptures. While apparently addressed to the outside reader, we are assured that the book will be of great use to the New Churchman, and prove an important addition to our literature. Subscriptions are invited by the New Church Press, Ltd., 1 Bloomsbury St., London, W. C. 1, at the price of 6/6 net, postpaid, to be mailed early in 1920.

     Reviewing Mrs. Twigg's poem, The Supreme Adventure. Mr. W. C. Rodman writes in The New Church Review for January, 1920 as follows: "in spite of its somewhat pedantic vocabulary, its too often inverted and sometimes stilted style, its unaccountably frequent substitution of the overworked apostrophe for the useful letter e, and its irritating derangement of lines,-triumphantly in spite of these, The Supreme Adventure is an extraordinary performance. Of all its 239 pages, not one is prosy; the reader's interest is captured at once, and held to the end. The work is pure poetry, conceived in sincerity, and executed with fidelity and unquestionable skill. The story is that of entrance into the other world, and of adventure, instruction and relationships there. To an outsider it must seem fanciful, and even fantastic; but its appeal to a Newchurchman is immediate and convincing. The author has a rare gift of imagery, and of graceful and vivid description."

     After quoting a number of passages from the poem, the reviewer concludes: "We may well believe Mr. Pendleton's declaration in the Foreword, that years of labor were devoted to the composition of the work; and we heartily echo his description of it as being 'wonderful in idea, delectable in its vision of supernal beatitudes-a noble task well done!'"

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GEOLOGY AND THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN 1920

GEOLOGY AND THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN WILLIAM EVENS 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     As there has been some discussion in the LIFE with regard to the antiquity of man, it may be useful to quote some extracts from the Encyclopedia Britannica, which give the results of geological science on that subject, as well as some reasons for the conclusions at which geologists have arrived.

     "The really efficient champion of the conception that the earth is very old was Sir Charles Lyell, who published the first edition of his epoch-making Principles of Geology only a few years before Queen Victoria came to the throne. Lyell demonstrated to the satisfaction, or-perhaps it should rather be said-to the dissatisfaction of his contemporaries that the story of the geological ages as recorded in the strata of the earth becomes intelligible only when vast stretches of time are presupposed. . . . The champions of the tradition that the earth was less than 6,000 years old held their ground most tenaciously. . . . The result of the contest was never in doubt: however, for the geological evidence was unequivocal. . . . A fresh volume of evidence required to be gathered, and a new controversy to be waned, before the old data for the creation of man could be abandoned. Lyell again was in the forefront of the progressive movement, and his work on The Antiquity of Man, published in 1863, gave currency for the first time to the new opinions. The evidence upon which these opinions were based...had to do chiefly with the finding of implements of human construction associated with the remains of extinct animals in the beds of caves, and with the recovery of similar antiquities from alluvial deposits, the great age of which was demonstrated by their depth. Every item of the evidence was naturally subjected to the closest scrutiny, but at last the conservatives were forced reluctantly to confess themselves beaten. Their traditional arguments were powerless before the array of data marshaled by the new science of prehistoric archeology. . . . The present generation accepts the antiquity of man as a mere matter of fact. Here, as so often elsewhere, the heresy of an elder day has come to seem almost an axiomatic truth.

     "When Queen Victoria came to the English throne, 4004 B. C. was still accepted, in all sobriety, as the date of the creation of the world. . . . Today, though Bibles are still printed with the year 4004 B. C. in the margin of the first chapter of Genesis, no scholar would pretend to regard this reference seriously.

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On the contrary, the scholarship of today regards the fifth millennium B. C. as well within the historical period for such nations as the Egyptians and the Babylonians. It has come to be fully accepted that, when we use such a phrase as 'the age of the world,' we are dealing with a period that must be measured, not in thousands, but in millions of years; and that to the age of man must be allotted a period some hundreds of times as great as the five thousand and odd years allowed by the old chronologists." (Vol. 6, page 307.)

     In the Writings, we find 6,000 years mentioned in a number of places, (Diary 1114, H. 417, etc), but, so far as I am aware, Swedenborg has never stated expressly that man has been on the earth but 6,000 years; but he appears to have taken for granted that such was the case, as was universally believed until several years of the nineteenth century had passed away. It was not until between 1860 and 1570 that the conclusions of geologists with regard to the antiquity of man became at all widely known. The writings of Bishop Colenso were the means of disseminating them to a considerable extent, although he was strenuously opposed by many of the leading theologians, among them Professor Rawlinson, of one of whose arguments Colenso remarked, "The above reasoning is very loose, and based almost entirely on traditionary prepossessions." Professor Rawlinson was obliged to fall back on the figures of the Septuagint, which gives the date of the Flood as 3400 B. C., instead of 2349 B. C., as given in the Hebrew.

     It is difficult for me to understand how anyone, whether in the New Church or the Old Church, can still hold what I may term the "6000 years theory," unless his reasoning is "based almost entirely on traditionary prepossessions." To the men of the New Church, it ought to be evident that man has lived on the earth for countless ages; for according to the spiritual sense of Genesis i, man was created on the first day, or perhaps I should say before the first day, when "the earth was without form and void." There is every reason to believe that it required many ages for our progenitors to have advanced from the first to the sixth day, when "God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good." Many generations of men (how many, none can tell) must have lived and died, from the time when they were wild-beast men and walked on all fours, to the glorious time of the Most Ancient Church, when they lived in Eden, and "God created man in His own image," of the full stature, or "measure of a man, that is, of an angel."
     WILLIAM EVENS, Penetanguishene, Ont., Canada.

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PROBLEM OF THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN 1920

PROBLEM OF THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN E. E. IUNGERICH 1920

     The Rev. G. C. Ottley, in the LIFE for January, in no way impugns the statement I advanced in two previous issues to the effect that Swedenborg, throughout life, believed that 6000 years was the limit of man's antiquity. Three direct statements in the Adversraria, another in the Index Biblicus, and still others in C. L. 39, and A. C. 9441, are explicit evidence as to his belief in this matter.

     What I particularly appreciate in Mr. Ottley's communication is that he recognizes, with me, that there is a problem involved here. Either Swedenborg is scientifically accurate, and the half a million years of modern scientists is wrong or the latter is right, and it behooves us to explain Swedenborg's declaration in some such way as Mr. Ottley suggests. I also appreciate Mr. Ottley's perspicacity in not trying to make out that I have as yet declared myself for either of these alternatives. New Churchmen sometimes fail to see, that it is perfectly proper to present a problem, in regard to which you have not yet come to a conclusion. They seem to feel it so discreditable not to be a partisan, one way or the other, that they try to help you out by insisting that you advocate one of the alternatives. It was in this helpful spirit that the Rev. John Whitehead remarked, in the August, 1919, LIFE, that I didn't seem to believe my own view!

     As a matter of fact, I have no pronounced view on the problem in question, though I am desirous of getting the evidence that will help me to one. In the main, I agree with Mr. Ottley that it may not always be requisite to believe in Swedenborg's literal accuracy in matters of science, and that the acknowledgment of the authority of the Writings does not necessarily force us to such a position.

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On this point, however, I would add that I believe we should be extremely reluctant to yield ground even on matters of science, and only when the evidence is irresistible.

To Mr. Ottley, the evidence of modern science in the present case is so, and I thank him for the reference he gives to the two authorities. But I very seriously question whether modern science views, if examined in the light of Swedenborg's philosophy and science, would prove to be anything but fallacious and heretical, in which case the 6000 years would be found correct. Till the joust is settled, the problem remains unsolved, at least for me.
E. E. IUNGERICH.
DEDICATION OF THE CATHEDRAL AT BRYN ATHYN 1920

DEDICATION OF THE CATHEDRAL AT BRYN ATHYN GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY 1920

     To the Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     As serious illness, and circumstances arising out of the late devastating war, presented my loyal and lifelong ministerial colleague, the Rev. R. J. Tilson, and myself from being present at the spiritually imposing ceremony of the dedication of the splendid cathedral at Bryn Athyn, we trust you will allow us, in the columns of the LIFE, as the only way at our disposal, to express to our brethren in America-clerical and lay-how we shared with them the feelings of heartfelt thankfulness to the Lord for having given us, in our day and generation, so signal a proof of His Divine guidance in the past and His blessing on the work which culminated in a ceremony calculated, in a special degree, to evoke the deepest feelings of the heart.

     A brilliant contributor to the LIFE records a striking phenomenon which attracted our attention, and doubtless that of those who were privileged to be present on two solemn occasions, (1) the laying of the foundation stone of your beautiful temple, and (2) at its consecration, when, on both occasions, "the sun, which all day had remained behind a black and threatening sky, suddenly came forth and flooded the hill and the valley with a golden tide of light." May this be an everlasting emblem of the truth which will be proclaimed within its hallowed walls,-the truth that the Lord has now come in fulfilment of His Divine promise, in splendor incomparable, to reign in the hearts of men as never before on earth,-to fill their minds with an abundance of truth, spiritual and natural, drawn from the depths of His Opened Word-that Word which appears at this day before the rational gaze of men as Divine Doctrine, which is the "Word in the supreme sense." (A. C. 3712)

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     While we rejoice that there has been, after the lapse of many years, such an ultimation of the teaching of the Immediate Revelation which is the Coming of the Lord, we would remind the younger generation, in particular, of the debt of gratitude they owe to their spiritual forefathers,-to two of them, of blessed memory, who prepared the way for such an ultimation of the teaching of the Opened Word, and whose names will stand out for all time to come in bold relief, high above all others in spiritual insight and strong initiative, in connection with the spiritually significant ceremony so vividly described in the LIFE,-Richard de Charms and William Henry Benade. In the words of the eminent historian of the Church, the Rev. Carl "Theophilus Odhner, the former was "the first systematic exponent of the Divine Authority of the Writings and the distinctiveness of the New Church; and, to fight for these principles, he became the founder of that movement which, many years later, assumed organic form as the Academy of the New Church. In the midst of unceasing and universal persecution, he fearlessly proclaimed these most unpopular principles of New Church truth, together with all the issues involved in them I the recognition of the state of the Christian world, the necessity of a distinct priesthood for the New Church, in an orderly, trinal form, and of marriage and education within the New Church."*
     * New Church Life, 1902, p. 1.

     With respect to one of these issues,-the "trinal form" of the Priesthood,-Mr. de Charms published, in 1848,-thus more than half a century ago,-a scholarly work on the Trine in the Ministry, which is characterized by a grasp of doctrine and a fulness of illustration with respect: to the fundamental principles involved, which must ever appear astonishing to a reader not deeply versed, as the learned author was, in the teaching of Revelation, of ecclesiastical history, and of cognate branches of human knowledge bearing on this important theme. The publication of such a bulky work of 632 pages,-replete, as we have said, with profound instruction and sound inductions,-would justify the author in exclaiming: Exegi monumentum aere perennius."*

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About a quarter of a century later, it bore its first "fruits" in the establishment of the General Church of Pennsylvania, under the leadership of Bishop Benade, and at a still later date, the General Church of the New Jerusalem, under the leadership of Bishop W. F. Pendleton.
     * "I have finished a monument more enduring than bronze."-Horace, Ars. Poetica.

     But there is one subject on which Mr. de Charms took a firm stand such as no clerical contemporary of his day had taken, viz., On the distinctiveness of New Church worship. It was when dealing with this subject in particular, in his remarkable work on The Importance and Necessity of an External Church, that he laid before the whole Church, with unequaled fulness and power, the teachings of the Writings on the subject of the externals of worship, and their power especially over the minds of the young. We would quote two passages especially illuminating:

     "Your children cannot be brought into the Church, or be brought up in it, until you provide for them priests, or teaching ministers, or pastors of the Lord's flock. And unless your children are brought up in your Church, that Church never cart be propagated on earth or in heaven. As well might a farmer expect to reap perpetual harvests without reserving enough seeds for perpetual plantings, as you, servants of the great Husbandman, expect to put in your sickles and reap the ripened harvest of immortal souls, to be garnered forever in heaven, without reserving those seeds, and perpetually planting them in this field of the Lord's external church on earth (p. 54).

     "Yes: you must make your external religious worship attractive and delightful to your children; you must have music, exquisite music, for their ears; paintings and sculptures for their eyes; sweet odors, as incense, for their nostrils; and all the appliances of true representative external worship for their every sense, and for the association of the angels with them in the seeing, hearing, and smelling of the representatives and significatives of the Word of God in representative temples for His external worship.

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You must have representative functionaries, representatively robed, for the administration of its rituals; and thus you must take up Aaron's serpent by the hand of Moses, as a staff for the spiritual man in their subsequently adult minds, or you never will have them secure from the enchantment of the old serpent, the persuasions of enthusiastic spheres in the various denominations of the old Church, and have their feet set upon a rock, and their goings established in the everlasting ways of the 'Everlasting Gospel' of the New Jerusalem" (p. 55)

     Happily for the future growth of the Church, he had, as a student, one who was able to see the full force and application of these Divine principles. That gifted student was William Henry Benade.

     When Mr. de Charms' life's work was concluded on earth, Mr. Benade stepped forth into the vacant space, and seized with a giant's hand the flag of authority which had dropped from the hand of his great and honored predecessor. The first notable sign of this was in 1873, when, at a Conference of Ministers at Cincinnati, he delivered a more powerful and closely reasoned paper than had issued from the pen of any Minister, on the Standard of Authority in the New Church. It is deeply to be regretted that this masterly paper-characterized, as we have said, by unsurpassed vigor of thought and language-has not been published in pamphlet form for extensive circulation.*
     * A well-read Conference Minister exclaimed, after reading it: "There has never been anything like it."

     As the result of Bishop Benade's action in the Convention, in urging on every possible occasion the importance of the Doctrine of the Priesthood as set forth in the Writings, he was finally deputed by that body to write the Report on the subject which was published in its Journal for 1875. It is significant that no notice was taken of it at any of the subsequent sessions of Convention. Its teaching, however, was to bear fruit elsewhere.

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The Academy was founded in 1876, and in the ever memorable Words for the New Church, its cardinal teachings were endorsed by the distinguished writer of the article on The New Church, the Rev. J. P. Stuart. (pp. 201-206.)

     While this great teacher, Bishop Benade, was in a sense the true founder of the Academy, he had the good fortune to be powerfully and zealously seconded by several Ministers,-the Rev. J. P. Stuart, his fidus Achates, Dr. Burnham, and others whose doctrinal position was identical with his own. His influence over intelligent and well-disposed laymen was no less marked, and no one in particular was more convinced of the absolute truth of his position than Mr. John Pitcairn. This fact explains how, many years later, this benefactor of the Academy formed the great design of ultimating the teaching he had so fully received from his father of the Church-one who will ever be affectionately remembered as "Father Benade."

     We pray the Lord that other laymen may arise in the Church to emulate his example,-his generosity in providing in so conspicuous and permanent a manner for the perpetuation of those Divine Principles which it is the unique function of a faithful and learned Priesthood to proclaim to the world in the sacred name of the Lord.

     We are, Yours sincerely in the Church,
           (Sgd.) GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY.
               ROBT. J. TILSON.
London, 31st December, 1919.
MISSIONARY WORK IN SWEDEN 1920

MISSIONARY WORK IN SWEDEN GUSTAF BAECKSTROM 1920

Supplementing his report of two missionary trips, which appeared in the LIFE for January, 1920, p. 54, the Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom has sent us an account of three more Journeys made by him in the fall of 1919, as follows:

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

At Koping, a town of 5000 inhabitants, I delivered two lectures, with discussion following, on the subjects of "Man after Death" and "The Reality of the Spiritual World," and there was an attendance of 158 and 152, respectively. Books were sold to the value of Kr. 64:80. (A Kroner = about 27 cents.)

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     Visiting Orebro for the second time, I delivered two lectures on the subject of "Conjugial Love," with an average attendance of 222 persons, and sold books totaling Kr. 136:70

     Returning to Stockholm, I spoke on the subject of "Man after Death" before an audience of 450 persons in the large hall of the Academy of Sciences, selling books on this occasion to the value of Kr. 157:50. Two days later, I delivered a lecture, not especially advertized, in our own little place of worship, on "The Dangers of Spiritism," with an attendance of 53 persons.

     On November 18, I began a fourth journey, being absent two weeks, during which the weather was very bad, and at some planes I encountered competition, which reduced the expected attendance. At Orebro, where I spoke on "The Universe according to Swedenborg," the attendance was only 80, owing to the fact that one of our most popular actors held a recital at the same time. At Kristinehamn (9500 inhabitants), I lectured on "Man after "Death" and "Swedenborg on the Times and Religion," with an average attendance of only 31, due to counter attractions in the form of a concert by the most famous opera singer in this country and the opening of a new moving-picture palace which the whole population was eager to see. Still, I sold books in these two places to the value of Kr. 145:, in spite of the small attendance.

     I now visited Gothenburg again, and delivered three lectures on the subject of "Conjugial Love," having an attendance of 96, 64, and 210, or an average of 125. Here I sold books for Kr. 125: I also went to the nearby town of Trollhattan (14000 inhabitants), celebrated for its falls, and here I had a most gratifying attendance, and one of the most interested and inspiring audiences I ever addressed, which applauded in a most hearty way. The meetings were held in a Labor Hall, which was filled both evenings by an average of about 220 persons, some of them standing. The newspapers also printed sympathetic accounts of the lectures, and I sold nearly all the books I had with me, to the value Kr. 158:, making a total for this journey of Kr. 473.

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     On my return to Stockholm, I again spoke at the Academy of Sciences, this time on the subject of "Swedenborg on the Times and Religion," the attendance being 210, smaller than before, though greater interest was manifested, both by applause and in conversation afterwards. I have found that people are more willing to listen to lectures on the spiritual world than on more theological subjects.

     The fifth missionary trip in the fall was to Vasteras, where two lectures on "Conjugial Love" were delivered before an average attendance of 80 persons.

     Thus, during three months of this autumn, I have, in addition to my regular work, delivered 31 lectures-27 in the provinces and 4 at Stockholm-before 4818 persons, or an average of 155.

     During the same period, books to the value of about Kr. 1500. ($405.00) have been sold, more than in the last four years put together. As most of the books sell for the same as before the war, it will be seen that quite a flood of New Church literature has been poured out in these few months, probably 1000 books in all.

     The expenses have been large, for traveling, rent of halls, advertising, etc., but, for the most part, they have been met by the admission charge at the lectures. I have undertaken the work at my personal risk, and tried to make it self-supporting. As concerts and public lectures are given all over the country at low prices, it is encouraging to see how people will pay 50 ore (12-1/2 cents) to hear the New Church truth, and especially that they are so willing to buy the books. But the economic risk may increase, and unfavorable circumstances arise which cannot be foreseen, as in the cases mentioned above, producing losses which may become too heavy for me.

     Though promising and encouraging, this missionary work is still a question of "to be or not to be." But I will go on with it as long as I can, and if possible Preach the New Gospel all over the country, distributing the books of the Lord's New Church to all who want to have them.
     GUSTAF BAECKSTROM
December 15, 1919.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.;-On Saturday, January 3rd, at ERIE, PA., I officiated at the funeral of Mrs. Myron Near, an earnest member of the New Church. Prolonged ill health had prevented her from participating in the life of the Erie Society for a number of years past. Her husband was baptized at the service the following day,-a step he had long contemplated, though he, too, had not been able to take an active part in the Church for a long time. Doctrinal classes were held on Sunday and Monday evenings.

     On January 19th and 20th, I again visited Mr. and Mrs. Harold Pitcairn, at CRYSTAL CITY, MO. On the first evening a missionary lecture was delivered in the City Court Room, the subject being "The Divine Trinity." As a result of the vigorous advertising campaign conducted by Mr. Pitcairn, we had an audience of about 50 persons. After the meeting, a number remained for about an hour's conversation on the subject of the lecture, a full report of which appeared later in a local newspaper. On the second evening a doctrinal class was held at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Pitcairn, at which four persons were present.

     The evening of January 21st was spent with the Sherman families at SANDOVAL, ILL., an enjoyable doctrinal class being held, with an attendance of ten persons, our subject being the nature of the spiritual world.
     F. E. WAELCHLI.

     GLENVIEW.-Swedenborg's Birthday was celebrated at our Friday Supper on January 30th, Mr. W. H. Junge being the toastmaster. Following the toast to "The Church," our Pastor read a most interesting series of notes on the life of Swedenborg, and also cited a number of criticisms of Swedenborg and his writings made by prominent writers in this country. Mr. G. G. Starkey then delivered an eloquent address on "Swedenborg's Doctrine of Use," and said: "Swedenborg's life is an admirable example of the work which the Lord's Revelation through him has accomplished in uncovering a new conception of use. It seems strange, even paradoxical, that while the world is filled with a bewildering multiplication of the forms of use, it has practically lost the right conception of use, because it has turned away from the essence to the form. But form without essence is dead. The essence of a thing is the love that is in it. It is to that daughter of heaven,-the love of use for its own sake,-that we look as to our one hope in the Maelstrom of despair into which the world has sunk."

     On Saturday, January 31st, the wedding of Mr. Geoffrey Blackman and Miss Emily Gartner was solemnized in the church, followed by a reception in the parish hall, where the bride, assisted by her sister, served the wedding cake, the bridegroom standing by her side in his usual stately manner. We all feel much pleasure in this latest addition to the number of our young married people.

     On Sunday evening, February 1st, a memorial meeting for Hilary King was held. After a reading from the Word by our Pastor, Dr. King gave an impressive account of the circumstances attending Hilary's death. He spoke as follows: "Either as a child or as a man, Hilary was known to everyone here.

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It was on Monday, January 26th, while driving a wagon loaded with heavy timbers over the steep, rough roads of the Rocky Mountains, that he was thrown from the wagon and instantly killed. In sudden, shocking accidents like this, it is necessary to remember that God, the Omnipotent, the Omniscient, the Awful One, is also the All Loving, the All Pitying, the All Merciful; that He does not afflict His children with one unnecessary pang; but that all is done in mercy and love. It is a time to remember also that there is no death. What seems so, is transition. Life is continuous, with a scant three days' interruption, from one world to the other. At the first breath, we are already immortal. With every human being, to have lived at all is to live forever. Everyone who has lived upon this earth, from the great ones in marble mausoleums to the myriads in nameless graves, everyone who has stormed across this planet of ours and fallen into dim forgetfulness, lives yet, lives now, has never ceased to live. Somewhere in God's great universe they stand, surrounded by the stream of His Providence, in full possession of their faculties, in the full exercise of all their capacities and feelings; for the life after death is more full and intense than this dim and disordered life upon earth, where the soul, as the center of life, is surrounded and limited and hampered, by the flesh, the 'muddy vesture of decay,' the earthly tenement, the crust and circumference of mortality.

     "Our beloved friend and brother, Hilary King, is now, after six days, up and alive. He sits, he walks, he runs in a new world that teems with hopes and possibilities and new experiences. He entered the Church in his youth, and in the time of death he departed not from it. He stands at the very gates of life. Behind him are the inertia of matter, the limitations of space, the disabilities of sickness, the infirmities of age, the disappointments of ambition, and all the tribulations of this old world of ours. He stands a strong immortal spirit at the gates of life, and before him are the glorious possibilities of eternal life in heaven. There we leave him, with benedictions, with salutations, all hails, and farewells; there to worship, to labor, to love, in the presence of his Lord, in whose presence, as we read, there is 'fulness of joy.'"

     If the father of our departed friend could thus speak, what more could be added by the friends at the meeting, except from their hearts to say "Amen."
     G. A. MCQUEEN.

     PHILADELPHIA.-An item of interest not before mentioned in our reports was the election of the Rev. K. R. Alden as Pastor of the Advent Society. Mr. Alden was ordained by the Bishop into the second degree of the priesthood on October 12th last, this leaving the Advent Society without a Minister or Pastor. The ensuing election, however, resulted in the unanimous choice of the present incumbent from among the names submitted by the Bishop. Mr. Alden came to us first as Leader; after his ordination into the first degree, he was chosen as Minister; and it was the source of great satisfaction to him when finally he became Pastor of the Society he had served for three years.

     The Pastor's Council differs from the did one in this respect, that there is now a General Council of ten members, which meets three times a year, and within which there is an Executive Council, meeting on the second Tuesday of every month, and consisting of the Treasurer, Secretary, Chairman of the Finance Board, Chairman of the Property Committee, and Superintendent of the Sunday School, thus all the executive heads of the Society except the President of the Ladies' organization, who must rely upon private Pastor's councils.

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     On January 11th, Miss Vera Fitzpatrick, one of our Sunday School teachers, and very active in the work of the Society, made her Confession of Faith. It was a very beautiful service, marked by the inspiration that comes to all when the younger people "take upon themselves the vows made for them by their parents in baptism." The following Sunday witnessed another beautiful service when the children of Mr. Goldhorn were baptized, a family that has come to us through the work of the Sunday School. The father, who had been baptized on a previous occasion, brought forward his four children, ranging from three to eleven years, and they all knelt before the altar of the Lord at the beginning of the ceremony,-a touching sight indeed, impressing us with the promise of permanent results to the Church from the work of the Sunday School.

     On January 12th, Mr. George B. Heaton gave an interesting and instructive address to the Advent Club on the subject of the "Bond Business," and hereafter it will be easy for us to make proper disposition of our surplus cash. The same week we began a series of biweekly entertainments to raise money to take the Boy Scouts to Delaware Water Gap next summer, the sum of $8.80 being realized. The plan is to have the parents go with the boys, as many as can arrange it, and this has fired their enthusiasm, so that we now see more of them, which will tend to bridge the gap that lies between religious conversion and social absorption,-one of our most difficult problems.

     The ladies now meet once a week to sew for the Fair, by which we hope to refill our depleted treasury. Mt. William Alden, Jr., is in charge of the undertaking, and the ladies are enthusiastic.

     We now come to the event of the month,-Swedenborg's Birthday! Assuredly it was one of the finest banquets we have ever had. The whole affair was left to Mr. Fred. J. Cooper to arrange, and he handled the situation with a stroke of genius. The supper itself was great success, having been prepared by Mr. Harvey Lechner and Miss Edith Smith; the intellectual repast that followed was noteworthy. At the very commencement of the banquet, after the blessing had been said, all sang "Our Glorious Church," and the spirit of this immortal song pervaded the whole meeting. The Pastor chose this occasion to receive Miss Vera Fitzpatrick formally into the Society, and to extend to her the right hand of fellowship in a brief service that evoked the spontaneous singing of "Happy, happy."

     The genius of the toastmaster was evidenced in the choice of the subject for the speeches. Instead of the time worn topics of Swedenborg the child, patriot, man of letters, etc., he selected the four "Rules of Life," and each was ably handled by the speakers, who derived not a little assistance from the handsomely engrossed copy of the "Rules," the work of Mr. Walter, hung upon the wall for this occasion, and presented by him to the Sunday School.

     The first rule was discussed by Mr. Craigie, of Toronto, who in a masterful way described the sphere of wonder that must have filled the home of Swedenborg's parents at his birth, and showed how his "reading and meditating upon the Word of God" was a dominant factor in his life from early years, and long before the opening of his spiritual eyes. Mr. Doran Synnestvedt followed with a paper on "Providence." It was inspiring to hear his appeal for daily worship, and his evident zeal for the spiritual things of the Church. He made it plain that the Lord's Providence can only be seen from a diligent study of the Word and the Writings.

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Mr. Harvey Lechner spoke on the third rule, and explained in an interesting way the reason why it is twofold, and how a "pure conscience" and a "propriety of behavior" make one thing in the life of man.

     The fourth speech was made by the Editor of New Church Life, whom we were fortunate to have with us. Mr. Caldwell summed up the four "Rules of Life" in a few words, showing how comprehensive they are, covering our duties of piety and duties of charity, in this respect resembling the Ten Commandments and the Two Great Commandments. Commenting upon the last rule,-"to obey what is commanded, etc.,"-he introduced a vein of humor by stating that if Swedenborg were now living he would cheerfully obey the prohibition laws,-in fact, would probably shake hands with William Jennings Bryan! In support of this assertion, he read from the Documents (pp. 393, 494), to show that Swedenborg at one time advocated the prohibition of whiskey in Sweden, and favored the abolition of the saloon. Some present marveled that these quotations had been so long hidden, and that in the days of Dr. Ellis the Editor of New Church Life had apparently overlooked them.

     Mr. Donald Rose, in a clever and witty rejoinder, said that the shock to Swedenborg in shaking hands with W. J. B. would not be half as great as that experienced by the first sponsor of grape juice! Thus the evening drew to a close amid many a happy jest and timely remarks. We shall remember the occasion for a long time to come. K. R. A.

     CONVENTION FOREIGN MISSIONS.

     A Missionary number of the New Church Messenger, (November 5, 1919), gives interesting reports of the Convention Mission activities in foreign lands-Europe, Asia, and South America. They tell of the beginning, made in Japan under the Rev. I. L. Watanabe, a photograph of whom is given, together with pictures of Sunday School group and the first couple in Japan to be married with the New Church ceremony. In the Philippine Islands there are said to be 68 towns where there are readers of New Church literature. "The American Bible Society reports that the largest demand in the world for Bibles comes from the Philippines."

     Of the Mission in Georgetown, British Guiana, under the Rev. F. A. Wiltshire, the Messenger gives photographs of a group of the members and the chancel of the church. Nearer home, we find a picture of Chief Red Fox Skiushushu, Blackfoot Indian who is studying the Doctrines by correspondence with a view to imparting them to his people in the West.

     The Messenger for November 26, 1919 contains a report from a recently formed "New Church Assembly" in the Czechoslovak Republic, under the leadership of Mr. Jaroslav Im. Janecek, and mentions that the first minister from the United States to that Republic is Mr. Richard Crane, formerly of Chicago, whose mother, Mrs. Charles R. Crane, is a member of the New Church, and accompanied her son to services in the National Church at Washington just before his leaving America for his new post.

     The same number prints a letter from the Rev. F. A. Wiltshire, of Georgetown, British Guiana, describing his visit to Surinam, Dutch Guiana, where he believes the New Church can be built up. He closes by saying, "I am praying that the New Church in the world may help in this historic field, and will erect a building worthy of the name of the great James Glen, the first missionary of the Lord's New Church in this region." (See New Church Life for July, 1919, p. 456.)

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HOW GREATLY THE MEDIATE REVELATION WHICH TAKES PLACE BY MEANS OF THE WORD EXCELS THE IMMEDIATE REVELATION WHICH TAKES PLACE BY MEANS OF SPIRITS 1920

     Announcements.

     "It is believed that man would be more enlightened and wise if he had immediate revelation by means of speech with spirits and angels, but quite the contrary is true. Illustration by means of the Word comes by an interior way, but illustration by immediate revelation comes by an exterior way; the interior way is through the will into the understanding; the exterior way is through the hearing into the understanding. . . .

     "Moreover, no spirit or angel is allowed to instruct any man on this earth in Divine truths; but the Lord Himself teaches everyone by means of the Word, and He teaches in so far as man has received good from the Lord in the will, and man does receive this good so far as he shuns evils as sins. Besides, every man, as to his affections and thoughts, is in a society of spirits, in which he is as one of them; wherefore, the spirits that speak with a man speak from his affections, and according to them. Nor can a man speak with other spirits, unless the societies in which he is be first removed, and this cannot be done except by the reformation of his will. For every man is in a society of such spirits as are of the same religion as himself; wherefore, the spirits that speak with him confirm everything which the man has made a part of his religion. Thus, Enthusiastic spirits confirm all things of Enthusiasm with that man, Quaker spirits confirm all things of Quakerism, Moravian spirits confirm everything of Moravianism, and so forth. Hence are confirmations of falsity which can never be up-rooted. From these things it is evident that the mediate Revelation which takes place by means of the Word excels the immediate revelation which takes place by means of spirits. As regards my own case, it was not allowed to take anything from the mouth of any spirit, nor from the mouth of any angel, but from the mouth of the Lord alone." (De Verbo xiii.)

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DANGER OF SPIRITISM 1920

DANGER OF SPIRITISM Rev. KARL R. ALDEN 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL          APRIL, 1920           No. 4
     There are three legitimate ways of "being in the spirit" which the Lord has seen fit to grant unto man. There is a fourth way, which was not only forbidden by the Word of the Old and New Testaments, but is also abundantly condemned in the Writings of the New Church. It is our purpose here to set forth briefly the three legitimate ways of "being in the spirit," and at the same time to point out the dangers of the fourth forbidden way, which the members of the Lord's New Church will shun, if they would avoid the pitfall of spiritism, so often concealed along their pathway.

     In the past, the three ways provided by the Lord that man might come into the spirit were the following: First, a state of open vision into the spiritual world, such as was granted the apostles when they saw the Lord transfigured, such as was granted Ezekiel when he saw the four beasts by the river Chebar, and such as was granted Elisha's boy when he saw the mountains filled with horsemen and chariots of fire; not to mention many other instances recorded in the Word, the foremost of which, perhaps, was the vision of John in the Isle of Patmos. In all of these cases, it was the Lord Himself who opened the eyes of the Prophet, Patriarch, or Apostle, who then saw into the spiritual world with the eyes of his spirit, and afterwards recorded the things he had so seen. This kind of "being in the spirit" was orderly because the Lord Himself commanded it for the Divine purpose of giving Revelation from heaven to man. It took place without any rational understanding on the part of the Prophet, Patriarch, or Apostle.

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They merely saw and recorded what the Lord commanded them to.

     The second legitimate intromission into the spiritual world was that granted to Swedenborg for the sake of giving the Revelation of the Second Advent to mankind. This differed from the visions of the men of old-time, in that Swedenborg was introduced into the spiritual world as to all of his faculties, whereas they were introduced only as to sight, and sometimes as to hearing. Swedenborg not only saw and heard, but also touched, tasted, and smelled the things of the other life. Again, unlike the prophets of old, he understood the things he saw. And because the Lord had prepared him for his office from earliest youth, he possessed a highly trained philosophical mind, into which the impressions of the other world could flow, and by means of which a truly rational revelation could be given, as the basis for the Second Advent of the Lord.

     The third legitimate way of "being in the spirit" is that which is granted to every regenerating New Churchman. This is not a state of open vision into the spiritual world, such as, it is regrettable to say, some New Churchmen have thought it to be. Rather is it the sight of the spirit in which the things of the spiritual world are seen by means of the spiritual rational mind. This kind of "being in the spirit" enables man to see the realities of the spiritual world in a rational manner, so that the freedom which is the heritage of our life in this world is not destroyed. This kind aids and does not injure man's spiritual progress.

     But spiritism, which is the fourth and false way of coming into the spirit, is the direct communication with the spirit world by using any of the various methods that have been employed in the past. Many well-meaning New Churchmen have confused this fourth and harmful way of "being in the spirit" with the third and legitimate one. And, inasmuch as the subject of spiritism is prominent in the thought of the world at the present time, it would seem wise to devote some space to its discussion.

     The doctrine of the New Church teaches that man, as to his spirit, even while it is enclosed in the natural body, is surrounded by spirits.

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We are surrounded by spirits, not only in general, but also in particular, since there are two good and two evil spirits present with every person, by which he has communication with both heaven and hell. If man were dissociated from his spiritual companions, he would immediately fall down as one dead. Yet man's freedom demands that the fact of this spiritual association be utterly unconscious to him. If he were to become aware of the spirits that are with him, his body would become like a haunted house, and his peace of mind would be destroyed.

Since all New Churchmen know about the spiritual conditions surrounding their spirits, it is to be expected that they will be tempted by reason of that knowledge, for temptations can only come to man in the degree that he has a basis for them in his mind. Because the New Church is a spiritual Church, the men of this Church are capable of entering into spiritual temptations, and one of the great temptations that have come to them is the desire to enter into spiritism, the desire to gain from sensual demonstration a confirmation of the revelations made through the Lord's specially prepared servant. But we can see in such temptations a fulfilment of the Lord's words in Matthew: "For false Christs and false prophets shall arise, and shew forth signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect." (24:24.) The "very elect" are those who receive and embrace the Heavenly Doctrines of the New Jerusalem, who find in these Doctrines the "signs and wonders" that appeal to their rational mind, leading them to see the very Coming of the Lord therein. But the "false Christs and false prophets" are the hordes of spiritists who are showing "signs and wonders," and thus convincing the learned world that there is a survival after death, or comforting the sorrowing mother with the words, "Thy Son Liveth." They are doing this in so subtle and-convincing a way that, "if it were possible, they would deceive the very elect" into believing that these are the true signs of the Advent of the Lord. Inasmuch as the Lord did make His Second Coming in a spiritual and not in a natural manner, the Devil, anxious to deceive the world by an imitation of the true coming, has adopted the so-called spiritistic communication to "deceive, if possible, the very elect."

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Yes, to deceive them, and turn them aside from a reverent study of the Writings into the paths of self-investigation and mediumship.

     But the real character of this kind of communication has been revealed to us. For we are told in the Writings that the spirits who desire to speak with men are of a low and sensual class, who, during their sojourn upon earth, loved the world and the things of the world, and who now want to come back into the world, that they may taste once more of its enjoyments. And this is why they seek to establish communication with persons still in the world.

     In passing, we will cite the notorious example of a New Churchman who was deceived by these false Christs,-the case of Joseph Hartman, as described in his own book, Facts and Mysteries about Spiritism. Like many another good New Churchman, Hartman commenced his first-hand experience with spiritism in the apparently harmless way of experimenting with the planchette. But, giving himself over to it completely from the first, he passed rapidly through the various stages, until finally the spirits had complete possession of him, infesting him continually, and destroying the very freedom of his life. It was only by the aid of a New Church minister and physician that he eventually broke the yoke from off his neck, if, indeed, he was ever completely delivered. His case, therefore, stands as a great warning to those who would meddle with these forbidden things.

     No! At the present time, there is but one legitimate way for New Churchmen to "come into the spirit," or to see with the eyes of their spirit. This way they are urged to use, for it requires the exercise of their spiritual rational faculty, which is the peculiar treasure of the New Church. Nor does it demand the surrender of that freedom and rationality by means of which man is regenerated.

     Truly our spiritual eyes may he opened, so that we may see the things which "must be hereafter." And this ability to have the spiritual sight opened is the result of the Last Judgment, before the time of which the dogmas of the former Church were reinforced by such a powerful spiritual sphere that independent spiritual thought was rendered impossible, and men were unable to elevate their spiritual minds to the contemplation of the things of the spirit, or to exercise the spiritual rational faculty.

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The essence of the spiritual sight which is legitimate in the New Church today is expressed in the words, NUNC LICET,-"Now it is permitted to enter intellectually into the mysteries of faith." This entrance into the mysteries of faith, under the guiding hand of a resplendent Revelation, is the spiritual sight now permitted to mankind.
LAST PASSOVER 1920

LAST PASSOVER Rev. W. B. CALDWELL 1920

     "Jesus said unto His disciples, With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer; for I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God." (Luke 22:16) Lessons: Genesis 18:1-22. Luke 22:1-30. A. C. 4735.

     When the Lord ate the last passover with His disciples, He instituted the Holy Supper as a sacrament to be observed in the Christian Church, and now in the New Church, in remembrance of His Passion and Glorification, in remembrance of His temptations and victories, the last of which was His death and resurrection, whereby He fully overcame the hells and redeemed the human race, completely putting off the infirm human, rising in the glorified Human, to be forever present in heaven and the church, and to save all who receive Him in that Divine Human.

     The sacrament, therefore, is in remembrance of the Divine Love, from which the Lord came into the world to perform redemption,-Divine Love toward the whole human race, from which He desires with an infinite desire to impart to all men the blessings that are within His gift, and which He was able to impart in greater measure after He had removed hell from men, and had taken to Himself a new power in the glorified Body in which He arose. In this We is present immediately in heaven and the church, to impart new spiritual blessing. "This is my body, which is given for you."

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After the glorification, the life of Divine Love went forth from the Divine Human, from the Divine Body of the Lord, whose presence and operation is the gift of the Holy Spirit, regenerating, saving, providing all spiritual life, intelligence, wisdom, and power, with angels and men. And it is the giving of the life of this Divine Love, and the reception of it in reciprocal love by men, that is represented and actually fulfilled in the partaking of the bread and wine of the Holy Supper,-a spiritual reception by men, a Divine spiritual giving by the Lord,-an imparting and communication of the life of His Divine Love to all who are prepared by regeneration to receive it. These the Lord takes to Himself, or receives unto Himself in heaven, that He may be conjoined to them and they to Him in eternal life. For the Lord in His Divine Human is present in the Holy Supper and opens heaven to those who worthily approach. Thus the sacrament is introduction into heaven for those who are regenerating, who have received the Lord in the life of faith and charity, whose minds are thereby opened to receive the heavenly sphere of love and wisdom from the Lord. These have received and reciprocated the Lord's Divine Love, with whom, therefore, the sacrament is a remembrance of His Divine longing and desire for their salvation. "Jesus said unto His disciples, With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer."

The sacrament is also to be a remembrance of the Lord's suffering or passion, which was the supreme sign of His love for mankind. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." The man of the church remembers this when he suffers the death of evil in himself, even by bitter repentance and temptation despair. The Holy Supper is a sacrament of repentance. As our Lord, by the humiliation of the human, even to its abject degradation and death, poured out the evil thereof, receiving into Himself the fullness of Divine Good, so man, by the complete humbling of the natural man, is to remove evil as sin by repentance, that he may receive spiritual good from the Lord. The receiving of this good from the Lord after the fasting of repentance is the nourishment of the soul unto eternal life which is actually given in the eating of the Supper,-an inner correspondence of the material bread and wine.

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"Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God."

     Our Lord partook of the bread and wine with His disciples while He was yet with them in the flesh. But that this was an act representative of His giving them the bread of spiritual life, which was to proceed from His glorified Human, We taught when He said, "For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God." (Luke 22:16.) And in like words, in Matthew, "But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom." (26:29.) This, indeed, the Lord actually fulfilled when He appeared to His disciples after the resurrection, opening their spiritual eyes, and giving them to know and receive Him in His spiritual kingdom. "And it came to pass, as We sat at meat with them, He took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew Him; and He vanished out of their sight." (Luke 24:30, 31.)

     The Lord ate with His disciples before and after He underwent the Passion of the Cross. His last act before He was betrayed was to eat the passover with them, and after He had risen He again gave them to eat. The significance of this lies in the fact that His giving them to eat involved the actual communication or giving of the life of His Divine Human to them,-to heaven and the church, represented by the disciples. Because of this ultimate actuality, the sacramental eating and drinking is the most holy act of worship in the church.

     It is also recorded that when the Lord, after His resurrection, appeared to the eleven gathered together in Jerusalem, He said unto them, "Have ye here any meat? And they gave Him a piece of broiled fish, and of an honeycomb. And He took it, and did eat before them." (Luke 24:41-43) We are led to enquire, therefore, what is meant by the Lord Himself receiving food from His disciples, seeing that in reality the Divine hath no need of anything that finite beings can supply; and also what is meant when it says in the Word that the Lord hungered and thirsted; and what is meant by the words of the text, "With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you."

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We are taught in the Writings that by the Lord's hungering and thirsting is meant the desire of His Divine Love, His desire and longing for the salvation of men, that He may take them to Himself, and receive them into heaven. And we know that this is to receive them into His Divine Human, into His Divine Body, which is the essential life of the Gorand Man of heaven and the church. We are familiar with the teaching that those who enter the other life from the world are to be compared to foods that enter the life of man's body, (A. C. 5175); also the doctrine that it is the soul of finite man that nourishes his body, attracting and appropriating the essences of material food, according to its love, and corresponding to it. (D. L. W. 420.) So, in an eminent sense, the Divine Love, as the Soul of the Human, as the Divine Human Itself after glorification, draws to Him in heaven all who are prepared by regeneration to abide with Him forever. Hence the Lord's words: "This is the will of Him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day." (John 6:40.) "No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him; and I will raise him up at the last day." (John 6:44.) "And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me." (John 12:32.)

That a love for the whole human race was the soul of the Human of the Lord in the world,-the Divine love and will of Jehovah the Father, to do whose will He came into the world to perform the work of redemption,-He taught when, on a time, His "disciples prayed Him, saying, Master, eat. But He said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of. Therefore said the disciples one to another, Hath any man brought Him ought to eat? Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work." (John 4:31). Again, this Divine Love is signified when, after fasting in the wilderness, "He was an hungered." The tempter then came, and there was an assault of the hells upon that love. (Matt. 4.) On the cross. "Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, saith, I thirst." (John 19:28.)

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This was His love for the salvation of men, and in special for the gentiles, whose falsity of ignorance is signified by the vinegar that was offered Him to drink. And because good gentiles were accepted by the Lord, notwithstanding their falsities of ignorance, therefore He finally drank of the vinegar. Again, after He had risen, when He appeared to the disciples on the shores of the sea of Galilee, (Tiberias), He represented His love for the gentiles, and His longing for their gathering into the Christian Church, when He said, "Children, have ye any meat? They answered Him, No. And He said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes." (John 21:5, 6.)

Since, therefore, the Lord's hungering and thirsting represent the desire of His Divine Love for the salvation of men, we may see what is meant spiritually by His desiring to eat the passover with His disciples, namely, to take them to Himself in the kingdom of God, there to nourish their souls with the bread of eternal life. "For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God," or "until that day when I drink it new with you in the kingdom of God." And so His actual eating with His disciples, and giving them to eat, after He had risen in His glorified Human, is representative of His receiving the men of the church into heaven by the sacrament of the Help Supper. For all the regenerate are His disciples.

And this reception into heaven is reception by the Lord, and conjunction with Him by love. To be received into heaven is to be received into His Body, into the Gorand Man of heaven, of which the Lord's Divine Human is all in all. Men receive the Lord, and He receives them. The one is their eating of His supper, the other is His eating with them. Not that the Divine of the Lord can appropriate or add to Himself anything from finite men, but that by means of men He perfects heaven in His image and likeness, and this by means of reciprocal love with the human race, though even this reciprocal love is from the Lord, inspired into angels and men by Him, together with every appearance of its being their own.

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It is by this reciprocal with men that the end of Divine Love is fulfilled,-the Divine hunger and thirst for the salvation of all whom He has created, His infinite desire to take them to Himself in heaven, and to impart the blessings of eternal life, that they may abide in Him, and He in them. By this, indeed, He receives them unto Himself, into the Divine Body in which He rose glorified, and which He had formed to be a receptacle of His Divine Love, "formed to the idea of an infinite heaven,"-(D. 4845), a Divine end which He represented to His disciples when the day of His Passion and Glorification drew near, and when He said unto them, "With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer; for I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God." Amen.
NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL 1920

NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL W. F. PENDLETON 1920

     XI.

     THE PROCESSION.

     The importance of a perfected ritual for the worship of the Lord is as the difference between a man well clothed and one dressed in garments soiled and worn; and worship cannot be said to approximate perfection without a procession of vested choristers.

     The Choir.

     The procession involves a choir. Rationally considered, the whole congregation is a choir, but untrained. To attempt to train the congregation as a choir is to undertake what cannot be accomplished under present conditions.

     The need of a specially trained choir for the uses of worship was seen and acted on in very early times. Even as far back as the Jewish Church-an indication of a more ancient custom-we find the Levites were required, as one of their duties, to act as a choir of singers. They were arrayed in white linen, standing near the altar.

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They also played on musical instruments. (I Chr. 75:27, 28, 2 Chr. 5:12.) We learn also that in the early Christian Church the choir was on the chancel, thus between the altar and the people. We are told further that "every choir was divided into two parts, stationed on each side of the chancel, in order to sing alternately the verses of the Psalms and hymns, one side responding to the other." (McClintock and Strong.) How well the dual form of the Psalms lends itself to this use is familiar to all.

     In the Greek drama the choir or chorus occupied a position intermediate between the actors and the audience, the place now held by the orchestra. "Similar bodies of singers attended the religious observances of nearly all the nations of antiquity. In the Jewish worship they were especially prominent after the time of David, at times being composed of four thousand singers and two hundred and eighty-eight leaders." (McClintock and Strong.)

     If, therefore, it be taken for granted that a selected choir is a necessity for the perfection of worship, where shall it be placed! Experience, as indicated above, points to the chancel as the most suitable place, for reasons both practical and representative On the chancel the choir is in the best position for co-operation with the minister, and for leading the congregation in the singing, in the unisonal reading, in the responses, and in the prayers-for singing is not the only use of the choir.

     Let us remark that the practical reasons for the choir are also representative, since there is nothing in worship that is not representative. What is not representative of the Lord, and of heaven and the church, has no place in worship. It is the representative character of the choir that gives it its place of use and value. Does the choir represent a thing that ought to be represented in worship? This leads us to the subject of the procession, and to ask the question. Does the procession fill an important place in ritual? If so, there is no agency but the choir at the present time that can so efficiently perform this representative use, and no position more suitable and appropriate than on the chancel.

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     The Procession Defined.

     A procession (from procedere-to go forth), is "the action of a body of persons going or marching along in orderly succession, in a formal or ceremonious way; especially a religious ceremony or on a festive occasion." (Oxford Eng. Dic.) It is "that which is moving onward in an orderly, stately, or in a solemn manner." "A solemn march of the clergy and people, attended with religious ceremonies, prayers, singing, etc., in the churches or streets of a town." (Encyclopedia Americana.)

     Thus the term procession is applied to many things, or where one thing follows another in orderly succession, as ships, birds, animals, a caravan, an army, or marching on festive occasions or in dances. The term "processional" is given to "a hymn, psalm, litany, etc., sung or recited in procession, for example, by the clergy and choir in proceeding from the vestry to the chancel at the opening of the service." (Oxford Eng. Dic.) And a "recessional" is defined as "belonging to the recession or retirement of the clergy and the choir from the chancel to the vestry at the close of the service; especially a recessional hymn sung while this retirement is taking place." (Ibid.)

     The distinction of a religious procession from other kinds, we discover in the purpose or end in view. Those who look for a material origin in everything of worship hold that processions "are in imitation of the motion of the heavenly spheres, the courses of the stars, the revolutions of the seasons, the regular and orderly succession of the days and nights," etc. The year is a procession of the seasons, spring, summer, autumn, and winter. A going and returning, or a going to and fro, is a universal law, as the going of the blood from the heart by the arteries and returning by the veins. It is the law of influx and reflux, as creation going forth from God and returning again to Him. (D. L. W. 167-172, 316), producing that wonderful form called by Swedenborg in his philosophical works the vortical form. Thus each thing in the created universe has some place in an orderly and active progression.

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     Abolished at the Reformation

     Religious processions were largely abolished at the Reformation. The Reformers continued to adhere in general to that which constituted the internal of the Catholic Church, its theology, or its faith and doctrine; but they very much modified its ritualistic and religious practices, wishing to differentiate their worship as much as possible. The Church of England retained the procession as an act of worship, but limited it to the church service.

     Processions in the Primitive Church.

     In the early Christian Church, processions were many, deriving their customs from the Jewish and Gentile religions around them, all of which were from the Ancient Church, in which were numerous processions, representative of things in the spiritual world; for in that world there are many forms of representative processions, as we shall see. In the Primitive Church the procession represented a going forth to enter into the presence of God as the King; hence they were clothed for it in a special manner, or in their best garments. There were at that time processions at baptisms, at the communion, and at all church festivals. There were also funeral and bridal processions, which are still retained, and it never occurs to any one to see anything wrong in them.

     Common in the Middle Ages.

     Processions of every kind were very common in the middle ages. "In times of calamity the Litanies were sung processionally about the streets of great cities in divers dioceses." (Oxford Eng. Dic.) Processions, and ceremonials of all kinds, were developed with great magnificence by the Roman Catholic Church. The cross or the host led the procession; but sometimes images, banners, etc., were used. They walked two by two, because the Lord sent out His disciples two by two. It was also considered a symbol of the two great commandments. These street processions were nearly always attended with singing. But now, in Catholic countries, very many processions are of a civic, not of a religious character, having commercial ends in view.

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     Origin in the Ancient Church.

     We have spoken before in these notes of the origin of Christian ritual in the representative worship of the Ancient Church, and it is a point that a New Church student-of ritual should ever keep in mind, remembering that the ancient representative worship had its source in representatives seen in the spiritual world, even as we are told that the literal sense of the Word to a large extent had a similar origin. Moses by command built the tabernacle according to a pattern shown him in spiritual vision, (Exod. 25:40, 26:30, 28:8. A. C. 9577.) The ancient and most ancient people had similar visions, and what they saw was reproduced in the world of nature, giving rise to all the forms of worship, many of which have come down to us. Among the things seen were processions, which we may know from the wonderful procession shown to Swedenborg, as described in Heaven and Hell n. 534, and the procession seen by him when he was reading the 3rd Chapter of Joshua. (S. D. 2289.)

     From this origin came the universal prevalence of processions in ancient times, in the Christian world, and in modern Gentile nations. This is so manifest that ecclesiastical historians have called attention to it, noting as "a significant fact" that "processions, as solemn religious rites, are of very great antiquity," (Oxford Eng. Dic.), that "the processional formed an essential part of the ancient worship," that "the ceremonial of Egyptian worship was essentially processional," and that "the procession was an essential part of the initiation into the ancient mysteries in Egypt, Greece, and elsewhere." From these mysteries came not only much of Christian ritual, but from the same sources were drawn, to a considerable extent, the ritual of the modern secret orders, in which the processional plays an important part.

     "With the Greeks and Romans the processions took place chiefly on the festivals of Diana, Bacchus, Ceres, and other deities; also before the beginning of the games of the circus; and in spring, when the fields were sprinkled with holy water to increase their fertility."*

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These processions were headed by priests carrying images of their gods and goddesses, as in dedication we carry the Word to be placed in the Sacrarium upon the Great Altar.
     * The notes from which this paper is prepared were made some years ago, and I am not able now to identify all the sources.-W. F. P.

     Examples in Scripture.

     Since processions were so general in ancient times, and are in modern, there must be indications of it in the letter of Scripture, and in the Jewish worship, all the forms of both being of a more ancient origin, as we have seen; and we would here make the general remark that the things which have such an origin may be selected for use in worship, when the ultimate or practical conditions are favorable. Anything of ancient rite and custom that appears in Scripture may be introduced into worship now; for in ancient times all representatives, all customs, were ritualistic and significative in character.

     In the letter of the Word we find many examples of the ancient processional reproduced and continued in the representative worship of the Jews; as for instance, the procession of the women, led by Miriam after the passage of the Red Sea, and the destruction of Pharaoh and his army. "And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances; and Miriam answered them, Sing ye to the Lord, for He hath triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider hath He thrown into the sea." (Exod. 19:20, 21.) Similarly we read that "when David was returned from the slaughter of the Philistines, the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing, to meet King Saul, with tabrets, with joy, and with instruments of music. And the women answered one another as they played, and said, Saul hath slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands." (I Samuel 18:6, 7.) These two instances indicate the existence not only of the procession but also of responsive singing. (See A. C. 8340.)

     The passage of the Jordan by the Israelites was a religious procession. The officers went through the host and commanded the people to follow the ark when they saw it borne by the priests. Then the priests bearing the ark came to the river, and the waters divided, and the priests stood firm on dry ground in the midst of the Jordan, until the people passed by.

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Then twelve men took twelve stones, etc. This procession was reproduced in the spiritual World on an occasion as noted above. (S. D. 2289.)

     After crossing the river, there was a procession around the city of Jericho, repeated seven times on seven days in succession, the priests bearing the ark and blowing the trumpets, the people shouting, all followed by the falling of the walls of the city on the seventh day. (Joshua 3:4, 5)

     David brought the ark of God in procession, and restored it to its place in the tabernacle, after it had been taken by the Philistines. "And David, and all the house of Israel, brought up the ark of the Lord with shouting and with the sound of trumpets." (2 Samuel 6:15.) A similar procession took place when the temple was built, the priests and Levites bearing the ark from the tabernacle to the temple. (I Kings 8:3-6.)

     The word halikoth, in Psalm 68:24, (literally walkings, rendered going in the A. V.), "means a religious procession, as described in that context, headed by the singers who preceded the sacred ark while the instrumental musicians followed, and a line of females with timbrels accompanied on either side." (McClintock and Strong.) The verse translated literally is as follows: "They have seen thy walkings, O God; the walkings of my God, my King, in the sanctuary." The walkings of God in the sanctuary were "processions in honor of God." (Gesenius.) These verses (2-1, 25) "appear to be a description of the procession." (Clarke.)

     There are signs of the procession in the Apocalypse, especially in the vision of the white horse, "and he that sat on him was called faithful and true. . . and his name is called the Word of God. And the armies which were in heaven followed Him upon white horses." (Apoc. 19:11, 13, 14.)

     We read also that the Lord went in procession into Jerusalem on what is called Palm Sunday, sitting upon an ass, "and the multitude that went before, and that followed, cried saying, Hosanna to the Son of David, blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord." (Matt. 21:9.)

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     There are many other evidences of the processional in the Sacred Scripture, as, for example, the processions around the altar during the feast of tabernacles. A notable instance, also, is the march of the sons of Israel in the wilderness, which was a continual procession, the ark leading the way every day, following the pillar of cloud.

     Representative of a Pilgrimage.

     The procession represents a pilgrimage. This word, in its literal rendering, means a journeying through the country, (per ager.) It signifies to journey and to sojourn. Sojourning involves traveling, journeying, walking, and tarrying at times on the way. Thus the word pilgrim, (from the Latin peregrinari-to sojourn), came to signify "one who from a religious motive travels to a shrine or holy place, or sanctuary," tarrying here and there for food and lodging, or for other reasons. It is "one who journeys, especially on foot, to some sacred place, with a religious end in view."

     Pilgrims began going to Jerusalem and the Holy Land in the early days of the Christian Church. That land was regarded as holy ground because the Lord Himself had sojourned there, and they thought they were fulfilling the command, in Psalm 132, to "worship at His footstool." Let us worship where His feet have stood. The crusaders had as their object the liberty and security of the pilgrims going to and from Palestine. There were also early pilgrimages to Rome, which have been continued to the present time. The object was the actual presence and prayer in some holy place, or before some holy thing, faith being thereby confirmed and "devotion inflamed by sight," followed by the return homeward inspired to a better life. They believed they would thus receive a benefit they could not obtain at their own dwelling place.

     The real object of pilgrimages, especially in the Ancient Church, was to be instructed, as is seen by the journeying to the oracles, so common during the early historical period in Greece and other ancient nations-a custom derived to them from a time before the dawn of what we know as history, a time when the Ancient Church was in its prime and glory.

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The purpose of these journeys was not only to be instructed, but to carry into effect by obedience the instruction received. It was as a sign and memorial of this early custom that the procession in worship came into use.

The Reformers saw that the procession, like the other forms of worship, had become a merely external thing, having lost its original spirit and life; and regarding it as a meaningless form, they wished to abolish it altogether. They could not wholly effect this, however, and there were some who were able to perceive that it involved a certain law of spiritual life. "It is taken as an obvious symbolism representing the Christian journey." (Schaff.) "It represents the pilgrimage of man upon earth on his way to a better land, from the cradle to the grave, as St. Paul says that we are pilgrims and sojourners in this world." (McClintock and Strong,) Paul derived his knowledge from the ancient custom, and interpreted it correctly. For the procession, existing in the Ancient Church, as all things of external worship did, had its origin in the law of action, that is, the law of progressive action, progressive growth, advancement in spiritual life, regeneration, or the pilgrimage from earth to heaven. This was represented by the pilgrimage, or procession, if you please, of the Israelites from Egypt to the land of Canaan. There must be some deep-seated reason for a custom so often depicted in the Word, and for a practice so widespread among the nations.

To sojourn is to travel and then to tarry to receive instruction concerning the journey, to inquire the way, and to travel on, that is, to carry into practice the instruction received, thus representing actively the journey of life in this world. And we learn from the Doctrines that this representation as a journey continues in the world of spirits after death. In that world a man, now a spirit, journeys from one society to another, tarrying for a time in each, to receive instruction on his way to heaven. Read the description of a grand procession, as representing the world of spirits, in Heaven and Hell n. 534.

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     Significance of the Processional.

     In the Protestant churches the entire congregation seldom takes part in the procession. The choir does it as representing the congregation, though the congregation enters into the action with the choir by rising when the procession enters and taking part in the singing. Marching along the aisle represents a journey to a holy place or shrine, which is the sanctuary where the Word is. It involves walking on a way, path, street, or road, which, as we know, signifies to live according to doctrine. Tarrying in the chancel in the presence of God represents the sojourn to worship and to receive instruction. The return to the vestry represents a carrying into life by obedience the instruction received. The choir, as being in the chancel for instruction, represents the congregation, and leads it in the singing and worship. The choir does not in any sense take the Part of the priesthood or represent the priesthood. Its purpose is one with the purpose of the congregation, which is to receive instruction, not to give it. Let it not be forgotten that the purpose of the choir is one with the purpose of the congregation, and for this reason the congregation ought to co-operate with the choir as actively as possible. The congregation is the solid factor in the worship. The people go to church for the purpose of worship and receiving instruction. The choir takes up this purpose and introduces it actively into the worship by proceeding from the vestry to the chancel and in returning to the vestry, just as the members of the congregation proceed to the house of God to receive instruction, and return home again.

     The procession of the choir introduces action into the service, and action means living. That is, the service then becomes not only the representation of a sojourn, but a representation of actual living. This is illustrated by the meaning of the word drama, in the Greek language, signifying acting or doing, the same as agere in the Latin; and we know, as a historical fact, that the drama was originally a form of worship; but it represented worship by acting or doing. There is in worship both speaking and doing, but the Protestant Church removed a large part of the doing, and the Puritans nearly all of it; so that, with the latter, almost all the co-operation of the people in worship was taken away, and the sermon became a lecture to a passive congregation.

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Action ought to be restored in worship, as far as is convenient and possible under the conditions that exist.

     Vestments of the Choir.

     The members of a choir should be clothed in suitable vestments. A choir in procession and on the chancel without appropriate vestments would not be in keeping with its solemn environment, and would be incapable of properly performing its function. It would, in fact, present an unseemly and an undignified appearance. Uniformity as well as neatness and beauty in dress is a requisite in all choral function, or on occasions when men and women speak, move, and act together; this is especially true in the solemnities of worship, representing in this manner unanimity, order, and complete organization, or where a number act together as one man, as in the choirs of the spiritual world. A vested choir in procession meets a need in worship that no other agency can so well supply.

     Finally, a choir in procession and on the chancel should be composed of both men and women. A choir of boys brings down from the dark ages a taint of Catholic celibacy, and is far away from any representation of the marriage of good and truth, from which the conjugial descends into the world. A choir in which there is no such representation has no place in the worship of the New Church.

     (To be continued.)

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CARL THEOPHILUS ODHNER 1920

     AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

     (For previous installments, see issues of New Church Life for January, February, and March, 1920.)

     1883.

     December.-Not long after I entered the School of the Academy, the old "itch to write" (cacoethes scribendi) seized me, and has continued raging ever since. My first efforts were short articles in Swedish, preaching Academy doctrines in SKANDINAVISK NYKRKTIDNING, then edited by Pastor Boyesen. In December, these were followed by the first of many contributions to NEW CHURCH LIFE, in the form: of an article on "The Swedish Words in the Spiritual Diary," which had been wrongly translated in the English edition of that work.

     At Christmas I accompanied Fred Waelchli to his home in Allentown, where I spent my vacation very enjoyably, forming friendships in the Church which have never been broken. The Rev. E. J. E. Schreck was Pastor of the Allentown Society at that time, and had a big fight on his hands against the "liberal party."

     1884.

     January.-I returned to Philadelphia, and was present at the double wedding of Gertrude and Cara Starkey to John Pitcairn and Robert M. Glenn; great occasion, with sumptuous spread at Dr. Starkey's. School opens again, greatly increased teaching force; Mr. Pendleton moves to Philadelphia from Chicago; Mrs. Hibbard and Miss Alice Grant engaged in the Girls' School; Homer Synnestvedt begins attending school; Mr. Benade opens a course of "Conversations on Education," held at the church on Wednesday evenings.

     March.-The students start a debating and literary society, which develops into a continuation of the "Gymnasium," originally founded by the first students of the Academy. We have a great discussion on the best form of national government, which knocks "democratic republicanism" out of my head,-good riddance to the rubbish!

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I am made Secretary of the Gymnasium.

     Wrote a paper on "Charles XII" for the Young Folks' Club; this was subsequently published in the LIFE for April. During this month I wrote a tract in Swedish, called "Swedenborg och den Nya Kyrkan," which was published by the American New Church Tract and Publication Society. It was well advertised, and brought me hundreds of letters from Swedes all over the country; some of them have been brought into the Church in this way, though only a few. At this time I was in a "missionary fever," and started a "Scandinavian New Church Missionary Society in America," which Asplundh wanted to "boss," and which soon came to nothing.

     On April 24th, we all attended the wedding of Mr. Schreck and Miss Fanny Aitken. I wrote a poem for the bridal couple.

     May.-Two general meetings were held this month: first, the meeting of the General Church of Pennsylvania, and, secondly, that of the General Convention, which met in Chestnut Street. I attended both as a delegate, but was away from the latter meeting a good deal, being occupied in painting the fence around our church in Cherry street. For this I got twenty dollars, which was a good help towards the expenses of the coming summer.

     June.-Great excitement on "the fourth story" over the planning of a camp over the summer thorough organization and preparation-high times at the Walkers once a week. School closing; I read an essay on "Life." Then off with Dan, Fred, and Homer to Allentown; from there by canal-boat to March Chunk, then on foot overland through the utter wilderness of Carbon County to Newfoundland P. O., in Pike Co.; where we pitched camp near a lake. Oh, what a time we had of it there, four boys in a tent, three whole months. "Camp Benade," we called it.

     I returned to Philadelphia two or three weeks earlier than the other boys, as I had a job on hand, assisting Charlie Stuart to arrange the rest of the Academy Library.

     September 23rd.-School again opens; my second year at the Academy.

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     November.-Wrote the following articles for the LIFE: "The Peopling of America,"-showing Swedenborg's early theories on this subject.

     "Historical Inaccuracies" in Dr. Bayley's New Church Worthies. This critique was republished in the MESSENGER, and quoted by Dr. Bayley in the preface to his book.

     "The Term "Priest' in the Writings," showing that Swedenborg uses the word "Priest" in Swedish in the same sense as "Sacerdos" in Latin.

     Published the second of my Swedish tracts: "Om den Gudomliga Treenighteten" ("On the Divine Trinity"), being translated extracts from the True Christian Religion.

     December.-Read a paper, describing Aug. Nordenskjold's "Forsamlings formen i det Nya Jerusalem," before the monthly Conference of the New Church Ministers. It was received with great applause, and was published in the December LIFE, but gave great offense to Dr. Rudolph Tafel in London, who said that "he did not care to be criticized by boys." The same month, Mr. Charlie Stuart-between whom and myself there had sprung up a great literary friendship-showed symptoms of consumption so severe that he had to give up all work and go to Valdosta, Georgia, to eke out his threatened span of life. From him the Library and the Book Room passed into my hands, the latter "a young white elephant," which well-nigh brought on "premature baltitude.

     Christmas was again spent in Allentown, this time by all the boys. We had a great feast at Art Beery's, an Old Church friend of Fred Waelchli's who had spent some time with us at the Camp. Those were fiery times in Allentown; the Society was about to split, and we worshiped for the last time in the Temple on 7th Street.

     1885.

     January.-My recollections of this year, or the greater part of it, are rather meager. On my return from Allentown, I attended another double wedding, that of Pauline Starkey to John A. Wells, and Dora Starkey to Charles S. Smith. It was another grand affair, with a sumptuous spread.

     About this time the Young Folks' Club started a monthly paper, called "The Budget," of which I was one of the editors.

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We were very funny in its columns, too funny for the longevity of the journal. I had an article on "Corns," and Price a long poem in hexameter describing the gatherings of the boys in Allentown. The whole began to be too spirited for the "sistren," and so "The Budget" fell through.

     March.-In the meantime there was a big fight going on among my former friends in Sweden, and, of course, I had to take a hand in it, writing red hot articles in favor of Church order and against the "liberals." I also wrote for the LIFE, keeping the English-speaking public posted on the affairs in Sweden. The "liberals" were furious against me, and I received threatening anonymous letters.

     April.-One day in the spring I received a very remarkable letter from a Swede residing in Indian Territory, Mr. Ansgarius Boren, who was a Sergeant in the U. S. Army, and who had seen my name in one of the Swedish papers in Chicago, and now wrote for some New Church literature. He got some books from me, and a most interesting correspondence began, which resulted in Mr. Roren's full, enthusiastic, and most rational reception of the Doctrines. One of his letters was published in the LIFE for May. Mr. Starkey became interested in him, and effected his release from the Army, as he wished to study for the ministry.

     June,-I don't remember much about my doings this year until the closing of the schools in June. But now a change was to come for the Academy, and a break-up of the old state. The Academy had purchased Mr. Adolph Tafel's big house on Summer St. (southwest corner of 17th), and I was employed to make a Catalogue of the Library, and to watch over the removal of the schools from the dingy quarters at 110 Friedlander St. I undertook this "small job," but surely had a little elephant on my hands. The summer was frightfully hot. I had a pair of lazy, ill-smelling negroes to help me, and worked until I was exhausted. I bearded for a while with Mrs. Coffin at the Orphanage, and afterwards with the janitor, Mr. Van Horn. While here, I succeeded in bringing Mr. Van Horn's brother-in-law Mr. Schwindt, to the Church, and he has remained a loyal member ever since.

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     July.-Well, I worked away until the school was moved and the whole Library roughly catalogued. It was now getting so hot in the city that the pavements burned through one's shoes, and many died from sunstroke every day. No sooner was my work in Philadelphia completed than I fled for my life to Allentown, where I took lodgings with Mr. John Waelchli, and where I wrote out the Catalogue in two big volumes. Fred Waelchli had charge of the Allentown Society during the summer. Lulu Xandry was also spending her vacation here with the Kesslers, and was budding forth into a remarkably pretty and attractive little girl. Of course, I was head over heels in love with another girl, but could not help enjoying the childish beauty and pleasant company of Lulu. We had a glorious time that summer in Allentown,-classes and socials, picnics and moonlight rides, etc., without end. The mountain air built me up splendidly, and I returned to School in fine condition.

     September.-School opened an the 16th with a lot of new students, including Edward S. Hyatt, Alfred Acton, W. H. Acton, Joe Boyesen, and Boren. I began teaching that fall,-Botany and Hebrew. I was very much interested in Botany, and made an Index to all the botanical references in the Writings-an enormous undertaking-and wrote an almost complete textbook on the subject, which I have used in school to this day and hope to complete some time. I worked prodigiously on this, sat up late at nights, and drank blade coffee to keep awake, until I had symptoms of heart failure.

     December.-During the winter we had a dancing school in Summer Street, and I was inaugurated into the mysteries of the whirling art, danced a good deal with Lulu, and used to have my heart torn between the idealistic love for the other girl and the attraction which Lulu undeniably exercised upon my distracted mind.

     Christmas was spent in Philadelphia this year, but the folks were rather melancholy over the loss of Dr. Farrington and Charlie Stuart, who died, one after the other, on December the 17th and 18th.

     (To be continued.)

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ELEANOR 1920

ELEANOR EDWARD POLLOCK ANSHUTZ 1920

     CHAPTER XI.

     The old story and the old road again.

     Mrs. Davis was not a vulgar woman. When she voiced her yearnings for the white robes and golden crowns of the saved, as she often did, it was in a genteel manner, and in phrases that were rather poetic even though trite. She longed for rest from the "turmoil of life;" for the "quiet of the peaceful grave;" for the time when she could "join the glad throng beyond the river." Such were her yearnings when in good health, but when sick, she usually got very much frightened.

     Her illness, mentioned in the last chapter, was quite severe, though more painful than dangerous, the doctor told her. But his word did not allay her fears, and on the third day of her sickness, she begged her husband to telegraph her favorite brother, Dick, that she was dying. He obeyed her at once, though he knew that she was mistaken. Mr. Davis was a quiet, submissive man, and advancing years had taught him that earthly peace was found only by holding no opinions contrary to those of his wife. Dick arrived in time to join her at a very good supper. She was languid, and calmly talked of death. "I suppose that my time for leaving this fleeting world has not come yet."

     On the afternoon of the next day, Dick listlessly sat by the open window in his sister's room, while she reclined on a lounge and dozed, for the weather was very warm. He had taken a walk, this morning, along the path he had trodden so often the preceding autumn. As the familiar scenes opened before him,-the fields, fences, bushes, stones, and, lastly, a distant glimpse of the brook,-his old feelings returned with tremendous force, and he could only turn his back doggedly on these silent friends, and retrace his steps. For months he had been fighting his "passion, as he termed it, and had so far conquered as to become a silent man, with but few traces of the careless boy of a few months before.

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He now sat gazing vacantly out of the window, as oblivious to the rich green foliage, the scent of the June roses that stole into the room, or, to the faint hum of the bees, as he was to the peaceful sound of Mrs. Davis' slumbers. He saw nothing, heard nothing, thought nothing, but sat hopeless; for his short morning walk had shown him that the delight of his life still stood opposite to duty and honor. At last the door opened, and Mrs. Davis' servant put her head in, and said: "Mis' Davis, Miss Mayburn is here to ax how you are, and if there is anything they can do for you"

     "A nice time to come, after I have recovered," said Mrs. Davis, acidly, becoming very wide awake at once.

     "She said they'd just heard tell that you was sick," continued the servant.

     "Very well, 'Liza, give her my compliments, and tell her that I am a little better, but cannot receive callers, and do not require any assistance." Then, as the girl withdrew, she turned to Dick, who had risen and was restlessly pacing, or rather raging, up and down the floor, and said: "She has heard that you are here."

     "Don't talk that way about her to me, Kate!" he exclaimed, facing his sister.

     "Well, you needn't speak so savagely to me; perhaps you had better go down and see her, since she has taken the trouble to call-on you," and saying this, Mrs. Davis fell back on her pillow.

     "So I will," he answered, as he flung himself out of the room, closing the door behind him with emphasis. He would see her once more; he would be cold and formal; she did not and never had loved him; perhaps seeing her once more might cure him of his misery; if not, no matter, it could harm neither of them; one more meeting, and then-he cared not what became of him.

     He ran rapidly down the stairs as 'Liza shut the door, after delivering her curt message. Waiting until she had withdrawn, he softly opened the door. What a leap his heart gave! No; there was no cure for him in the sight of her, nothing but a mastering desire to be with her once more.

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He wheeled around to get his hat. Where was that hat! wretched hat! base hat! to hide so perversely when wanted as never before! He tore through the house; upstairs, three steps at a time; down again with a furious rush, until 'Liza, alarmed at the commotion, looked in from the kitchen and exclaimed: "La! Mr. Dick, whatever is the matter?"

     "Where's my hat?"

     "Right there on the floor beside you, where you threw it this-"

     He snatched it up, and was off before she could finish. He ran down the path to the gate that led out on the road, but no one was in sight in the direction that he was wont to take; he was about to heap bitter abuse upon the cause of his delay, when, glancing in the other direction, he saw her. His favorite short cut across the fields had too many fences to suit her, and she was returning by the longer road that led through the forest. He hurried after her, and hearing his footsteps, she turned. A flash of something lit her face, but it was quickly merged into a friendly welcome. "This is a surprise; I didn't know that you were here."

     "I arrived yesterday," he replied, heroically striving to keep his voice under command. "I am glad to see you again, Miss Mayburn." They shook hands very decorously, exchanged a few formalities of greeting, and an awkward pause followed.

     "I suppose your sister sent for you?" she said, breaking the silence.

     "Yes, she sent for me."

     "We heard of her illness today, and father sent me over to inquire, and offer any assistance that we could give."

     "Your kindness met with a poor reception."

     Ignoring this, she said: "I was glad to learn that she is better."

     "Yes; Kate is all right. She got scared, as she always does when sick, and telegraphed for me."

     There are certain conversations that are so difficult to maintain that every available word is a treasure; his was one, and Eleanor was about to-reply, "What a pity that you had your trip for nothing," when its inappropriateness struck her, and she checked the half-formed sentence and smiled slightly.

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     "What are you laughing at, Nellie?" he asked, in an aggrieved tone, and unthinkingly lapsed into the old familiar name.

     "Nothing, Dick."

     "Is it this rascally hat? I had trouble enough to find it. I saw you in the yard, and wishing to speak to you, I looked for my hat, and after searching every room in the house, where do you suppose I found it, Miss Mayburn?"

     "Really, Mr. Gray, I cannot imagine."

     "Right on the floor beside me."

     "You must have searched rapidly to have visited so many rooms in so short a time."

     "I did my speed would have beaten that of a race-horse." At this she laughed, and thereat he chose to get highly offended. That she should look as happy as she did, and be able to laugh while he was so wretched and gloomy, was too much, and he said, elaborately, "I beg your pardon for using such a sinful comparison; horse-racing is almost as wicked as dancing."

     She was not offended at his rudeness; in fact, it rather pleased her; and if he had come as careless and light-hearted as he once did, she would have been secretly disappointed. She replied: "Do you really think it is?"

     "You know what I mean," he said, viciously kicking a stone out of his path. Then, as she kept silent, "Miss Mayburn, I have no right to talk to you. I beg your pardon."

     "It is not necessary, Mr. Gray."

     "There now, I have offended you," he said, hoping that he had, for anything would be better than seeing her so cheerful.

     "You have said nothing to offend me, I assure you."

     "No, I suppose not; what I say isn't of sufficient importance. Of this bit of pure ill-humor she took on notice. Then he changefully said: "Please do not mind me; since I last saw you I have been in trouble-I'm all out of sorts."

     "I hope your trouble will soon pass away."

     "So do I, but it is hoping in vain."

     "Perhaps you take too gloomy a view of things every one's troubles are lightened in time. Mine generally are."

     "Have you had troubles, too" he asked, hopefully.

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     "Yes," she replied; "but nearly all of them have left me, and I am happy-or nearly so."

     At hearing this he frowned, and, after walking a short distance in silence, asked, in an icy tone, "Do you object to my walking home, or at least part of the way with you?"

     "Not if you wish to; why should I?"

     Glum silence.

     "I hope you will call to see father and mother before you go home."

     "Thanks," was his brief response. ["She does not care for me a particle. Phil was right."] Then aloud, and with an attempt at ease that was a miserable failure, "How is Mr. Powman?"

     "He is well, and, I believe, very happy."
"What right-why is he so very happy!" frowning, and looking at her sharply.

     "Engaged people have a right to be so, haven't they?" She smiled, and slightly turned away her head; it was a cruel act.

     He stopped short, and seemed to shudder, as in a dead voice, he said, "I wish you joy." Then, after a low "Good-bye, Nellie," he turned, and with lifeless steps left her.

     This was carrying the matter too far to suit her, and after watching him a moment, she said: "Dick!"

     He stopped, but did not turn around.

     "Before you leave me," she said, "I wish to correct your mistake; it is Molly that is to be congratulated, not I. Good-day." And saying this, she resumed her walk-very slowly.

     "You don't say so!" he exclaimed, in a joyous voice, and at her side again in a moment. "I haven't heard anything that pleased me so for an age. I certainly must see them and offer my congratulations."

     His past sufferings seemed happiness when compared with the bottomless depths of despair which for the moment had yawned before him-anything but that! The reaction seemed to restore, for the time, the Dick of other days; his gloom and moroseness vanished, as he now fared, gayly by her side. They talked of the engaged pair, of events of the last autumn, of the brook, the maples, and of "old times" generally.

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While so talking, they left the main road, and followed a branch one that led them to a forest, on the border of which Dick stopped, and after looking about for a moment, said:

     "Here it was that I first met-no, not met, but first spoke to-a Miss Mayburn, and asked her if I might have the pleasure of seeing her home."

     After taking a quick look about, she replied:

     "And this is the-spot, the exact spot-you should stand a little nearer that stone, and rest your foot on it-where a Miss Mayburn first thought that a Mr. Gray was a little affected."

     "You did! Why, did I put on the airs of a rescuing knight?"

     "No. But the idea of asking me that question, who had been trembling and clinging to you as I had!"

     "Well, you know, what else could-"

     "Stop!" said she, holding up her hand. "My knight of that day needs no defense."

     "To hear is to obey, your majesty," he replied, with a low bow.

     "But permit me humbly to remind you that he was affected.

     "You are unable to comprehend. His was a knightly affectation."

     "Did you comprehend him?" he asked, half lapsing from the playful tone.

     "I think I did," she answered; and then they resumed their slow walk along the old, unused road through the forest. Two walls of June foliage rose on either side and formed an arched roof above them. In the cool, green shade of the woods, another change came over him-a vague feeling that the present was but a dream from which he would soon awake. But this fancy caused him no anxiety; he was for the present in a world where sorrow was unknown-where was no past to regret, no future to dread-where was only the present, with its calm and tranquil happiness. It was a moment of rest.

     After a long interval of silence, he asked:

     "Am I so very much changed!"

     To this question-apropos of nothing said before, but which seemed perfectly in keeping to her-she answered:

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     "Yes, very much. Don't you think so, too?"

     "No," he answered slowly shaking his head, "I fear not."

     She saw the meaning of this reply. Follow the path of duty as he would, his love was still the same. Yet she asked:

     "Why do you fear?"

     For an instant, a rushing impulse to throw duty to the winds swept over him; but only for an instant, and then he quietly replied:

     "I can't tell you. It's of no importance; and, to change the object, though not the subject, I think that you also have changed."

     "Is it for the worse?"

     "No," he replied, as though speaking to himself. "No; for the better. And yet I once thought that could not be."

     "That is bold flattery," said she, with an attempt at lightness of speech.

     "This is perhaps the last time I shall ever see you, and I am speaking what I believe to be the truth. Has there not been a great: change in you?"

     "Why do you ask?"

     "I do not know, I do not know" (slowly shaking his head). "The change is-but I do not know what it is. In this dream, there seems to be not one discord, while in the old-"

     "There was a discord."

     "Yes."

     "And has that discord ceased?"

     At this question, he started as a veritable sleeper awakening, but before he could reply, she darted to one side of the road, and called to him:

     "Now, Dick, tell me, do you remember this place?"

     He walked across the road, and, standing slightly in front, but with his back towards her, he said:

     "I stood this way."

     "Yes, that's right; and I held on to you this way."

     "Yes, and I gazed up at the old tramp, and felt afraid of him."

     Giving him an impatient little push, she said:

     "Didn't I tell you that you shouldn't slander my knight of that day! He knew not fear."

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     Relapsing into his previous state, he turned, and, after looking at her a moment, said:

     "All that happened ages and ages ago. It was but a dream, after all-just as the present is. I shall soon awake to the real."

     "What is that?"

     "Misery!"

     "Dick, why do you persist in talking so?"

     "A dreamer cannot control himself, can he'" he replied, faintly, smiling.

     "Perhaps your misery was the dream!"
He shook his head.

     "Were you happy then-and now?"

     "Yes, nearly so-completely so-but for that black phantom that is hovering near you-"

     "Where," she exclaimed, in a frightened voice, looking over her shoulder, and drawing close to him, as she had done once before in this place; for he had spoken as though he saw the terrible thing.

     "It is the gloomy specter of an old book."

     A beautiful light shone in her eyes, as she raised them to his, and replied, "That specter has fled from me forever."

     "Nellie!"

     "Yes, the old Book of Sermons, and all belonging to it, have fled before the Books of our Lord and His Light."

     His morbid fancies were dissipated as by a flash of lightning, and he trembled now with quick life as he extended his arms;-but instantly there arose the thought, "She does not love me," and he let them fall again-dead. She was not prepared for this sudden change in him. She did not know how faithfully Phil had obeyed her injunctions. He stood in down-looking silence, and she nonchalantly plucked a leaf from a bush, and, as she played with it, said, at the same time carefully suppressing all her previous glowing enthusiasm: "Yes, since I saw you last fall, I have read a great deal in the Writings, and fully accept them. I may not fully comprehend them, but I have faith," smiling at the term, "that they are Divine Revelation. I accept in them even what I do not understand. Is it rational for me to do so?"

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     "Yes-no-I don't know," he replied, not heeding what he said, as he stood absorbed in his new trouble. She, too, for the first time today was not happy. Perhaps she had pictured something quite different from this. She hummed a little air to make her assumed indifference seem natural. At last it dawned upon him that he must say something.

     "You cannot have read much, for you have but one book-the one I gave you."

     "I have a number of others, but I have twice read the one you gave me.

     "Did you buy them?"

     "No; they were sent to me by a gentleman friend."

     "What is his name?" demanded Dick, with a touch of savagery in his voice.

     This bit of impoliteness did not displease her, though she drew her little self up in a dignified manner, as she replied: "I do not recognize your right to question me in that tone, and I do not know whether the gentleman wishes his name known."

     "Is he ashamed of it?"

     "No; he has nothing to be ashamed of. He is a man I admire."

     "I-" began Dick, hotly, and then checking himself, "but pshaw! it doesn't matter. I'll not pry into your secret."

     "It is no secret," she answered, haughtily. "As he has not told you himself, I thought perhaps he might wish it concealed. But there is no reason for concealment. It was Mr. Brown who sent them to me."

     "Phil!"

     "Yes."

     With a look of amazement he said: "There is something in all this that I cannot understand."

     "Is there, really?" she replied, her haughtiness vanishing as she glanced up at him, with a look that caused him to do what perhaps he should have done sooner-gather her into his arms. Of course, from a purely logical point of view, his premises did not justify this conclusion. But there is something in such matters that routs logic every time. Having now, so to speak, clasped his conclusion close to his heart, this illogical Dick proceeded to his premises. Said he: "Nellie-darling, why could you not have changed your feelings toward me when you changed your faith?"

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     "Why should I, Dick?" replied the sweet young conclusion.

     "Because I love you so. I have suffered so much."

     "Have you? Poor fellow!"

     "Can't you change now? Can't you learn to love me just a little?"

     Just a little! O foolish boy! But it is in keeping with thy illogical course in this matter. Still, it is an old, old request, and, though absurd, its meaning is always comprehended by those to whom it is spoken. Eleanor's reply was as true as she was, and though whispered, he heard it: "I have no need to learn." Then the misery that so long had beset his soul was swept away, and a great peace reigned.

     In time, he asked: "Why did you tell Phil that you didn't love me, when you knew I was dying for you?"

     "I didn't tell him so," she replied, indignantly. "What did he say to you of the meeting he had with me?"

     "He said that he first asked you if he might hunt on your father's place."

     "Yes, so he did."

     "Then he told you that I had gone home. Nellie, that 'going home' was worse than death to me."

     "I'm glad of that, but it's past now. What did he tell you I did when I heard that you had gone home?"

     "That you merely said: 'Has Dick gone home?'"

     "Yes, yes, go on-only I didn't say it in that way."

     "How did you say it?"

     "That doesn't matter now; I'll tell you some other time. Let me hear more of what Phil told you."

     "Well, then he said that you had a little chat together."

     "Chat!"

     "And that you seemed to have a pretty fair opinion of me, for when he pointed out my demerits, you playfully told him that he was 'old.'"

     "Well, I declare!" ejaculated Miss Eleanor.

     "And then," continued Dick, "after an amicable talk, you parted the best of friends."

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     "But when did he tell you that I didn't-" her eyes completed the sentence.

     "He didn't say it in so many words, but the way he told me the story made me believe that you did not, and never had, loved me in the least."

     "Then Phil is a great big story-teller." Such are the thanks that a steady-paced philosopher got for obeying a young girl's request.

     "What did you say and do on that day?" asked Dick.

     "I'll tell you about it some day."

     "I remember now," mused Dick, "that after he had told me the whole story, and I, feeling sick, tried to glean one grain of comfort by questioning him, he told me that you leaned your head against the maple tree and wept as though your heart would break."

     "Did he? Well, we must forgive him."

     "Yes, poor old boy, he meant right, I know, even if I don't fully understand him, and we'll forgive him," said Dick, pitying the whole world.

     "Yes, he showed that he meant well by sending me the many books I sorely needed."

     "I wonder how he came to send them to you?"

     "Maybe he thought they would do me good-and they did."

     "Yes, I suppose so." Then, "Nellie, it wasn't a dream after all."

     "No, it wasn't a dream."

     "It is far better than any dream could ever be."

     "Yes, far better."

     A long silence; the sunbeams filter down through the green leaves and silently play about the young pair, while through the old forest the breeze softly whispers; then;

     "Nellie, this is the dearest place in the world to me."

     "Why, Dick?"

     "Because here where we stand the truest and best girl in the world once came to me for protection-"

     "And came again for love."

     THE END.

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM BRYN ATHYN, PA.
Editor                    Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager      Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communication should be sent to the Business Manager.
TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION
One Year          $3.00 payable in advance
Single Copy           30 cents
     WEEKLY SERMONS FOR THE ISOLATED.

     Recognizing a desire and a need on the part of those who are isolated from our societies and the regular Sunday services there provided, the General Church is now undertaking to supply weekly sermons in pamphlet form. Those that were sent out by The Academy War Service Committee were warmly received, and there was a general expression of regret when they were discontinued. This led to a consideration of the subject at the recent General Assembly, which formally approved the idea that the Church should undertake this use. Means have now been provided to make a beginning, and the plan will soon be in operation, in charge of a Committee appointed by the Bishop.

     While the main object is to make a sermon available every week for the private reading or home worship of the isolated individual and family, it is thought likely that our members generally will want to receive the sermons, and will find them useful in various ways. The plan has the advantage of making it possible to print fifty-two sermons in the course of a year, in addition to the twelve usually printed in the LIFE. Thus a wide range of texts and subjects, treated by many ministers, will be presented during the year, affording a wealth and variety of spiritual instruction not hitherto provided in this manner by the General Church.

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Among other uses, the pamphlets should be valuable for missionary purposes.
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

     Among the articles appearing in THE NEW CHURCH REVIEW for January, 1920, we found especial interest in "The Search for Truth," wherein Mr. Benjamin A. Whittemore treats of Swedenborg's preparation to become a revelation quoting his writings extensively in chronological order, from the Principia to the True Christian Religion, and thus citing the evidence that he was led by the Lord in his sustained "search for truth."

     In the same number, the Rev. Lewis F. Hite, under the title, "The Hobart Report on New Church Education," describes the movement toward establishing a distinctive New Church Schools in Massachusetts in 1838. The records he brings forward show that, in addition to a keen realization and admirable expression of the need for such Schools, some excellent plans of carrying the idea into effect were offered. For example, the Hobart Report said:

     "There are to be primary schools in the different societies, under their exclusive care and management, for the smaller children; a High School, or schools, under the care and management of district associations, for youth of a more advanced age; and a College or University under the care and management of the General Convention, for the higher branches of education. . ."

     Mr. Hite is "curious to know why this scheme was not carried out." From a casual survey of the evidence presented, we should say that, for one thing, there was too much "passing of resolutions" and "referring to committees," and not enough of forceful and persistent leadership, which would have secured support for the movement, both in money and attendance. Mr. Hite touches upon this weakness, but also believes that the few schools that were started under the movement perished of too much "exclusiveness."

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On this, he says:

"Another point of rather fatal significance is the attitude and policy of exclusiveness, hinted at on occasion in the records. It seemed to be the prevailing, if not unanimous, opinion that the schools should admit only the children of New Church parents; and this was-probably sufficient reason why the schools languished and died. The principle of love to the neighbor and practical helpfulness should have made it seem incongruous with New Church profession to exclude any who sought the benefits of a New Church institution. If the schools, however distinctively New Church,-and the more distinctively New Church the better,-had been the means of benefitting the community at large, and had thrown open their doors to all comers, they might have taken their place in the community as uniquely valuable public institutions, instead of being looked upon as hostile and unsocial. It may be that the open door policy would have made little practical difference, but, at least, it would have kept the schools in sympathetic relations with the public; it may be that it would have preserved them from extinction and made them permanent both for the Church and the world."

If "exclusiveness" accounts for the failure of those early plans to materialize in a permanent form, we are led to ask why it is that the Academy, with its maintenance of distinctive education, and the "exclusiveness" implied in the baptism requirement, has grown steadily in the 44 years of its existence? Mr. Hite's article voices a most laudable aspiration for the establishment of a strong system of New Church schools in the Convention, and we would rejoice to see this accomplished, as the most effective possible means for the growth of the Church in power and numbers. But experience has proven that nothing but failure can attend a policy of the "open door," in so far as this means sacrificing distinctive standards of instruction to increased attendance and the consequent diminishing of a New Church sphere.

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PROPHECIES OF DANIEL 1920

PROPHECIES OF DANIEL GEORGE DE CHARMS 1920

THE PROPHECIES OF DANIEL, by A. L. Kip. The Knickerbocker Press, New York, 1919. This latest production from the yen of Mr. Kip is a further development of the correspondences set forth in his previous work, as applied to an exposition of the prophecies of Daniel. After an introduction setting forth the purpose of the book, there follow twelve chapters, each expounding the significance of a corresponding chapter of the Book of Daniel; and the argument is then summed up in a conclusion. The expository nature of the book leads us to judge of it in the light of the teaching given in De Verbo, no. 21, where we are given the three essentials of a sound interpretation of the Scriptures, viz., a knowledge of correspondence, the doctrine of genuine truth, and illustration from the Lord. While we may recognize and admire the wide reading and historical knowledge of the author, and his remarkable familiarity with the science of correspondences, his conclusions are in such striking opposition to the fundamental doctrines of the New Church that the presence of the other two essentials above-mentioned may with propriety be called into question.

His views purport to be drawn from the Heavenly Doctrine, and numerous references to the Writings are to be found in the footnotes. But he takes issue with the statements there made, that the Christian Church came to its end in Swedenborg's day (T. C. R. 757), that the Last Judgment was accomplished in the year 1757 (L. J. 45), and that the Lord has made His Second Advent in the theological writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. "It has been customary," he says, "to think in New Church circles that the Christian Church came to an end in Swedenborg's day. It is true that it did then come to an end so far as its being the central and most vital religious dispensation on earth is concerned, but it did not come to an end so far as regards its career as a church." (p. 8.) So far as we are aware, no such distinction is made in the Writings, which treat of the consummation of the age as the end of the Christian dispensation without further qualification.

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In order to support his contention, the author is compelled further to explain away the teaching with regard to the state of the Christian world. "Swedenborg's statement that the Christian Church of his day was so devastated as to be devoid of any love or genuine truth is not true of the Christian Church at present, which abounds in good works of love and charity, and possesses many helpful truths explanatory of the literal sense of the Bible." (p. 8.) He thus admits that Swedenborg correctly describes the spiritual state of his day, in the statement that the Church at that time was utterly dead and vastate, but he holds that this dead Church was infused with new life by means of the wonderful arcana revealed to the New Church, and this on the authority of C. L. 532 where we are told that the revelations to the New Church were made "for the end that the Christian Church, which is founded on the Word, and is now at its end, may again revive and draw breath through heaven from the Lord." That this statement does nor refer, as Mr. Kip seems to suppose, to any spiritual revival of the dead Church, but to the establishment anew of the living Christian Church in a separate and distinct organization, is evident from this statement itself, as well as from hundreds of other passages in the Writings. Interpreted in accordance with Mr. Kip's view, the Revelator would here be made to teach that the primary purpose in the revelation of the Heavenly Doctrine was not the establishment of a New Church, but the revival of the dead and vastate Christianity, which the Writings elsewhere say is incapable of resuscitation.

Upon this view the whole argument of the book rests, and it qualifies all that is set forth in the succeeding pages. By it the author is led into a chain of reasoning altogether alien to the teaching of the Writings. With remarkable assurance he points to the capture of Jerusalem from the Turks, in 1917, as marking "the beginning of the end of the Christian Church" (p. 21), and sets the final consummation and Last Judgment, as symbolized in the Scriptures by the Babylonian Conquest of the Judaean Kingdom, in the year 2150, or thereabouts (p. 36.)

234

Thus "the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the Prophet," and the consequent condemnation of the Christian Church, is ingeniously postponed to a future time, against which the author seeks to give timely warning.

At that future time, we are told, the spiritual drama symbolically described in Daniel will be enacted. In this drama, no part is given to the New Church as a distinct organization. Daniel and his companions in captivity are compared to "perceptive receivers of the New Church" who remain members of the old dispensation, and identify themselves with the organization of the Roman Catholic Church. Indeed, the author states that in the "present intellectual era, which will probably last from 1900 to 2150 A. D., . . . the Lord's message to His followers in the Christian Church of this period is that, when they behold the predicted abominable state of affairs in their Church, they should take refuge in interior states of good life" (p. 33) remaining externally as members of the Old Church sects to which they belong. Only at the end of this period is the Lord's message to His followers "no longer an exhortation to take refuge in interior states of goodness; but it is a command to leave their church for good, lest they be engulfed in the ruin" (p. 35.)

In the opinion of Mr. Kip, therefore, the formation of a distinct external New Church at this time is not only unnecessary, but quite contrary to the Divine Purpose. Such an external organization will come when, in 250 years, the curtain lifts upon the scenes foretold by Daniel. Then the views of the "perceptive receivers" in the Catholic Church will be acknowledged and regarded as authoritative by the future leaders of that Church, who will elevate to high honors those who promulgate them, and give them part in the government of the Church (pp. 66, 108, etc.). As a result of this acknowledgment, these "perceptive receivers" will emerge victorious from the dire temptations signified by the sufferings of Daniel and his companions, and the New Church will rapidly spring into national and international prominence, gathering into its fold thousands of those who secretly cherished the teachings of the Writings in the old dispensation.

235

And, as the New Church thus comes into being as a distinct organization, the devastated sects of Christendom will decay and disappear.

Here, indeed, is brought to view a strange and fanciful picture of the Catholic leaders of the future, experiencing conversion to the New Church through the subtle influence of certain members of their own organization who are privately receivers of the Heavenly Doctrine! When we consider the attitude of the Catholic leaders toward the Writings in Swedenborg's day, and their continued opposition and contempt for the New Church at the Present time, 250 years is none too long a time to allow for so miraculous a change. And the prospect cannot be said to lend encouragement to those who are struggling at this day to maintain the foothold of the New Church as a distinct organization.

We have not space to follow the author's argument further. The above is the central idea around which the whole is built. The correspondences from which the fabric is woven are in many instances taken directly from the Writings, and to this extent they are clear and convincing. But these are supplemented by fanciful deductions for which there appears to be no basis in Revelation, and which are presented with what may be justly characterized as an unwarranted assurance. In its rejection of the idea of the present necessity for the distinctive establishment of the New Church, apart from the sects of Christendom; in its denial of the utter death and consummation of the Christian Church at this day; and in its tacit denial of the Second Advent of the Lord, as having been already effected in the Heavenly Doctrine, implying that this Coming will not ultimately take place for some 250 years to come, the book would seem calculated to retard the genuine growth of the Church, encouraging the members of the present New Church to remain supinely inactive until the year 2150, rather than waste their efforts upon a movement that is contrary to the Divine purpose, being confident that the "perceptive receivers" in the Catholic Church will then cause their influence to be profoundly felt, and will begin the establishment of the Church in every part of the world on a large scale.

236

If we look squarely at the signs of the times, and read aright the pages of Revelation, it will be evident without demonstration that the New Church will never descend from God out of heaven in the manner Mr. Kip so confidently foretells, but that it will be established only in the degree that the "perceptive receivers," even in this "intellectual era," come out of the dead Church, and earnestly associate themselves in a new organization, devoted to the study and the life of the heavenly truths contained in the Writings. A rational religion cannot be founded on a miracle of conversion, but must be built on the firm foundation of repentance, reformation, and regeneration, such as can only take place outside of the oppressive spheres of the dead and vastate sects of Christendom. GEORGE DE CHARMS.
SIGNS OF THE REMISSION OF SINS 1920

SIGNS OF THE REMISSION OF SINS 1920

     "What the remission of sins is: To be able to be held by the Lord in the good of love and the truths of faith, and withheld from evils and falsities, is the remission of sins; and then to shun evil and falsity, and to be averse to them, is repentance; but these are only given to those who have received a new life from the Lord by regeneration; for they belong to that new life.

     "The signs that sins have been remitted are the following: They perceive delight in worshiping God for the sake of God, in serving the neighbor for the sake of the neighbor, thus in doing good for the sake of good, and in believing truth for the sake of truth; they are unwilling to merit by anything of charity; and faith; they shun and hold in aversion such evils as enmities, hatreds, revenges, unmercifulness, adulteries; in a word, all things that are against God and against the neighbor.

     "But the signs that sins have not been remitted are the following: They worship God not for the sake of God, and serve the neighbor not for the sake of the neighbor, thus do not do good and speak truth for the sake of good and truth, but for the sake of themselves and: the world; they wish to merit by their deeds; they despise others in comparison with themselves; they perceive delight in evils, as in enmity, in hatred, in revenge, in cruelty, in adulteries; they despise the holy things of the Church, and in heart deny them." (A. C. 9448-9450)

237

CELESTIAL, SPIRITISM 1920

CELESTIAL, SPIRITISM PRESTON M. BONNER 1920

618 Frisco Bldg., St. Louis, Mo.
The New Church Life Publication,
Bryn Athyn, Pennsylvania.

Gentlemen:
     A friend of mine called attention to the critique in your publication.* This critique blames the writer for publishing "Celestial Spiritism in relation to the New Church" anonymously. It was meant to stand on its own foundation. There was no turpitude concealed behind, nor moral weakness.
     * See a review, entitled "Pseudo-Celestial Spiritism," in New Church Life, October, 1919, p. 641.-Editor.

     I hardly know what to say of the critique. I regard it as a very good photograph of New Church attitude. The two branches of the Swedenborgian followers seem to be strangely phlegmatic on his revelations as regards his statement on man s (all men's) internal constitution and endowments, and they are as strangely hypersensitive as to possible "dangers." I doubt whether anything can be said that will correct their attitude in this respect. However, changes are taking place in the world that will overcome obstructions that the New Church teachings could have overcome, if they had found a way to continue in line of Swedenborg's great work in spirit and in the natural at the same time.

     Swedenborg met, in spirit, messengers from all spheres. This proves that all men are so endowed, though not all are prepared to benefit by conscious intercourse. Only such can render effective aid to the unfortunate ones, for they must come into the earthly state to lay aside the earthly conditions in the sphere in which they belong. I believe that much of this work is now performed more or less imperfectly even now by the despised spiritualists, in spite of their real or alleged shortcomings.

238

Some Swedenborgians will be much surprised when they have their eyes opened.

     I would like to have you publish the typewritten reply enclosed, and give my respects to Mr. Iungerich. Tell him I am not offended, and hope he may apprehend at least what I mean to convey. I know it is hard to do for most people who have not had some experiences. I am,
     Yours sincerely,
          PRESTON M. BONNER.
SPIRITISM-AN INITIAL EVOLUTION OR STEP LEADING TOWARD CELESTIAL SPIRITISM 1920

SPIRITISM-AN INITIAL EVOLUTION OR STEP LEADING TOWARD CELESTIAL SPIRITISM E. E. IUNGERICH 1920

     Swedenborg, at the beginning of his work of publishing his spiritual acquisition of knowledges, states in nos. 67, 68, and 69, A. C., as follows:*
     * The italics are Mr. Bonner's.-EDITOR.

     67. "It having been granted me, by the divine mercy of the Lord, to know the internal sense of the Word in which are contained the deepest arcana such as never heretofore have come to the knowledge of any person, nor can come, unless the nature of the other life is known; for, the most part of which is contained in the internal sense of the Word describes, involves, and relates to this interior life. Therefore, it is allowed me to disclose what I have heard and seen during the communications with spirits and angels, which now for several years have been permitted me."

     68. "I am well aware that many persons will insist that it is impossible for anyone to converse with spirits and angels during his life in the body; many that such intercourse must be mere fancy and illusion; some that I have invented such relations in order to gain credit; whilst others will make other objections. For all these, however, I care not, since I have seen, heard and had sensible experience of what I am about to declare."

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     69. "Man is created by the Lord so that during his life on earth in the body he is capable of conversing with spirits and angels, as indeed occurred in the most ancient times; for, being a spirit clothed with a body, he is one with them. But because in process of time mankind so immersed themselves in corporeal and worldly things, caring for nothing else, thus the way to effect this condition became closed. Nevertheless, it is again opened as soon as bodily things in which he is immersed, are removed, and then man is introduced amongst spirits, and associates with them."

     From the foregoing we are led to conclude, first, in no. 67, that there are important knowledges which the individual man cannot uncover by his natural faculties, and that he (Swedenborg) had seen and heard and received such knowledges by conscious intercourse with spirits and angels; secondly, (68), that all people who know naught of such intercourse themselves, will inevitably deny it, or at best hold only an affirmative attitude; thirdly, (69), that men are so constituted that they may enjoy such intercourse, except in those cases where they are so immersed in their personality and worldly things that this inner endowment remains dormant until their worldliness has been removed in some way, when it will come into action automatically.

     The above statement is a fundamental one, and predicates a fact that is constitutional with us. The variations in manifestation are incidental to development. We must, therefore, assume that most people of the world are closed, or have closed themselves to an inherent gift of the Creator. We must also assume that Swedenborgians, in view of new revelations accepted by them, are more culpable than others for neglecting investigations or efforts to restore an innate function. For they insist that such intercourse is unnatural, illegitimate, and unqualifiedly dangerous. But, if the intercourse is a normal function, and is an innate endowment it cannot be wrong or unwise to aspire to it, to prepare for it, or to possess it. We do unconsciously aspire to it when we say, "Let Thy Kingdom come so that Thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven" by our ascended brothers who are the inhabitants and angels of that heaven.

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     It is true that Swedenborg states that such intercourse with spirits is dangerous for mortals who are without faith, that is, without a conviction of or an unwavering faith in God's abiding presence and power. This he realized in some of his own severe spiritual trials attending the full opening of his interior faculties. The separation of man's spirit from obstructive influences residing in the mortal realm is often painful and distractive.

     It is not strange that spirit intercourse may be dangerous in certain respects and for certain reasons. Even human intercourse between man and man may be dangerous. Electric currents are dangerous, yet this form of energy will probably supplant every other in the transportation and application of power. The free will of man is the most dangerous of all endowments of men in this world or the next one. How men have hated one another because they saw things differently, and lived in discrete realms! Yet there are many men continually meeting and overcoming these dangers by harmonizing methods learned through experience or intuition. The dress and the evils of mortal wanderings will be and must be eliminated. There is a strong current or draft upwards in all supernal spheres that cannot be avoided, and the willing evil in spirits seeks to flee from this current by a return into a purely mortal consciousness, and would do this in ways that are obsessive. Jesus, we are told, went even into this realm of spirit to preach repentance and amendment, for there is no place where God's love and Divinity is absent. Any life that we have ever lived is a latent possibility in us for future work, at the Divine command. The soul that has arisen and is perfected no longer follows its own will, but is moved to its supreme bliss by the Infinite Will in consciousness proportionately to its co-operative activity in the preparatory school of individual development. All will be as happy as they can conceive of being, that is, their spiritual consciousness will be commensurate with mortal preparation.

     The supernatural, in the natural world, has had a place in history from the earliest times. It has flourished always rather among the simple and lowly than among the intellectual and conventional classes. It was nearly a century after Swedenborg's spiritual disclosures that the barrier between the two worlds was suddenly pierced by a powerful psychic wave or irruption of spirit into matter.

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The inner sphere contacting with this world had been clarified, but the outer one had remained unresponsive to the change. The inner, therefore, was moved to invade the whole natural sphere of man in this eruption, even the material and physical. Thus it was that the denial of spirit and occult forces was made impossible.

In the middle of the last century, Christian teachers feared to dilate on miracles, or on the continuity of life, lest agnostics or rationalists outside of the church and inside of it might find opportunity to ridicule their simplicity or credulity. Scientific men, also, in their pride of modern discoveries, supported this criticism of unproved belief, using arguments that could not be refuted. Spiritualists, as well as Christians, were confronted by this antagonizing and materialistic condition, but were supported by occult phenomena and proofs that materialists could not gainsay or explain. Rationalism and Agnosticism have had their day, and, as antagonistic forces, have practically disappeared. And now, within the last decade, scientific men have begun to examine into occult forces, and have made open-minded and painstaking investigations. They admit now and confirm the reality of spiritistic phenomena and the survival of the individual spirit after the death of the body. A new world has been opened. The life of true Science is the search for Truth wherever found,-the Truth that affiliates with further Truth. Science gladly and quickly discards a cherished truth when confronted with a broader and more illuminating truth. It is opened to an interior natural sense which approximates to a harmonizing spiritual sense. One almost is tempted to ask whether that cold, independent, and materialistic scientific spirit of fifty years ago may not prove to be the woman coming out of the wilderness, loyal ever to Truth in the Highest for the sake of the indwelling Good manifest in the Truth.

Those who have not experienced some consciousness of an inner and more potent consciousness must necessarily look for it without. The public and private circles of spiritualists may attract their attention.

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These meetings are devoted to the showing of occult phenomena, and the giving of messages coming from departed friends and guides. The investigator of this cult may, at his first visit, resolve never to attend another. He may not have heard or seen anything that is worth while at the meeting. He may have failed to perceive the good that was detected by others. The phenomena at these meetings are not all fakes nor are they always spiritual. But if the spirit is innate in man, why does he seek without in order to buy or borrow what he already possesses? Why does he not enter into the silence, and sit by himself or with his own family, and devoutly wait for a blessing from on high? Is this not the spirit of true prayer! In this respect he can learn much from the Spiritualist who devotes much time and great patience in his searchings. Did not Jesus withdraw from the multitude and even from His disciples that He might be influenced less by outer distractions? In the searching, much will depend on man's spiritual evolution. Not a salvation for the self should be desired, but salvation from the self for the sake of the universal. The Lord is ever in His holy temple; man need not strive or dictate. He need but dedicate himself, and keep silent. When that silence has come to the full, he can say, "I am not come to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me," and will know whereof he speaks. He must begin where he can, and must remain faithful in the little things of life.
     PRESTON M. BONNER.

     EDITORIAL COMMENT.

     We are unable to see that A. C. 69, quoted by our correspondent, contains any promise that open communication with spirits and angels, such as took place in most ancient times., will again be granted to the men of this earth. According to our reading of this passage, Swedenborg is simply explaining how it was possible in his case, because, as Mr. Bonner observes, "all men are so endowed, though not all are prepared to benefit by conscious intercourse."

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He is not the first one to seize upon this passage as "fundamental," as a warrant for renewed spiritistic communication in the New Church, and as a "key-passage," in the light of which the warnings given throughout the Writings are to be disregarded. Nor is this the only statement in the Writings that can be so employed by those who wish to obtain confirmations in favor of their spiritistic experiences. Mr. Bonner finds "Swedenborgian followers strangely phlegmatic," and perhaps strangely united against his advocacy of a "celestial spiritism," and he will continue to find this the case with all who go to the Writings with an open mind for the purpose of finding what they really teach on the whole subject of communication with the other world, and not for the purpose of seeking a justification of spiritistic practices.

     Any notion can be confirmed by detached statements from the Writings or the Scriptures, especially when they are loosely translated, and convey a meaning foreign to the original. And since the version of A. C. 67-69 quoted by our correspondent is of this character, we think it well to print herewith both the original Latin and a more faithful English rendering:

     67. Quia, ex Divina Domini Misericordia, datum est scire Sensum Internum Verbi, et in illo continentur arcanissima, quae nusquam prius in alicujus cognitionem venerunt, nec venire possunt, nisi sciant, quomodo se habent res in altera vita; nam perplurima, quae in Interno sensu Verbi sunt, illa spectant, memorant, et involvunt; concessum est, aperie illa, quae nunc per aliquot annos, quibus interesse datum consortio Spirituum et Angelorum, audivi et vidi.

     68. Non me latet, quod plures dicturi, quod nusquam aliquis loqui possit cum Spiritibus et Angelis, quamidu in corpore vivit; et plures, quod phantasia sit; alii, quod talia tradidero, ut fidem captem; alii aliter; sed haec nihil moror, nam vidi, audivi, sensi.

     69. Homo ita creatus a domino est, ut, dum vivit in corpore, cum Spiritibus et Angelis simul loqui potuisset, sicut etiam antiquissimis temporibus factum, nam unus est cum illis, quia spiritus corpore amicuts: sed quia post tractum temporis, homines se ita immerserunt corporeis et mundanis, ut paene nihil aliud curent, ideo clausa est via; ut primum vero recedunt corporea, quibus immersus, aperitur via, et inter spiritus est, et cum iis sociat vitam.

     67. Because, by the Divine Mercy of the Lord, it has been given me to know the internal sense of the Word, in: which are contained the deepest arcana, which have never before come to the knowledge of anyone, nor can come, unless they know how the case is with things in the other life; for very many things in the internal sense of the Word regard, mention, and involve them; it has been conceded to me to disclose the things which I have heard and seen now for some years, during which it has been given me to be in the company of spirits and angels.

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     68. It is not hidden, from me that many will say that no one can ever speak with spirits and angels so long as he lives in the body; and many that it is a phantasy; others, that I set forth such things in order to captivate their faith; others otherwise; for these things, however, I care not, for I have seen, heard, and felt.

     69. Man was so created by the Lord that, while he lives in the body, he could at the same time speak with spirits and angels, as also was done in most ancient times; for he is one with them, because he is a spirit clothed with a body. But because in process of time men so immersed themselves in corporeal and worldly things as to care for almost nothing else, therefore the way was closed; but as soon as corporeal things, in which he is immersed, recede, the way is opened, and he is among spirits, and lives with them.

     In presenting a literal translation of the numbers, we have no desire to quibble over phrases, but only to make the real meaning of the passage clear. If the reader will consult the Arcana Coelestia at this place, he will note that, in the numbers following the above, Swedenborg proceeds to describe the resuscitation of man from the dead. That this is done primarily for the sake of an understanding of the internal sense of the Word, wherein "very many things regard, mention, and involve" a knowledge of the other life, is evident from what is said in nos. 67 and 71. To this end, Swedenborg makes the declaration contained in nos. 68 and 69 concerning the possibility and the fact of his own intromission into the spiritual world, as he does frequently in the Writings; as, for example, in Conjugial Love, no. 1. Such testification is necessary, to the end that "ignorance may be enlightened, and unbelief dissipated." (H. H. 1e.) In view of this, therefore, we are unable to see how no. 69 holds out any hope of a restored open communication for the man of the New Church. Rather the reverse. The vast record of Swedenborg's experience makes it unnecessary.

     In accordance with our correspondent's suggestion, we have brought his communication to the attention of Mr. Iungerich, who has sent us the following reply:

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     SPIRITISM: THE DOWNGRADE TO IRRATIONALITY AND DIABOLISM.

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     As Mr. Bonner has dropped the cloak of anonymity under which his pamphlet, Celestial Spiritism, appeared, and has assumed responsibility for the views contained therein, repeating them in his communication to the LIFE, I cannot refuse to withdraw the charge of insidious propaganda made in my review of his pamphlet published in your October, 1919, issue.

     The reiteration of his plea for spiritism adds nothing new to his case, unless we regard his reasoning from A. C. 67-69 as additional material. He brushes by the specific charges made in my review; as, for example, spiritism's deliberate contravention of prohibitions made in God's three Revelations: and offers no valid rational grounds for duplicating the sensual side of Swedenborg's experiences with the other world, beyond the assertion that only one who has experienced the Same can judge of their benefits, this being no more of an argument than the usual flimsy plea in favor of the use of tobacco; and so I might quite properly rest my case on a repetition of what I said in that review. In response to your invitation, however, I shall make some further observations in reply to his communication.

     It would seem that Mr. Bonner only looks at Swedenborg from a relatively superficial aspect, viz., as a pioneer and explorer of the sensual phenomena of the other world, as if this were the sole end and sum total of his mission. He fails as yet to see that Swedenborg as an inspired prophet was the faithful servant of the Lord Jesus Christ, and as such could not but reiterate to mankind what former Revelations had enjoined, namely, the prohibition against resorting to those with familiar spirits. On this point, read A. C. 9349, which includes among the Mosaic laws that are still to be literally observed the command, in Exodus xxii, that a witch should not be kept alive.

     Now a person anxious to kindle public conscience to redress a wrong, or to develop some despised field of activity which he feels would be a benefit to mankind if exploited, should not confine himself to glittering panegyrics about that field, nor contemptuous animadversions about those not caring to till it; but he should do a little painstaking work in meeting, one by one, the objections those people sincerely hold.

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In the hope that he will do this, I will briefly indicate the thorny path Mr. Bruner must traverse if he would convince Swedenborgians they are culpable in not cultivating spiritism.

     First. Let him explain why the following prohibitions were made, and give his reasons for thinking they are no longer in force; especially when the inspired Swedenborg testifies that they are still in force, and furnishes rational grounds to explain why:

     "Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek afterwards, to be defiled by them; I am the Lord your God." (Leviticus 19:31.) "And the soul that turneth after such as have familiar spirits, and afterwards, to go a whoring after them, I will even set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from among his people." (Leviticus 20:6.) "There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord; and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee." (Deuteronomy 18:10-12.)

     Second. The Lord, who on earth fulfilled all things of the Word, also fulfilled the above commands. He drove out spirits called legion from demoniacs, and sent them into swine, as the proper receptacles for such spiritistic influences. I am tempted to ask Mr. Bonner whether he thinks the demoniacs were thus deprived of a delightful source of spiritual experiences; and whether, if they had been men of less corporeality, they could have stood this high-pressure spiritistic obsession, and produced thereby works redounding to the Lord's glory. I will also ask him why the rich man's brothers were not to receive a message from the dead, but were to read the Scriptures; and why the Lord said to Thomas, "Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." (See A. E. 1155, 1156)

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     Thirdly. In the work on the Divine Providence, we are told by Swedenborg "That no one is reformed by visions and by speech with the dead, because they command." At the end of that article, Swedenborg adds a few words about his own case, which was of a special Divine provision, and with a protection against the loss of rationality, saying: "No spirit dared, nor any angel wished, to instruct me at all about anything in the Word or about any doctrinal from the Word, but the Lord alone taught me." (D. P. 134, 135) Let Mr. Bonner explain how a Swedenborgian entering into Spiritism could be sure that he would not be the scapegoat for evil spirits to make a fool of him, if not to deprive him of rationality, or to lead him into favoring diabolic practices contrary to the ten commandments.

     It is wrong to encourage the members of the New Church to imitate Swedenborg's psychical experiences. Certain faculties, dormant in all men, to be sure, were "miraculously" awakened with Swedenborg, in order that through him and his Writings the New Jerusalem might descend from heaven to earth, and that those Writings might be to all future ages the Word of the Lord's Second Coming. (See T. C. R. 776-791.) If other men attempt to develop these same faculties, have we any warrant that the result will be the descent of anything equivalent to the New Jerusalem, and that it won't be rather the furnishing of an opportunity to adulterous spirits who lust to obsess men, and further to ultimate their evil practices? See, on this point, what is said about a so-called Christian sect of enthusiasts who became obsessed by filthy spirits, calling themselves the Holy Spirit, and encouraging their dupes to practice a nefarious adultery which they termed the Holy Supper (Diary 3765-3770) It is not strange, therefore, that, spiritually viewed, the men of this sect are elsewhere said to resemble the animals into which the spirits called legion were sent. (C. J. 83)

     The New Jerusalem is a rational Church, and it is the part of rationality not to plunge, hit or miss, into what is valueless and may be dangerous, especially if there are Scripture prohibitions against it, and a rationally given explanation of the danger involved.

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The tobacco smoker's argument, that you can't know how blissful it is until you have tried it, maybe smiled at in a case where the worst harm is a sapping of physical stamina; but when harm to the mind, and the possibility of becoming like the swine who received legion, is involved, a rational being, and a true follower of the Lord, will stand by the Word of Revelation, and repeat: "Thou shalt not."

     The race of men on this earth are in corporeals, according to A. C. 69, cited by Mr. Bonner, and only a man prepared like Swedenborg, for a providential purpose in the Lord's order, can be intromitted into open intercourse without danger. Who among us can be so spiritually conceited as to assert that his corporeals are so well-disposed that he can safely court the risk of injuring his mind and soul by spiritism? Can he say he is doing God a service by so doing? God placed him here to develop his mind and save his soul, and has warned him against the things he must not tamper with.

     If it be argued that, in most ancient times, and also on other planets, there was and is open intercourse, the answer is that the case with those who live upon this earth, where scientifics and corporeals have been developed, absolutely inhibits the recurrence of open intercourse as a commendable pursuit. Besides, a resort to spiritism, and a reliance upon dreams, visions, and voices, is specifically declared to be peculiar to external, sensual men, who are of a low type of mentality. (A. C. 5121.) Internal men of the Lord's present-day truly rational Church are to be guided by a perception of the truth within His written Word. What was peculiar to the infancy of the race upon our earth, before writing was invented, no longer obtains with those who may now run to read what is the Master's will.
     E. E. IUNGERICH.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     COLCHESTER, ENG.-Sergt. Sanfrid Appleton was demobilized on December 3rd, and Staff Qrtr. Mstr. Sergt. N. H. Motum on December 19th. We were all glad to welcome them home after four years of active service.

     A social on December 4th included a very interesting lecture by Mr. Potter on the subject "The Moon," followed by a game that was new to us, called "Bunco."

     On December 23rd, the Rev. and Mrs. F. E. Gyllenhaal, with their little daughter, arrived from America. Mr. Gyllenhaal conducted the usual services on Christmas morning, and, in an excellent address, pointed out that the Birth of our Lord was at once the simplest and the most profound of all subjects, which is to be received and believed in childlike simplicity. He also conducted Divine Worship on the following Sunday, and administered the Holy Supper to 18 communicants.

     On December 31st, a Young People's Party was held at the home of Mr. and Mrs. F. R. Cooper, 24 persons being present. After progressive bunco, supper was served, at which Mr. Gyllenhaal was the genial and humorous toastmaster, introducing toasts to "The Church" and "The Old Year." The passing to the New Year was in silence, followed by the Lord's Prayer. Toasts to the New Year, greetings, and other speeches brought a very enjoyable gathering to a close. Mr. Jack Cooper proposed that the young people clear off the small deficit due on the piano before the old year passed, and this was accomplished in the nick of time.

     At a recent meeting, a vote of thanks was tendered Miss Gill for her work as collector of the Piano Fund, and it was decided that the small balance in the fund should form the nucleus of a Building Fund. Messrs. N. Motum and A. Appleton, Jr., were appointed collectors, and thus a start was made toward a church building of our own. Some suggestions by Mr. Gyllenhaal were considered and approved, viz., kneeling stools for use in the Holy Supper, a notice board for service, and an altar rail. The first item has been completed, and is of great convenience to the communicants.

     On January 8th, a children's New Year social was held, with a good attendance, including the Rev. and Mrs. Gyllenhaal and the Rev. Theodore Pitcairn. After taking tea together, every effort was made for the enjoyment of the children, Mr. Gyllenhaal contributing some amusing items, and also addressing us upon the importance of social life, in as great variety as possible, as an important means toward the growth of the Church. We also much enjoyed hearing from Mr. Pitcairn about his experience in Basutoland and elsewhere.

     January 15th. Fortnightly social-whist drive-arranged by Mr. S. Appleton. Mr. Cooper read from a letter from our former Pastor, the Rev. T. F. Robinson, which gave us much pleasure. Miss Gill read an interesting letter from Miss Olive Rose, describing the Christmas service at Bryn Athyn.

     January 18th. The Rev. Theodore Pitcairn conducted our worship. A Powerful sermon on Isaiah 1:18 was much enjoyed by a large congregation.

     January 25th. The Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal conducted the service, which was of great interest throughout.

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The rite of Confession of Faith was administered to six of our young people: The Misses Edna and Eunice Motum and Doris Potter; Messrs. John F. Cooper, Philip Motum, and Geoffrey Morris (of London). The Holy Supper was administered to 31 communicants. The congregation numbered 42, including 8 visitors from London and Chelmsford,-our largest attendance since 1914.

     In the evening of the same day, Swedenborg's Birthday was celebrated, Mr. Motum, as has been his practice for so many years, providing the supper. Mr. Gyllenhaal presided, and in an eloquent address spoke of Swedenborg as the Servant of the Lord, of the humility and simplicity of his character, which we should ever try to emulate, and thus become, in ever-increasing measure, "servants of the Lord" ourselves. Later in the evening Mr. Gyllenhaal gave us a very interesting account of his experiences in the Church, and particularly of his work in Durban and Basutoland. There were many impromptu toasts and speeches, and the occasion will long be remembered by the Colchester Society.
     F. R. COOPER.

     DENVER, COL.-While our Pastor was absent attending the recent General Assembly, the Sunday morning services were conducted by the Rev. J. S. David very acceptably. On October 19th, our Pastor was with us again, and it was plain that he had received much benefit from the change and the experiences that the trip had afforded him. Our people being eager to hear about the Assembly, an evening meeting was appointed for that purpose at the chapel. Upwards of twenty gathered, and listened with emotions of joy to the account of the meetings, of various incidents, and of some of the things said, all leading up to a description of the wonderful Dedication service. We seemed to see the procession, to hear the music, and to feel the holy sphere of it. A few pictures added greatly to the pleasure of the account.

     Early in November, the Rev. Richard Morse paid us a visit on his return trip to Australia. His stay was much too short, but the reception at the chapel on the evening of his arrival was enjoyed to the full. A novel experience for him was a beautiful feathery fall of snow-the first nearby snow he had seen in his life-and he was seized at once with the snowballing spirit. The next day he was shown about the city, had luncheon with the men of the society, and in the evening resumed his journey.

     We have to record the removal of one of our families to Seattle. It is needless to say that the Bundsen family is much missed by us, for they have been both useful and delightful members of the church. On account of their hurried departure, we could not have such a farewell party as we would have liked. A Council meeting being called while Mr. Bundsen was in town, it was arranged to make it a social occasion after business was finished. Some delicious home-made cherry wine was available for toasts.

     The next social event was the supper in honor of Swedenborg's Birthday. On this occasion we had songs, but no toasts; The address of the evening was given by the Rev. J. S. David on "Reasons Why the New Church is Needed in the World."

     Some weeks ago we had two visitors at our morning service,-Mr. Harry Hilldale, of Bryn Athyn, and a Mr. MacBratny, of Portland, Ore., who attended the Sunday School in Allegheny many years ago; and he remembers "Maria Hogan, Andy Carnegie, Auntie Aiken" and others.

     Our Sunday School is going on, as usual.

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The Christmas Festival was very happy one, with the beautiful trees, the representation, the procession of the children with lighted candles, and the gifts. The Friday class is busy learning to draw the Hebrew letters.

     The Doctrinal Class is being held at the homes of members this year, and in that way reaching some who cannot get out evenings. Our Pastor is giving us an interesting survey of the several historical periods of the Israelitish people in the promised land, namely, the conquest under Joshua, the Judges, the various things, etc., showing in broad outline the internal sense as represented in the leading men and incidents of the time.
     MRS. LUELLA M. T. DAVID.

     PHILADELPHIA.-The laymen may not be wholly aware what an influence they exert upon their fellow laymen in the matter of boosting attendance at church and doctrinal classes. A good example of this was manifested recently when Mr. Craigie, of Toronto, at our Swedenborg's Birthday banquet, made an earnest appeal for a larger attendance at our doctrinal classes, with the result that the next class showed an attendance of 29 persons,-the largest we have ever had. The supper itself was a splendid success, and we are finding it an advantage to hold the suppers once a month instead of weekly. This is frequent enough to preserve the continuity without becoming burdensome, and we have real feasts of charity similar to the happy events so described by Mr. Charles Francis Browne in the March Life.

     On Friday, February 6th, we had a fine lecture on "Mexico" by Dr. William Moore, which was illustrated with 100 lantern slides. It was given under the auspices of the Boy Scout Troop for the benefit of their summer camp, and proved a great success, the boys especially enjoying the adventure and thrill so ably portrayed by the speaker.

     One of the most interesting talks of the year was tendered the Advent Club at their meeting of February 17th, when some eight members listened with wrapt interest to a talk on "New Church Journalism" by the Editor of New Church Life, who reviewed for us the New Church periodicals now published, and exhibited sample copies of them all. We were amazed at the number, most of us supposing that the Bulletin and the Life were the only ones now issued! Mr. Caldwell also gave us a short biographical sketch of the various editors, together with the general tone and standpoint of each paper, and earnestly recommended that we subscribe to several of them. The "inside information" he gave us about editing a magazine like the Life was rare, nay rich! As these news items are penned for the Life, we are not at liberty to reveal those secrets without violating his confidence, so you will have to see him personally and perhaps make a date with him as we did. The meeting was held at the home of Mr. John Walter, who gave us a royal banquet.

     The third Scout entertainment came in the form of an enjoyable moving-picture show, and we would utter a word to the wise in this connection. Our Bryn Athyn friends recently tried to secure the films of Charlie Chaplin in "Shoulder Arms," and were told that it would cost them $75.00, whereas we obtained them through one of the Sunday School parents for nothing! For the same low figure we secured the films of Mary Pickford in "Daddy Longlegs." In fact, none of our films cost us anything, so the Scouts have a clear profit on their entertainment. You would be surprised, gentle reader, if you knew all the material benefits that come to us through these mysterious parents of our little Sunday School flock, showing in a concrete way their appreciation of the work we do for their children.

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     Our Annual Fair was held on February 23rd, with proceeds of $150 for our contingent fund. The leading feature of the Fair was the bookstall conducted by Mr. F. J. Cooper with a large display of the Writings and recent collateral literature, including the books by Mrs. Twiggs and Mr. Iungerich, which had quite a sale. One gratifying thing was that the Sunday School boys and their parents bought copies of the Writings, and this undoubtedly will yield fruit in the days to come.

     Mr. W. H. Alden, Jr., Chairman of the Committee, and his loyal workers, deserve the credit for the success of the Fair, which was very enjoyable as a social event and apart from the fact that we were gently but surely parting people from their money. Liberal refreshments and games of darts and quoits seemed to keep the friends occupied during the spare moments of the evening. A small group of about seven ladies also deserve special mention for their weekly meetings and the art needlework they produced.
     K. R. A.

     KITCHENER, ONT.-We have had an unusually severe January and February without any signs of a thaw, and were compelled to hold church downstairs several times instead of in the hall of worship. We have also gone through a siege of the "flu" which played havoc with the attendance for several weeks. Meetings were held as usual, however, and now all is running smoothly again.

     Swedenborg's Birthday was celebrated by a banquet and social, and the evening was happily spent, with a good attendance in spite of the "flu." The room and tables were decorated in red and white, and various pictures of Swedenborg and early church Fathers adorned the walls. The Pastor was toastmaster, and responses were made by Mr. Nathaniel Stroh and Mr. Theo. Kuhl. In the absence of Mr. Rudolf Robert Schnarr, our youngest speaker, whose sickness prevented his attending, the Pastor read us a story he had written about an imaginary gathering of newcomers in the world of spirits. It was interesting and very humorous, depicting the various modes of thought in the world today. As the entertainment committee all took sick at the last moment, the social program consisted of one musical number-the First Movement of Beethoven's 5th Symphony, played as a piano duet by Mr. and Mrs. Nathaniel Stroh-after which there was dancing.

     The air is again filled with rumors of weddings shortly to take place. On January 28th, Miss Evangeline Roschman and Mr. Harold Kuhl were surprised at the bride's home with a "shower" of kitchen utensils and other household articles.

     Since New Year's the Pastor has been conducting a special Sunday School teachers' training course, which is held on alternate weeks, and is attended by twenty or more members, married and single, old and young-the minimum age limit being twenty years. It is a very interesting and useful course in the study of the Word, and will prove of value in many ways to those who attend, though many of them do not expect to make actual use of it in assisting with the Sunday School.

     At a recent Friday supper we had the pleasure of a visit from the Rev. Lewis Slight, who is temporary Pastor of the Convention Society in Kitchener. He arrived from his home in England quite recently. During the supper he favored us with an interesting account of the New Church in England.

     Since December the arrival of four infants has added that many prospective members to our Society, As this is where we look for the future growth of the Church, it is a cause of rejoicing to us.
     F. V. S.

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     BRYN ATHYN.-The banquet in celebration of General Church Day, held in the Auditorium of De Charms Hall on Friday evening, February 6th, was characterized by a spirit of spontaneity that was very stimulating. The subject of the evening was "The Need of Progress, and the Value of Tradition," and the Bishop, in his introductory remarks, emphasized the need for both progressive and conservative elements in the healthy growth and development of the Church. "If we are to abide in firmness, our roots must sink deep into the past, in order that we may draw that vital nourishment which can come only from acknowledgment of due reverence for the wisdom of our fathers." But it is an "eternal truth that to live is to grow. We must expand, must meet and compass new issues, lest death be our portion." And in order to do thus, we need present-day enlightenment. "Enlightenment is the true pewee of the church. It is that which gave birth to all our valued traditions in the past. And it is that which will lead us on to the making of new traditions for our sons. Our ideal of government, for instance, is neither that of an autocracy not of a democracy, but of the rule of the spirit of enlightenment arising from a study of Revelation with an abiding faith in its truth, and a constant acknowledgment of the authority of that truth to govern,-putting aside our own self-will, however strong, and our own self-conceit, however ingenious."

     Mr. Ernst Pfeiffer was then introduced and spoke on the need of progress and the value of tradition "in the General Church." He began by expressing his thanks for the kindness which had been extended to him as a stranger in a strange land, and his delight at finding in the Lord's New Church a spiritual home. He said the greatest tradition of the General Church was that contributed by Bishop Benade when he set the priesthood free, and "first prepared an effective and stable organization in which all the distinctive New Church uses could be established and performed." In general this tradition has, without doubt, been adhered to, but there were two points in which he suggested that progress might be made, viz., (1) greater freedom of the priesthood from dependence upon individual charity "by more liberal financial support, and (2) placing more distinctly in the hands of the Bishop and the clergy the decision on the relative value of uses. He had hesitated to express an opinion on so vital a subject, which required the thoughtful consideration of the wisest men in the Church, but having been asked to do so, he felt impelled to state simply and straightforwardly what he thought. The speaker was enthusiastically applauded, and the Bishop thanked him for his frank presentation.

     Mr. R. G. Cranch then spoke to the subject of the evening in its relation to missionary work, outlining the needs for progress in this field of activity. He recognized the educational field as holding the first and most important place, but thought we should also take definite steps to reach adults in the world about us. He advocated wider advertisement of our services and our place of worship in the public press together with lectures and sermons designed to meet the needs of such as are sincerely looking for the truth, and are not satisfied with their traditional beliefs. He spoke also of the needs of new members, for whom much that is profound and philosophical is not adapted, and suggested some provision for an open discussion of active questions by the members of the Society.

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     Mr. D. F. Rose, in addressing himself to the educational needs, spoke especially of the value of text-books, written from the New Church standpoint, as a means of organizing our instruction, and differentiating it from that which is given in other schools. He said we needed to establish new standards by which to judge of the values and relative merits of literary and other productions, different from those by which they are elsewhere judged.

     The last of the regular speeches was by Mr. Samuel Simons on the value of tradition and the need of progress in Bryn Athyn as a community. He gave an historical outline of the growth of the Society from its early and simple beginnings to the relatively complex structure of which it is now composed, urging that the same forces which operated for its prosperity heretofore must be preserved if that prosperous development is to continue. And that this may be done, he advocated the establishment and perpetuation of the idea of Council and Assembly to that end, fully supporting the suggestion of an "open forum for the frank, open, unbiased discussion of questions of social, moral, and civil activities."

     An informal discussion followed, in which the young men of the Society took a prominent part, each adding materially to the thought and spirit of the occasion. The Bishop, in closing, said that he was impressed by the need for some such mode of free expression as had been suggested, and proposed that steps be taken at once to establish periodical meetings of the society which would provide such an open forum.
     G. DE C.

     GLENVIEW.-The members of the Immanuel Church are certainly indebted to their old friend, Mr. Charles Browne, for his cheerful and encouraging article in the March Life. Readers of these monthly reports will in future look upon our items of news as a record of "assets," and support Mr. Browne in his contention that they cannot be valued in dollars and cents. At the same time, your wise and experienced readers will understand that things happen in the life of a society which do not find their way into the news columns of our journals. Bearing this in mind, our friends will no doubt make allowances if they occasionally discover a tendency to blow our own trumpet. The writer of these notes aims to furnish news of the spiritual work of the Society which will be of interest to our fellow members of the General Church, wherever they may be, and by this means to provide a basis for a wider extension of spheres.

     At our service on Sunday, February 23rd, the brothers Ralph and Alan Synnestvedt made their confession of faith, this public act of our young friends adding an impressive and encouraging feature to our worship.

     An experiment is being made in connection with our Friday evening doctrinal class. On account of the variation in the ages of those who attend, our Pastor has arranged two classes; one for the older members, who read the Apocalypse Revealed in the library, while the other, for the younger people, is conducted by the Pastor in the parish hall. The two classes then combine, and Mr. Smith comments upon both lessons before closing the meeting with singing and prayer. The plan seems to meet with favor; and is likely to promote the study of the Writings.

     Our School has continued its work in spite of zero weather and the influenza. It has recently been the recipient of a valuable addition to its equipment in the form of a Victrola, which will be a great aid in the musical education of our children. This gift came from the local Chapter of Theta Alpha, to whom the Immanuel Church feels much indebted for their efforts in raising the necessary funds.

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This they did by organizing two very successful social events. The affair on St. Valentine's Day was a fancy dress social and dance, for which the hall was specially decorated, presenting a brilliant spectacle when the gorgeously appareled dancers filled in the scene.

     Some very enjoyable evenings have been spent recently at one of the private residences in the park, the male members of the General Church having been invited to attend a weekly "coffee meeting," at which various subjects mentioned in the pages of New Church Life were to form the basis for reading and conversation. It might have been called the "Life meeting." The attendance has been very good, and the discussions have brought out the fact that the Church possesses a mine of valuable learning in the pages of New Church Life. Among others, the following subjects have been considered: The Review of "The Palace of Wisdom;" "Taking Children to Church;" "Length of Sermons " "Sleeping in Church;" "Saturday Night Socials;" "The Holy Land and its Correspondences;" "The Origin of Evil;" "The Autobiography of Carl Theophilus Odhner."

     Although, according to our local poet, "The old steinfest, if ain't what it used to be," it seems to be doing pretty well, taking all things into consideration. The young men of the society are aiming to provide useful and entertaining programs, and no better steinfest could be desired than the one lately held, when the subject of "Universal Training" revealed an unexpected divergence of opinion. New topical songs by Mr. Winifred Junge were better than ever, and now that these notes have gradually descended to the lighter plane, it will be in order to close with a sample verse from one of the songs:

"I wish all the men
Were like Mr. Hugh Burnham;
If folks have no knowledge,
He surely will learn 'em,
Dispel all the mystery,
And tell the park history
Just over and over and over again."
               G. A. MCQUEEN.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-My last report mentioned the passing to the other world of one of the members of the Erie Society. And now we must record another such event. Mr. George W. Evans; associated since childhood with the Church in Erie and its vicinity, departed this life on February 7th. He was an active and earnest member of the Church, and his going will be felt as a great loss by the Erie Society. The visiting pastor officiated at the services.

     Another death must also be recorded, that of Mrs. James A. Givens, Ohio, daughter of Mr. S. A. Powell. The service, at which I officiated, was held in the Christian Union Church at Givens. About two hundred persons were present, and gave close attention to the presentation of the doctrine concerning the Divine providence, the resurrection, and the life of heaven. Many expressed their great delight in the discourse. This is the usual occurrence at New Church funerals, where those present are for the most part not of the Church. For instead of the cheerlessness, anguish and gloom, which characterize Old Church funerals, there is comfort, consolation and light.

     The next morning Sunday, a neighbor came to the house of Mr. Powell and said that he was delegated by a number of the people of the community to ask me to give an address in the school house that evening. This invitation was, of course, accepted with pleasure. During the afternoon a private service was held for the baptism of the infant child of Mr. and Mrs. William Powell. At the evening meeting, which 45 persons attended, we presented the doctrine concerning the internal sense of the Word, illustrating the same by a general exposition of the first chapter of Genesis.

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The teaching seemed to be affirmatively received by most, if not all, present, and a general desire was expressed for future visits. Aside from the public services, the time was largely spent in enjoyable conversation with members of the Powell families (among them Mr. Arthur Powell, of Bryn Athyn), on various subjects of doctrine and on the life of the Church.
F. E. WAELCHLI.
SIXTH PHILADELPHIA LOCAL ASSEMBLY 1920

SIXTH PHILADELPHIA LOCAL ASSEMBLY 1920

     ANNOUNCEMENTS.


     Friday, April 9th, 8 p. m.-Session at the Church, with Address by the Bishop.

     Saturday, April 10th, 1 p. m.-Men's Luncheon (downtown).

     Saturday, 8 p. m.-Assembly Ball. Sunday, April 11th, 10:30 a. m.-Divine Worship. Sermon by the Bishop. Administration of the Holy Supper.

     Monday, April 12th, 6:30 p. m.-Banquet.

     Members and friends of the Advent Church are cordially invited to attend the Assembly.
ANNUAL COUNCIL MEETINGS 1920

ANNUAL COUNCIL MEETINGS 1920

The Council of the Clergy, Executive Committee, and Joint Council, of the General Church of the New Jerusalem, will meet at Bryn Athyn, Pa., during the week beginning June 22nd, 1920. The program will be published later.
ONTARIO DISTRICT ASSEMBLY 1920

ONTARIO DISTRICT ASSEMBLY HUGO LJ. ODHNER 1920

     The TWELFTH ONTARIO DISTRICT ASSEMBLY will be held in Toronto, opening on Friday, April the 16th, at 7 p. m., with a banquet at the Humber Beech Hotel. All members and friends of the General Church are cordially invited to attend. Visitors will be entertained by the members of the Olivet Church. Please do not neglect to notify Mr. Lorne Schierholtz, 63 Melbourne Ave., Toronto, Ontario.

     PROGRAM (subject to change):

     Friday, Apr. 16, 7 p. m.-Banquet and Reception.
Saturday, 10:30 a. m.-Children's Service.
2:30 p. m.-Bishop's Address;
8:00 p. m.-Session.
Sunday, 11:00 a. m.-Worship.
4:00 p. m.-Communion.
8:00 p. m.-Session.
Monday, 4:00 p. m.-Ladies' Meeting.
8:00 p. m.-Men's Meeting.

     HUGO LJ. ODHNER, Secretary.

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LAWS OF SOCIAL ORDER 1920

LAWS OF SOCIAL ORDER Rev. GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL          MAY, 1920           No. 5
     (Annual address delivered before the Council of the Clergy of the General Church, at Bryn Athyn, Pa., Oct. 2, 1919.)

     In attempting a subject so large as "The Laws of Social Order," one naturally feels some diffidence of his ability to present it in the completeness which it deserves. I feel confident however, that it would be difficult to name a subject of greater importance than the general one of social order; for upon this order the prosperity not only of the Country but also of the Church depends. And it is generally realized now, I believe, that the order of society, or at least such order as we have known, is under question, if not in jeopardy, all over the world. From a political and economic point of view, to say nothing of ethics and morality, this present moment of history is one upon the outcome of which a great deal depends.

     If the blood and sinew of the New Church consists in the application of new spiritual doctrines, is it not probable that amid the maze of scientifics and experiments connected with the social science there will be found principles of civil and social life, of which some agree with the doctrine of genuine truth and some do not agree?" We shall find, I think, in the realm of social science, the Egyptian often fighting with the Hebrew. And Moses, or the Divine Law, must be the witness and the arbiter. In other words, we rightly expect by study and patience to derive from the Doctrine of the New Church a reliable science of life or science of living; and from spiritual truths to enter into the scientific principles of social phenomena and needs.

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     There is, we are aware, a wide gap between truth that is spiritual and that which relates to social and economic problems. "The latter cannot be guessed at, or arrived at by perception. "The perception of a Church," we read (in the Arcana, no. 495), "consists in perceiving from the Lord what is good and true, just as the angels do; not so much what the blood and truth of civil society is, but: the good and truth of love to the Lord and faith in Him." The true science of social order is a thing to be arrived at and deduced, according to each man's ability, from a knowledge of spiritual life, and life in the spiritual world, making allowance for the imperfections here and the ends and permissions of Divine Providence. But though the mind be beset with bewildering problems, and aided by little direct perception of civil verities, still there remains the truth, which I shall quote later, that with men there are two things which must be in order, and one of them is the things of the world which in the Writings are called civil matters.

     When Swedenborg used the term "civil," he explained it to mean "the things of the world." We did not use the word "social" in the modern sense. But the things of the world, or things of a civil nature, as spoken of by him, we think are covered, by the general term "social." At any rate, what I would have you understand by social order is simply the order of life in human society. And by the laws of social order I mean the laws through the observance of which a state of harmony and concern is produced among men in their civil, social, and economic relations; the laws which will preserve society in the same unity as that exhibited by comparison in the human body,-the whole existing for the part and the part existing from the whole.

     SOCIETY IS AT PRESENT IN EXTREME DISORDER.

     From what is revealed in the Doctrine concerning the state of the Christian world in spiritual things, it might be concluded that in political and social life, including its economic relations also, the world is in a, state of extreme disorder. In making this conjecture, I am fully aware that the connection between spiritual truth and civil truth is not so easily seen.

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For it has been intimated that while one may perceive the truths and goods of faith from Divine Revelation with comparative ease, it is not so easy to perceive the truths and goods of social order. Hence, men of the New Church may differ widely in their views of the social outlook, and in their ethical and economic ideas. But let me ask, Is it true that business and social life are one thing, and the things of the Church quite another? Is there no true relation of cause and effect between them? Is it probable that the Lord has set such a gap between the things of heaven and the things of the world that no matter how much in disorder the former is, the latter, or the things of the world, do not necessarily partake of the disorder? It is quite natural this question should arise. Is the modern social and economic system built up upon so strong a foundation of worldly wisdom of law, of custom, and whatnot, that the spiritual death of the Christian Church has not materially affected it? Conservative thought wishes to be assured that our highly developed commercial and economic institutions are much as they should be. But radical thought, which in human weakness is liable to be too radical, seeks to convince itself of the need of an entirely new political and economic structure. Between the two currents of thought, society is in a state of "unrest." It is a state which cannot be ignored. And the probability is that it is not merely temporary and transient, but a state produced by evils which must sooner or later come to light and be corrected. The question is, whether the world is not at present in a state of moral, civil, and economic unsoundness which goes hand in hand with its spiritual desolation.

Reason seems to support the proposition that the state of the world as to spiritual things will be reflected in the prevailing social and economic conditions. If this is true, there is not much room for optimism in reflection upon the state of the world. Yet, though the outlook is not pleasant, we have at least this confident assurance, that the Lord will not permit any state of disorder to go beyond the limit set for it in His Providence, and that society cannot destroy itself, nor come into a condition which is hopeless of amendment.

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Nevertheless, it is of reason to assume that hidden evils of life will from time to time become manifest and be corrected.

     Society comes into disorder through the abuse of freedom and reason. Thus autocracy, going beyond the limits set for it, has been overthrown and condemned; not because there is anything fundamentally wrong with autocracy-for it is a heavenly form of government-but solely because of its abuse from the love of the world. Militarism also has suffered the same fate; not because there is anything wrong in national protection, but because it was grossly abused. And so, because there is no longer the restraint of a true religion and a religious morality, other institutions, good in themselves, are endangered entirely through the dulled conscience and the intolerance of selfish men and groups of men.

     When men are without a true faith in the Lord, and without charity, it is certain that society will drift into a state more and more like the state of hell. In fact, it is probably not too much to say that society is already in a state of hell, and is reaping the results of it; and that it will continue to reap those results until there is some kind of repentance. It is full of deceit, adultery, theft, and lying. There is almost no love of heavenly things. There is almost no knowledge of them. There is no spiritual understanding of the Word, and even less obedience to it. There is nothing-almost nothing-but materialism and naturalism. The strongest invectives used by the Lord, the most extravagant imagery of the Apocalypse of beast, locust, and dragon are none too severe to apply to the people of the present time, in description of their inward life; and consequently the life pursued by the majority may be said to be the veritable life of hell.

     But the Lord in His Providence will yet rule the world with a rod of iron, even as He rules over the hells. And this He will do in order that the remnant of the just may be separated from among the rest, and that a true Church may be established with them, accompanied by a social order which may in many respects differ widely from that which now prevails.

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     THIS PRESENT STATE OF SOCIAL DISORDER WAS TO BE EXPECTED.

     Social states, whether of order or disorder, are but the reflections of conditions in the world of spirits. We also say that civil laws follow spiritual laws. Ah, if we but realized the nearness of the spiritual world,-the irresistible, iron-bound connection that exists between this world and that, and this connection through man,-then would we perceive that world events are but the outside of the same book, written simultaneously in the world of spirits!

     "There are two things which must be in order," we are told in the New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine, "the things of heaven and the things of the world; those of heaven are called ecclesiastical; those of the world are called civil." (no. 311.) Knowing, as we do, what the state of the Church is with men, we should have been able to predict that a corresponding state of civil affairs was sure to come. If the Church is dead, the governments of the world could hardly escape some of the effects thereof. It was inevitable that society in general should suddenly find itself upon rotting pillars. "When god rusts," Chaucer said, "what will iron do?" If the things of heaven are out of order, what may be expected of the affairs of the world, which are called civil?

     But the same prediction which foretells the creation of a new heaven also proclaims the creation of a new earth. And as the natural man must be set in order from the spiritual man, through the trials of temptation, so in general society the external life must be brought into a spiritual order. How this new order will be brought about we cannot tell, but through some means of Divine Providence it is to be expected.

     OUT OF DISORDER THE LORD BRINGS ORDER.

     Plan is ever striving against order. The Lord is ever striving to bring him back into order. As we read in the Arcana Coelestia,

     "Before anything is reduced into order, it is very common for things to be reduced into a confused mass, as it were a chaos and then the things which cohere badly are dissociated, and the Lord disposes them into order." (no. 892.)

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The very fact that confusion and the clash of opposing interests are on the increase, as anyone may see, contains the promise of a better order in society. The confusion will be the means of separating those things which but poorly cohere, and of forming the alignments among men and their uses. Thus the political and social economy may suffer many changes, but of all this the New Churchman should have no fear; for he may know that whatever happens in the civil and social plane is of the Lord's Providence, to the end that the New Church may be firmly established.

     CLASSIFICATION OF THE USES OF SOCIAL ORDER.

     In the posthumous work on the Doctrine of Charity, we find the rudiments of a social science in the classification therein or all the "goods of use," or of services to the commonwealth. With this classification as our guide, we propose formulation of some general principles of social order. If this can be done, the beginning may be made toward the development of true science of life or of living. The orderly relation of one part of society to another may be more clearly seen. In view of the disorderly state of the world, both spiritually and naturally, this document is certainly worthy of the closest study.

     In the wide sense, the laws of social order are all the laws of Divine Providence, and also the laws of permission, which are also laws of Providence. But if, through the doctrine of charity, the application of those laws may be made to the problem of the youth of the commonwealth, so much the better for the Church in the midst of disorder.

     These laws of social order are eight in number:

     (1) Social order requires that there shall be what is Divine among men.

     (2) That there shall be justice with them.

     (3) That there shall be morality.

     (4) That there shall be industry, education, and orderly conduct.

     (5) That there shall be the necessities of life.

     (6) That there shall be the material for the support of occupations.

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     (7) That there shall be protection.

     (8) That there shall be a sufficiency of wealth, because from this come all the former necessities. (Doctrine of Charity, 130.)

     These eight requirements are called the "goods of use" to the commonwealth. They are the things which make up social order. They comprehend all spiritual, moral, civil, and physical life. All the laws of Divine Providence and permission have regard to these several requirements. But how are these social requirements to be provided and maintained?

     They are to be provided and continued through the uses which individuals perform. And Swedenborg, after thus outlining the social requirements, proceeds to classify the uses which individuals perform in a four-fold classification; and by so doing he enables us to simplify our thought. For he then divides all the works of man into four departments. These four divisions are called (1) Ministries, (2) Functions, (3) Offices, and (4) Employments. These four classes of individual use to society are roughly analogous to the four essentials in the economy of the human body, viz., health, purification, nourishment, and protection, Let us consider these four departments of individual social use.

     First, Ministries. They are all those things which provide for the existence of the Divine among men. If this is not provided for, society becomes disordered from its deepest roots.

     Second, Functions. They are, in general, all those uses which have to do with civil government and administration. In these two departments, we have an example of the priestly use and the kingly use. Ministries and Functions, the two higher departments of social use, must work in co-operation for securing the necessities of morality and justice. For these, the King and the Priest, the Church and the State, are jointly responsible.

     Third, Offices. Offices may be described as being various pursuits and services, contributing to the provisions and distribution of material for industry. Thus, under the head of Offices, we may think of the Wholesaler and the Retailer,-all distributing agencies. Here also belong the Financier and the Industrial Leader, the Clerk, the Salesman, and some professional men.

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For these are various pursuits contributing to the provision of the means and material for industry and their distribution. These Offices are represented in the body by the whole system of digestion and blood circulation. But the blood itself is comparable to the wealth that is produced.

     Finally, the fourth department of uses to the commonwealth,-Employments. Employments are those uses which are said to be productive, or works productive of the physical necessities,-food, clothing, and shelter. Here belong the Agriculturist, the Laborer, and the Artisan,-those who belong to the general class of Workmen.

     From these four general divisions of the goods of use we may now proceed to the formulation of four general laws of social order. We shall first state them, and then endeavor to present the confirmation and the illustration.

     THE FOUR SOCIAL LAWS OF ORDER.

     The first law of social order is, that provision should be made for the Divine among men.

     The second law is, that the conjugial law must be inculcated and observed.

     The third law is, that every person should be in the exercise of some use and work.

     And the fourth law is, that there should be a sufficiency of wealth.

     These four laws would seem to include and involve every other thing which is essential to social order. Let us see whether they are inclusive enough, and whether they are valid.

     We have deduced them from Swedenborg's classification of the departments of use,-from what is said about Ministries, Functions, Offices, and Employments. But let us note, as there are these four departments of use to the commonwealth, so there have been deduced four general laws of order for society. But our grounds for such deduction are not restricted to Swedenborg's classification in the Doctrine of Charity; we have also deduced and confirmed these four laws, or rudiments of social science, from the Commandments of our Lord.

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     For in the work on Heaven and Hell we find this statement: "The laws of spiritual life, the laws of civil life, and the laws of moral life, are delivered in the ten precepts of the Decalogue; in the first three the laws of spiritual life, in the following four the laws of civil life, and in the last three the laws of moral life." (no. 531.)

     The laws of civil life, and consequently the laws of social order, are therefore involved in the four middle Commandments: "Honor thy father and mother, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not commit adultery, and Thou shalt not steal." In these four precepts, the laws of social order are fully contained.

     The first law which we have adduced,-that there must be provision for the Divine among men,-is involved in the command to honor father and mother. The second law, which we have called the conjugial law, is obviously involved in the precept, Thou shalt not commit adultery. The third law we have adduced, to the effect that there must be useful work performed by everyone, is involved in the command, Thou shalt not kill. And the fourth. of our laws;-that there must be a sufficiency of wealth,-is clearly involved in the command, Thou shalt not steal.

     This is but the roughest correlation of the four civil law Commandments of our Lord with the four departments of individual use laid down by Swedenborg. But, however roughly sketched, there is here outlined material for reflection and further consideration.

     RELATION OF THE PRESENT STATE OF SOCIETY TO THESE FOUR ELEMENTS OF THE SCIENCE OF LIVING.

     First let us consider Ministries, which should keep the social body in health. It cannot be said that there is adequate provision for the Divine among men. This first requirement of social order is not satisfied in modern society because the Divine is rejected. And because of this rejection, the Functions, Offices, and Employments of men are deprived of their mainspring of order. It was said that the provision for the Divine among men is equivalent to the command, Thou shalt honor thy father and thy mother, in its social application.

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This command, in a wide sense, means the loving of all the means by which one enjoys the gift of life, both spiritual and natural. Father and mother are the means by which we come into natural life, and it is of order that parents should be loved and provided for by their children; but, in the spiritual sense, father and mother stand for the Lord and the Church, and these in a more eminent sense should be loved and provided for. To fail to provide for the ministries of the Church, nor yet to make use of them, is equivalent to a failure to keep this commandment.

In regard to the second class of uses, called Functions, or all those things connected with civil government and administration,-the uses which are analogous to the general purification of the human body,-this class may be thought of as including greater and lesser rulers and officers of the law,-judges, magistrates, legislators, soldiers, government officials, and some professional men, such as lawyers and physicians, especially when these are connected with civil administration. All the uses here represented are for the purpose of providing protection, orderly conduct, education, industry, justice, and morality. These are what are meant by Functions, or the second class of uses to the commonwealth. But since all these uses depend upon sincerity and chastity, and have their order from individual justice and morality, therefore we have correlated these uses with the second law of social order, which is the conjugial law, and with the command, Thou shall not commit adultery. But in the modern world the conjugial law is inwardly rejected, and consequently the deepest grounds of morality and justice are removed, and hence disorder has descended into government and administration.

Consider the state of society in relation to the third class of uses which is called Offices, and, in relation to the third law of social order, which is that everyone should be of service and perform useful work. We have connected this law with the commandment, Thou shalt not kill. Is it not clear, that, in a wide natural sense, to kill is to perform no good of use to the commonwealth,-to live a life of idleness or uselessness?

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That ideal condition under which all members of society perform useful work does not exist; for there are many who are idle or useless through unemployment and through choice, many whose work is not useful but harmful to the general good, and many who enjoy the fruits of the use of others without contributing a corresponding service. And consider further that there are many in the exercise of offices, that is, whose services are connected with the distribution of materials for industry, under the general processes of trade and commerce, who exercise a selfish and murderous monopoly over the material for industry and the distribution of it. Great is the disorder in that third class of uses which has to do with the distribution and supply of material for industry. Many are those, in other words, who in their offices to the commonwealth break that command which should be the one of all the rest which they should not break,-Thou shalt not kill. For to interfere with right methods of procuring and distributing materials for industry and commerce is to break this commandment in one of its true social applications. With these things in view, the validity of the third law of social order appears, which is, that everyone should perform use to the commonwealth, and not against it. And this applies in a peculiar way to those uses called Offices.

But let us pass to the special consideration of the fourth law of social order, and of the state of the world in relation to it. The fourth law is that there should he a sufficiency of wealth. 'The uses which produce wealth are those which are denominated Employments. They are the works done by men who collectively are meant by the common term Labor. Of the four civil-law Commandments, the one which applies especially and peculiarly to these is the commandment, Thou shalt not steal.

Can it be said that there is not a sufficiency of wealth? This requires some discussion. The question may be answered yes and no. This is not the place to discuss the intricacies and vexations of the large question of the distribution of wealth; but still the point may be made that the sufficiency of wealth is inseparable from the distribution of it. While there may be an actual sufficiency, there will be a practical insufficiency if it is not justly distributed.

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The social employments which produce wealth, and the social offices which distribute it, either as capital, or as the material for industry, inject order or disorder into the social body according as they keep or break the precept against stealing. This command, socially interpreted, has directly to do with the supply of material for industry, and with the production and distribution of wealth. And who can close his eyes to the existence of selfish monopoly of those materials, or to the fact that compensation for social uses is often widely disproportionate, in both directions, to the nature of the services to society which men render? The law requiring a sufficiency of wealth, or the law against stealing, is perhaps as little observed as any of the three other laws.

Hence we are threatened with open and actual social disorders, because all four of the civil Commandments have been grossly violated. When the production and distribution of wealth are interfered with, social order is attacked at its very foundations. For upon order in the class of uses called Employments depends the order and the support of all the other three classes of use,-Offices, Functions, and Ministries,-that is, in Business, Government, and the Church. Thus, in his tabulation of the eight requirements of social order, Swedenborg said that from a sufficiency of wealth come all the former necessities. Disorder has descended to the last trench of security. Dishonesty and avarice have invaded the ultimate uses upon which the higher uses depend. Violation of the first laws of social integrity, such as the failure to provide for the Divine among men, and the breaking of the conjugial law, may not cause open and general disturbance of society for a long time; but when the laws against killing and stealing are violated on a large scale, then the abomination of desolation has reached the vital organs of the body politic and the body economic.

To confirm further this idea that social order depends ultimately upon the production and distribution of wealth, let us quote from the True Christian Religion: "No man of sound reason can condemn riches, for they are in the general body like the blood in man." (no. 403.)

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If the blood in the body, which is its wealth, is withdrawn from some parts and concentrated in others, there is congestion and disease.

     Again, we are told in the work Conjugial Love that "The first affection of our age is the enlargement of private estate by wealth." (no. 274) This furnishes ground for the statement that the most general evil of our age is that of avarice. The fast trench defending social security is invaded and captured when in all classes of men there exists the willingness to accept illicit profits or gains; and by illicit gains are to be understood compensations in excess of the value of the service rendered by a man to the good of the commonwealth. This is profiteering. And this willingness to profit without reference to honest service describes the general state of the civilized world. Whereas the law of useful service for all should provide, through government if not through individual conscience, a just compensation for all uses, whether ministries, functions, offices or employments, and no compensation for those who render no service to the common good.

     THE RELATION OF THE STATE OF THE WORLD TO THE NEW CHURCH.

     As the love of the Lord and charity do not exist in society, so the love of use for its own sake, or the love of the common good does not exist. Instead of loving to perform use to the general body in the first place, and loving gain in the second place, for the sake of that use, the great majority love gain in the first place, and the performance of use to the commonwealth only secondarily and for the sake of greater gain. This is the condition which the death of the Christian Church has brought about, and it is with this condition that the New Church is confronted and surrounded. If the New Church is unable to combat this general sphere and attitude toward the social works of man, it may be said to have failed in the social application of its spiritual and Divine truth,-to have failed to develop that new scientific of life upon which its practical affairs must rest.

     But to think of the New Church as failing ultimately in any respect is inadmissible. Its ability to present to the world the spiritual teachings of the Word is sure of ultimate success. And its ability to make its social ideals known and felt is a thing of which we should admit no doubt.

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But we must know what our social ideals are, and must have our social teachings well crystallized and fortified with spiritual ethics and morality; and finally fortified by the simple and never-to-be-abrogated Commandments of the Lord which relate to social order: Honor thy father and thy mother, Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal.

     The social doctrine of the New Church, then, however it be formulated, must he a, doctrine which condemns that ingrained willingness to accept illicit gains, which condemns the hoarding and manipulation of wealth in any form for the mere sake of enlarging private estate without reference to service to the commonwealth or to the Church. It must be a doctrine which condemns any form of profiteering, whether in workmen, or civil functionaries, or in merchants, or manufacturers, or distributors, or capitalists, or industrial leaders. For this,-the widespread desire and madness to gain wealth,-is nothing else but violence against the foundation of social order, and against the precepts. Thou shalt not kill and Thou shalt not steal.

     We have already suggested that the performance of Ministries, Functions, and Offices,-the uses of men which are called non-productive,-depends upon the productive uses, which are called Employments. The workmen of the world,-the farmers, the laborers, and the tradesmen,-produce the wealth which supports all other uses. Their practical form and application of charity is production. For upon this depend all the former necessities and uses. When., however, the love of gain interferes with production, then the irreligion of the age has reached the last line of defense. The whole social structure is in grave danger. Or, as said before, the command against stealing, which on the civil plane amounts to the economic law against the unjust distribution of wealth, is the most ultimate of the four laws of social order.

     CONCLUSION.

     Our general conclusion is that there are four social laws, which are involved in the four middle Commandments of the Decalogue, and which are also to be correlated with Swedenborg's doctrine of the four kinds of use to the commonwealth; and that these laws, if we have properly deduced them, should form the basis of the science of living for the New Church.

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The first law requires, through Ministries, the adequate provision for the Divine among men; the second law requires, through governmental Functions, the inculcation and observance of the conjugial law, which can at least be reflected in the laws of marriage; the third law requires, through Offices or Businesses, a worthy service from all in some good use to the commonwealth; and the fourth law requires, through the productive Employments, a sufficiency of wealth, which also means just compensation for every good use. This, we believe, should form at least the four corners of our social platform.

And though we have spoken at length of the disorder which exists in the world, we should not look upon it with disquietude or fear, for we may be sure that the Lord will bring order out of confusion, and will provide for the establishment of the New Church. We may know that if men descend even further into the state which is an image of hell, the Lord will yet rule over it in such a way as to "restrain the remainder of youth," and thus create the most favorable opportunity for the New Church to succeed. The New Church cannot fail. It is growing, and it will grow. All who are worthy will grow unto it. Its Ministries will succeed; its Offices will succeed; its Functions and Employments will succeed. And this will come to pass because we, as ministers, shall enjoy the blessing of leading a body of men and women who recognize the importance of our ministries and support them adequately; who love and observe the conjugial law of individual chastity; who are willing to renounce the love of gain in their uses to the commonwealth; and who will thus develop the science of living for the New Jerusalem.

It is possible that the slow growth of the New Church hereto, fore is due, more than we think, to the general state of disorder on the mere social and economic plane. And it is possible that the growth of it may be greatly accelerated after the Lord, by some Divine means now in progress, has brought a better social order out of the confusion we now behold.

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CAUSE OF EVIL 1920

CAUSE OF EVIL Rev. E. R. CRONLUND 1920

     I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil; I the Lord do all these things. (Isaiah 45:7.)

     According to certain statements in the Word, the Lord is apparently the author of evil as well as of good. It is said in the prophet: Amos: "Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?" (3:6.)

     In the letter, the Word seems to teach that the Lord causes wars, that He stirs up the nations to fight against each other; that He causes evil to come upon the wicked: and casts them into hell. And there is a most important reason why such things are taught, and why the genuine truth is thus hidden as by a veil. The Divine purpose in giving the truth in such a form is to convey the idea that the Lord is supreme, that there is bur one ruler, one power. This is the truth that is taught in the first commandment of the decalogue, and it is the central truth of the Word. It is essential that this truth should be seen; for if this is not seen, no truth can be seen in light. Therefore the Lord says in Isaiah: "I have sworn by myself, the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, That unto me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear." (45:23.)

     The teaching that the Lord is supreme, that He is the only power in the universe, is what is insinuated, especially into the minds of children and the simple, when it is stated that evil and punishments are from the Lord. Afterwards, as progress is made, there is evolved out of this most general doctrine the truth that the Lord governs all things, evil as well as good, hell as well as heaven. And, in course of time, the genuine truth itself is seen, which is, that no evil is from the Lord, that He is not the cause of it, but that He only permits it, and while permitting, controls it.

     In this manner is everyone led by degrees from apparent truths to genuine truths.

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And no one can be led in any other way. The world of the infantile mind, of the undeveloped mind, is a world of appearances; and it cannot be otherwise. At first we see things from without; we see them as they look on the outside; but in course of time we are able to enter interiorly into the truth, to see it from within, in its real beauty and power.

     The Lord says: "I form the light, and create darkness." The light of heaven is from the Lord, but the darkness of hell is not from Him. The Lord is the truth, and all truth is from Him. Falsity arises when the truth is perverted. When a man denies the Word, and turns to his own self-intelligence, then he is in darkness. He himself, therefore, is the cause of the darkness that is in him.

     It is also said that the Lord "makes peace, and creates evil." The evil of war, or the evil of temptation, is the opposite of peace. The Lord does not lead any one into temptation; yet the appearance is that He is the cause of temptation; for man does not undergo spiritual temptations until he turns to the Lord and determines to live a life according to His precepts. When a man does this he is attacked by evil spirits, who endeavor with the utmost cunning and malignity to destroy his spiritual life. Thus temptations are not caused by the Lord, but by evil spirits. And when a man is thus tempted, the Lord defends him, and fights for him against his enemies. This is necessary, for otherwise the man would perish eternally. The Lord is called the "Hero of war," but He never begins warfare against evil. He never attacks. It is evil that attacks Him and all that is from Him.

     In that wonderful and dramatic nineteenth chapter of the Apocalypse, we read: "And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse; and He that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He doth judge and make war. And the armies which were in heaven followed Him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. And I saw the beasts, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against Him that sat on the horse, and against His army." These words do indeed declare that the Lord makes war, but in Righteousness; and to "make war in righteousness" is to defend.

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It is the "beasts, and the kings of the earth, and their armies," that attack; for those who are represented by them have no charity, no innocence, and their object is to kill and to destroy. But He who makes war in righteousness, He who defends, does so to preserve and protect charity and innocence, and to save the souls of men.

     The Lord, therefore, who is good itself, is not the author of evil. It is written: "Out of the mouth of the Most High proceedeth not evil and goad. (Lam. 3:38.) The Lord is the author of good only; for it is also written: "Wickedness proceedeth from the wicked." (I Sam. 24:13.)

     But the Word speaks as if evil were from the Lord, because such is the appearance, such seems to be the case. And there is another, a deeper arcanum involved in this manner of speaking, which is this, that there is one only life, and all live from it, everyone differently from another. The evil in the world live from the same life, and likewise the hells. This teaching that there is one only life, from which all live, "appears paradoxical and incredible to man," as the Writings declare. Nevertheless, it is the truth. The teaching that man "lives by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord" applies to the evil as well as to the good. The Writings say: "The truth is that the Lord alone is the life of all, and that from Him come all things, both in general and in particular, that angels and spirits think, say, and do, and also what evil spirits think, say and do. The reason why these latter say and do evil things is because they so receive and pervert all the goods and truths that are of the Lord." (A. C. 681.)

     The life inflowing from the Lord acts according to its reception. That life is applied by each one to his end, to that which he loves about all else. When life flows into affections which have the world for their end, this end is vivified by that life, and a worldly life results; when it flows into affections which have self for their end, this end is vivified by that life, and a corporeal life results; and so in all other cases. It is from the inflowing life that cupidities and phantasies live, although they live a life that is contrary to heavenly affections. (A. C. 1909.)

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     Because the evil also live from the Lord, because their ability to think, to speak, and to act is continually imparted to them by the life inflowing from the Lord, therefore the Word speaks in certain places as if the Lord were the author of evil. The truth that even an evil man, as to his body and as to his spirit, lives from the Lord; that his evil thoughts and intentions inmostly have their life from the Lord, the one and only life; is the arcanum that is stored up in the teaching that the Lord "forms the light and creates darkness," that He "makes peace and creates evil."

     It is said in the Writings: "Objects that suffocate and pervert the light appear of a black or filthy color; yet they have their blackness and filthiness from the sun's light. So it is with the light or life from the Lord with the evil." (A. C. 4320.) The evil, as well as the good, live from the Lord, "for He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." Still, evil is not from the Lord. Good inflows from the Lord, and is turned into what is evil by the wicked.

     Evil and falsity depend upon good and truth for their existence. If good and truth did not exist, neither could evil and falsity exist. If there was not what is innocent and pure, there could not be what is harmful and impure. If what is heavenly did not exist, neither could what is infernal exist. If there were not uses, abuses could not exist. Therefore, if influx out of heaven from the Lord were to cease, evil also would cease to exist. But the influx from the Lord cannot possibly cease; if it could, both heaven and, hell would be annihilated. Or, if men were to be deprived of free will in spiritual things, evil would be prevented, but in such a case, good could not be given either; for without free will in spiritual things man cannot be regenerated.

     The Lord did not create evil, for nothing but good could possibly flow forth from Him. But the possibility of evil existed from the beginning. In other words, men were given free will so that they might as of themselves love the Lord. But this freedom also involved an ability to turn from the Lord, if they chose to do so.

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And this was what men finally did. But still the evil also live from the Lord. It is His life that they receive and pervert. Their evil is not from Him, but from themselves. And yet it is the Lord's life that appears in them, for there is but one life.

     The evil also live from the Lord, for they as well as the good communicate with heaven. By means of remains, and by means of the knowledges of good and truth stored up in the memory, there is maintained an everlasting communication with heaven. Remains can never be lost, nor any knowledges of good and truth that man has ever acquired. Such things are preserved by the Lord even with the evil, in order that there may still be something human left with them, without which man is not man. Moreover, through these things, even the evil communicate with heaven, and thus they live.

     The evil have communication with heaven, but not conjunction. Conjunction with heaven takes place when that which inflows from thence is received with affection. But when that which inflows from heaven is turned into its opposite, conjunction is at once broken. With the evil, there is no reciprocation. They do not react with the Lord. They react against Him. No conjunction, therefore, can take place. Nevertheless, communication still exists. For there is a continual influx from heaven even with the evil. This influx is their communication; it is the only communication with heaves they are able to have. That there may be conjunction, there must be action and reaction. Thus reciprocation. Through action alone, there is only communication. It is through such communication that the evil are enabled to reason, to think, and to speak, from the sensuous, thus to confirm what is false and to defend what is evil.

     That a man may be able to see truth interiorly, to confirm it, not to defend what is good, he must have conjunction with heaven. He with whom there is no such conjunction, but only communication, can reason only from appearances, and from the fallacies of the senses. He who is in conjunction with heaven, sees objects by the light of heaven, whereas he who has only communication with heaven, sees objects by the light of the sun of the world.

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Thus he who is in conjunction with heaven sees things as a man, for he sees them intellectually, whereas he who has only communication sees things very much as an animal sees them.

The Lord wills that we should be images of Him, that we should be in heaven as to our minds even while we art living in the world. When such is the case, we are able to know, not only from doctrine, but from perception, that the Lord is good itself, and that no evil can possibly proceed from Him. The Lord is purity itself, and if we are to see Him as He is in His essence, we must be like Him; for it is written: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Amen. Lessons: Psalm 139, Matthew 12:1-37, T. C. R. 476; or C. L. 444.
OUR EDUCATIONAL IDEALS 1920

OUR EDUCATIONAL IDEALS WILFRED HOWARD 1920

     (A paper read at the meeting of the General Faculty of the Academy Schools, January 5, 1920.)

     For a novitiate to attempt a statement or restatement of our educational ideals, with the object: of adding to the vast store of accumulated wisdom on this subject, would be' an act of presumption, as well as folly. It is with the idea of entering more thoroughly into a knowledge of the essential and well-established ideals of our institution, and the means necessary for the preservation of such ideals, that the writer presents a brief study of this subject.

     That man may become all angel of heaven, a member of an angelic society, thus a good and useful citizen of both worlds, is the Divine End of creation; instruction and education, in the broadest: sense, are the means by which such ends are attained. Such is the testimony of the Writings, as abundantly stated in Bishop Benade's Conversations on Education, a work which embodies, in general, our educational ideals. In the field of modern education, such an end or ideal seems strange indeed. The existence of heaven, or of the spiritual world as a tangible, perceptive reality, is practically nonexistent.

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Its reality is either denied, doubted, or so uncertain as to prohibit its entrance into the realm of ends as an abode for which rational preparation is to be made. Herbert Spencer, in his treatise on what knowledge is of greatest value, defines the end of education as "preparation for complete living." Butler, in answering the same question, writes as follows:

"It is a question which each age must put, to itself, and answer from the standpoint of its deepest and widest knowledge. The wisest philosophers have always seen, more or less clearly, the far-reaching character of the question, and the great importance of the answer. Socrates and Plato, Augustine and Aquinas, were under no illusion as to it; but often in later years the deeper questions relating to the relative worth of subjects of study have been either entirely lost sight of or very superficially dealt with. Bacon clothes in attractive axiomatic form some very crude judgments as to the relative worth of studies. Rousseau outlines an educational program that ruined his reputation for sobriety of judgment. Herbert Spencer turns aside for a moment from his life work to apotheosize science in education, although science is, by his own definition, only partially unified knowledge. Whewell exalts mathematics in language only less extravagant than that in which Sir William Hamilton describes it. In similar fashion, others, holding a brief for some particular phase or department of knowledge, have come forward crying 'Eureka,' and proclaiming that the value of all studies must be measured in terms of their newly discovered standard. The very latest cry is that studies and intellectual exercises are valuable in proportion as they stimulate enlarged brain areas, thus making the appreciation of Shakespeare, of Beethoven and of Leonardo da Vinci, solely a function of the circulation of the blood." (The Meaning of Education, pp. 50, 51.)

It is true that many realize the necessity of something spiritual, in order to leaven the whole, and avoid the accusation of ideals purely materialistic. Thus Butler continues: "That subtle sense of the beautiful and the sublime which accompanies spiritual insight and is part of it,-this is the highest achievement to which humanity is capable."

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In this way the religious instincts are cared for by a well-stated reference to the subtle sense of the beautiful and sublime. The perception that purely materialistic ideals are to be avoided is common with most educators; and references to art, literature, and the uplifting power of religion together with the lines of a well-favored poet, containing a sufficiently remote reference to another life, are usually found at the end of such treatises."

Just as the religions of today are spiritually dead, lacking a definite and satisfying conception of the spiritual world, so, also, in the realm of educational thought, conceptions beyond the plane of the material are correspondingly weak and unsatisfying. The parallel is complete, and is but a manifestation of the law of cause and effect. In fact, when we consider that the belief in heaven, as an abode of some sort, is almost universal in religion, it seems strange that there are no educators sufficiently convinced of its existence to consider it an abode for which there should be arrive and rational preparation in this life. Only in the field of New Church Education do we find definite and rationally satisfying statements regarding the relation of education to man's spiritual progress. In a vast sea of educational theories, the New Church stands in a position of splendid isolation, by reason of its knowledge of the spiritual world and its belief that the end of education is a preparation for that world.

To state an ideal is an easy matter; to attain it is ever the problem. Its mode of attainment is the question that every generation must ask itself,-that every teacher of every generation will ask, in an effort to measure up to the exalted standards that our ideals make imperative The question of what is really involved, what we really mean by preparation for heaven, what are the actual forces that are opposing such ideals,-these are questions that confront all of us when thinking over these matters. The attaining of ideals, of course, is always relative,-relative with each generation to the men of that period. Just as the stream cannot rise above its source, so the degree of progress cannot rise above the state of perception and life with the individuals of a given period.

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The measure of our approach to the ideal, therefore, depends upon our individual and collective perception of the particular spiritual environment of the age, and our reaction with or against it.

Preparation for heaven, the Writings tell us, involves not only the shunning of evils, but also thought regarding heaven. To think about heaven involves a realization of the spiritual world and a belief in it, thus something of spiritual thought; and spiritual thought, in its descent to the men of this age, becomes more and more difficult of reception. It flows only through chinks and crannies, and finds in the minds of men an almost universal sphere of opposition. The story of the closing of the spiritual mind is well known to us. We recall what the ancient sages of the Socratic school said, on hearing of the latest news from the earth: "By this new information from the earth, we perceive that the interiors of human minds have become so closed up that, at this time in the world, a belief in the false shines like truth, and an infatuated ingenuity like wisdom, and that the light of wisdom has, since our day, descended from the interiors of the brain into the mouth, under the nose, where it appears to view like a shining of the lips, whilst the speech that issues forth seems like wisdom. Whereupon, one of the scholars said: How stupid are the minds of men on earth at this day!" (T. C. R. 693.) And yet, for the most part, we are of the men of the earth of this day,-of the same spiritual heritage as those spoken of above. The night of spiritual desolation is almost universal. In its general aspect "a belief in the false shines like truth, and an infatuated ingenuity like wisdom."

To restore the love of wisdom, the conjunction of good and truth, in the hearts of men, is, in the Divine Mercy of the Lord, the work of the Church on earth; and the success of New Church Education-the right arm of the Church-depends upon its ability to train or lead the youth of the Church into the love of wisdom. This involves, beyond the shunning of evils as sins, a powerful realization of the reality of the spiritual world, a clear perception of the relation and interdependence of the two worlds-the world of causes and the world of effects-until thought upon the phenomena of the natural world and its relation and dependence upon the spiritual world, becomes a matter of second nature.

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Then will follow a true perception of the state of spiritual darkness in the present age, which perception is in a measure the key to spiritual progress; For we are taught that from ignorance nothing is born, that evils cannot be shunned unless seen in the light of truth. Only from a sight born of the conviction of spiritual truth, received and building the mind into a truly rational form, is it possible to realize. First, the paucity of our own spiritual convictions, and secondly, the sphere of spiritual ignorance and apathy that everywhere surrounds us.

Owing to generations of disuse, the once fair and noble form of the human mind has become a diseased and palsied thing. By a gradual process of turning from higher to lesser goods, the mind has become closed from above, its noblest organs and powers rendered non-active, crusted over, unyielding, turning back the light and power of spiritual truth that is ever striving to flow into its corresponding form in man. Formerly tuned to the reception of such powers, it is now unresponsive,-as it were dead,-but not entirely. In the order of Divine Mercy, occasions arise when the light of truth shines with relative clearness, when the essential reality of the spiritual world is seen in sharp contradistinction to the temporal nature and quality of the material, when the love of acquiring wisdom in a life of use is seen to be of greater value than the love of acquiring riches for their own sake, when the Church, as the highest and noblest institution given to man, and our need of it, is seen with something of true perspective. But such periods of spiritual insight are, in the nature of things, of brief duration. They come for an inspiring moment, and are gone; and the mind falls back into its accustomed state. The reception of light from below assumes its sway. The appearances of the natural world become realities. Thought becomes uninspired. "A belief in the false shines like truth, and an infatuated ingenuity like wisdom."

In its broader aspect, this thought or light from below, from the senses only, which is almost universal at this day, is the cause of the spiritual insanity of the age. From such a lumen men delve into the mysteries of nature, and proclaim there is no God.

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The light of the senses failing to reveal a spiritual world, that world, as a tangible, real, and living abode, is proved impossible, and its existence denied. Advanced thinkers and scientists claim, indeed, to tread the threshold of another world, but view it from the realm of the senses, a material aspect only, which leads not to the recognition of the Divine. In an attempt to gain the scientific facts of the whole world, men lose the soul,-the soul of spiritual perception, from which alone the relation of cause and effect in both worlds is made manifest. And so the natural world, the things of nature, the vast realm of the material, gain priority in human interests. Standards of value with men have become materialized following directly as the effect from such a cause, the pursuit of wealth is the reigning activity of the age. The sciences flourish, true philosophy decays. In education, the sciences would reign over the humanities, being of major importance-powerful servants of the kings of the earth. As the direct product of the sciences, more things are created daily, and civilization measures its advance largely from the standards of such increase. Thus human interests of a natural kind multiply, innocent enough in themselves, but leading in their multiplicity toward the absorption of all men's time, and to the haste and turmoil of modern life.

     Matthew Arnold, in the slow and comparatively dull era of 1840, tells us of

"This strange disease of modern life,
With its sick hurry, its divided aims,
Its heads o'er taxed, its palsied hearts."

     If this was true of an era so much less advanced, how much more is it true of today.

     Such, in brief outline, is the picture of the sick man of today, the sick man of modern civilization, the product of generations of spiritual decay, of the dead Christian Church. Wise in the things of this world, but unwise in the development of all that is truly human, of the eternal realities of the spiritual, which, when received by man, constitutes the living principle of life making man a truly human being.

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     The necessity of realizing the state of the world, within as well as around us, becomes obvious when we consider that it is basic to the true progress of our educational ideals. Preparation for heaven involving, as it does, that subordination of loves which the Writings so often speak of, wherein the love of heaven is first, the love of the world second, and the love of self last, cannot grow in an atmosphere unperceptive of the truth that the reverse of the heavenly order mentioned above is the present unhappy lot of mankind. Neither does it call for a morbid introspection nor for a sentimental admission of all disorders without a clear perception of any in particular. We have nothing to be ashamed of in recognizing ourselves and the general state of mankind as pictured in the Writings of the Church, and as due to an age-long process of heredity.

     It is in non-recognition that the danger lies. When, in circles outside of our own sphere of thought, educational or otherwise, we find, to our surprise, that we have much in common, and are inclined to believe that the early founders of the Academy were too severe in their treatment of the state of the Christian world, that distinctive principles are essentially narrow, and that after all, distinctness is rather a matter of external form than of principles of life, or a distinction of ideas; when such is our case, we are confronted with two alternative solutions, namely, (1) That in spite of the teaching of the Writings, New Church permeation has been going quietly on, or, (2) That two or three generations of New Church influence and environment have made little fundamental difference within us in relation to an interior distinctness or differentiation of ideas.

     The degree and quality of our own conviction of the reality of the spiritual world, and of all that is involved in our institutional ideals, measures in a large degree the power to transmit such ideals to those under our care. Our greatest asset, therefore, or our educational method in the propagation of such ideals, is the power of conviction; and no institution has such a body of truths as rationally convincing as ours. To strive, in humility of heart, to attain that perception of truth which constitutes genuine intelligence, is the work that lies before m, therefore, even as it was the work of generations past, and will be the work of generations to come.

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Rather than despair over the small progress that has been made, we may well regard it as a marvel that so much has been done. Could we measure the forces throughout the ages that have opposed the Divine End of the conjunction of good and truth in man, we would wonder indeed at the miracle that has been performed. In the midst of a world composed of millions of men who are alien and opposed to the reception of spiritual truth, the New Church stands,-together with an institution founded for the purpose of education in the light of revealed truth.

But, as the perception of truth on the part of the founders of this institution was the chief instrumentality in its foundation, so the perception of truth with each generation will be the chief means of its continued preservation, leading in ever-increasing measure to the restoration of all those qualities that are truly human. Toward a spiritual renaissance, a reformation of the race, the end and stream of the Divine Providence is ever moving; and in the day of its fulfilment it shall not be said of the conjugial that men know not what it is, or of the love of heaven, that it is last in the series of human loves. For to restore these loves is the Divine End in the revelation of truth to man, and the "arm of the Lord is not shortened that it cannot save."
THAT AFFECTIONS ABE ATTENDED WITH ALL KNOWLEDGE 1920

THAT AFFECTIONS ABE ATTENDED WITH ALL KNOWLEDGE 1920

"If man were in the love of true faith, he would have no need to build up sciences artificially, and learn them, nor to write so many books about the education of infants and children." (Diary 4059e)

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CARL THEOPHILUS ODHNER 1920

     AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

     (For previous instalments, see New Church Life, January to April, 1920.)

     1886.

     During the early part of this year, I translated De Novo Hierosolyma into Swedish. This was my first real publication, and it was noticed in the LIFE (1886, p. 88).

     The March number of the LIFE contained a notice of the Report of the Swedenborg Publishing Association, written by me. It was terribly irritating to Mr. Barrett, who wrote about it in all the journals, wondering who the anonymous writer could be. In the same number of the LIFE, I had a review of Mr. Manby's new Swedish translation of the Scriptures.

     In May, I attended the General Convention, held in New York City. It was my first visit there since I landed at Castle Garden in 1882. How different my condition now! I stayed at the house of an old Swedish New Churchman, Mr. Kindberg, a very wealthy man. The Convention itself was rather tame, though there were signs of a coming fight. They tried to oust the General Church of Pennsylvania from representation in the General Council, and Father Benade made a grand fight against it.

     The Academy Schools closed for the year on June 10th, and a few days afterwards, by special invitation, I traveled to Beach Haven, to be present at the celebration of the Decennial of the Academy, which lasted over a week. I will never be able to do justice to that occasion. It was a milestone in my life, a foretaste of heaven. It was the very culmination of the glory of the old
Academy. About eighty persons were present, from different parts of the world, all being together as guests of Mr. John Pitcairn in a magnificent hotel at the seaside. There were services, ceremonies, discussions and feasts, every day. What sublime spirituality, and yet what intense natural gaiety and innocent enjoyment! We "boys," of course, especially enjoyed the "nachspiels" under the leadership of the indomitable Walter Childs.

286

Fred Waelchli and I roomed together. One morning we awoke to witness a glorious sunrise over the ocean, and seriously discussed whether we were in the natural or the spiritual world! I hope, some time, to write a history of the Academy, and to do justice to that grandest of all weeks in my life.

     July.-Immediately after this great celebration, I took the train for Chicago, on my first missionary journey. For I had received the grand subsidy of $50.00, and was to labor among the Swedes in the West during the summer. I remained in Chicago for about two weeks, and then went to Elgin, Ill., where I stayed for a month with a Mr. Hasselqvist, who had received the Doctrines through me. Here I delivered my first course of missionary lectures, though with small success, so far as converts were concerned. However, I managed to get into a very lively row with the Swedish Lutheran minister, who tried to take possession of the platform, and with whom I had public disputations ending in very exciting scenes. All of this I described in a letter to Bishop Benade, who published it in the Journal of the General Church, to the great amusement of our people.

     From Elgin I traveled to Rockford,-the scene of my first efforts as a laborer and lay preacher some years before. My lectures here were without visible results. In September, I returned to Chicago, where I joined some of the New Church boys for an outing at a nest delightful camp on "Rattle Snake Island" in "Magician Lake." Michigan. Here I had the grandest fishing that has ever fallen to my lot. Returning to Chicago, I began a course of missionary lectures among the Swedes on the North Side, and really had splendid success, the audiences sometimes numbering over two hundred. If I had been able to continue this work, I believe a Society could have been raised up.

     September-Back in Philadelphia, where I now began to teach in real earnest in the College of the Academy,-Hebrew, Greek, and Latin,-though I was poorly prepared, and had to do an enormous amount of studying to keep ahead of my pupils.

     1887.

     January.-An ever memorable New Year's Night!

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The Young Folk's Club had a social gathering at the Wells home, with dancing, etc. In the course of the evening I "met my fate" in the person of my little Lulu, now my wife. I went home from that New Year's social completely absorbed in my new-found love, though I had said nothing to her about it, and for several months afterwards I could think of little else.

     On January 29th, we had a school social, celebrating Swedenborg's Birthday for the first time. Boren read his English translation of Snoilsky's poem, entitled "Swedenborg's Garden."

     February.-My review of Professor Sundelin's History of Swedenborgianism in Sweden is published in the LIFE (p. 27).

     March.-[At this point Mr. Odhner gives an account of his engagement to Miss Lulu Xandry. It is very intimate, and was intended only for the eyes of his family.-E. S. P.] He continues:

     Next evening, I paid my first visit to my fiancee, who lived with her aged grandmother and her aunt in a little house on a little street in south Philadelphia. Lulu's pedigree is very peculiar. The family Xandry-a unique name-is said to have come originally from Greece. The name certainly looks Greek, perhaps an abbreviation of Alexandros-the "son of Alexander." For many centuries the family lived in France, but was driven out during the persecution of the Huguenots. Lulu's grandfather was born in Frankfort am Main, where he married a German girl. After they had come to this country, in the forties, Lulu's father married a Miss Krigswell, of an old English family. So my wife has in her veins the blood of four nationalities,-Greek, French, German, and English. We had agreed to keep the engagement a secret, but somehow the news leaked out. My time was now so occupied in making love that I do not remember much about passing events in the Church at this season.

     April.-About this time I wrote my first sermon, on "The Pre-Adamites," which was afterwards published in the MESSENGER. The LIFE prints a letter of mine on "Swedish Words in the Diary" (p. 61.)

     May.-The Academy had now purchased a splendid property for its Schools at 1821 Wallace Street, and we moved thither this month.

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I was still Librarian, and was kept very busy, what with the library, my teaching, my studies, and my love-making.

     June.-The closing exercises of the Schools took place on June 15th to 17th, and marked the close of my long, long school life,-from 1869 to 1887, or 18 years. Three of us were now ready to be hatched out as "Bachelors of Art,"-Price, Waelchli, and I. The graduation exercises were very imposing, and we all read our theses before the whole church in the Cherry Street Temple, afterwards receiving our diplomas from the Chancellor in full canonicals. My thesis was a long paper on "The Reconstruction of the Sciences," which was published in the December LIFE. In the evening of the same day, Mr. Pitcairn gave a sumptuous banquet to the graduates at the Cafe Finelli (Broad and Chestnut Sts.). All of the members of the Faculty and of the Council of the Academy were there. The Chancellor crowned us three with wreaths of smilax and roses. Thus were we started off on our careers of usefulness in grand style. No students of the Academy, before or since, have had such a send-off.

     The Bishop now authorized us to preach. Fred Waelchli was stationed at Allentown during the summer, Price at Jeffries P. O., Clearfield County, Pa., and I not far from him, at Renovo, where there was a small circle of New Church people, about ten in number, to whom I preached during the vacation, besides giving a course of evangelical lectures in Swedish. I stayed at the home of Mr. Kendig, and I think I was of use to the New Church friends themselves, who expressed much appreciation of my work. But, in my missionary efforts, I labored very hard in a very stony vineyard. Incidentally, I botanized and fished a good deal, besides writing innumerable love letters to Lulu. What a lovesick swain I was, to be sure, and how I must have wearied the Kendigs with my moping!

     September.-Finally, I could stand it no longer, and returned to Philadelphia on the 18th of September. I was, in fact, over-worked and overwrought, and fell quite ill while witnessing the grand celebration of the Centennial of the Constitution of the United States, and had to spend two weeks in bed.

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     October.-About this time, Dandridge Pendleton and I began to study Assyriology at the University of Pennsylvania under the phenomenal savant, explorer, and teacher, Professor Hilprecht. We were his first pupils, and the study opened up quite a new world to me. I had, long before this, dabbled in Egyptology and Archaeology generally, but the very, very ancient world now began to unfold its glories to me as never before. We worked very hard, indeed. I kept it up for two years, and then my marriage broke the points off the cuneiforms. I have stacks of beautifully executed MSS. on Assyriology. The amount of work involved astonishes me now, but I derived great benefit from the study.

     November.-About this time, the ministers connected with the Academy began to hold meetings for the translation of the Word, and I was made Secretary. On November 10th to 13th, the meetings of the General Church of Pennsylvania were held in Philadelphia. I remember advocating the publication of a New Church Almanac, and opposing the printing of volumes of sermons as being too ephemeral in their nature. I now began to visit Brooklyn regularly, to preach in German to the little circle there. It was very hard and uphill work for me, but I had good times socially.

     December.-The storm-cloud which had been gathering about the Academy broke on the 16th, and I was one of those who heard the first crash of thunder, the beginning of the troubles that have since been recorded in the volume on the Tafel Disturbances.

     During the Christmas vacation, I paid a visit to my friends in Renovo.

     (To be concluded.)

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GLEANINGS FROM NEW CHURCH HISTORY 1920

     THE DEAN OF NATAL SEEKS A DEGREE FROM THE ACADEMY.

     [For the hitherto unpublished letters printed below, we are indebted to Mrs. W. H. Benade. They present the astonishing picture of a Dean of the Church of England making application to the Academy of the New Church, soon after its establishment, for a degree in Theology. Additional interest attaches to the correspondence by the mention of Bishop Colenso, to whom Dean Colley refers in glowing terms, and whose books Bishop Benade speaks of having read, besides following the controversy to which they gave rise.

     Archdeacon Thomas Colley is said to have been "a receiver of the Doctrines of the New Church,"-a claim to which, the following documents appear to afford a certain degree of corroboration. Whether or not he remained in this affirmative state, we have, as yet, no evidence to show.

     As our readers may recall, Bishop John William Colenso (d. 1883) was the first prominent expositor of the so-called "rationalistic" interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures; especially as illustrated in his "Pentateuch and Book of Joshua Critically Examined," published in seven parts between 1863 and 1879. As the brilliant and formidable pioneer of the "higher criticism" movement, which-at a time when popular unbelief in the Divinity of the Word was less pronounced than today-naturally aroused the keenest excitement and opposition amongst the orthodox, Bishop Colenso was immediately the target of well-nigh the whole "religious" world.

     Deposed from his office as Bishop of Natal, and even "excommunicated" by the coercive action of the metropolitan of Capetown who arbitrarily claimed jurisdiction over the neighboring bishopric, Dr. Colenso made a successful appeal to the judicial committee of the privy council in England, which pronounced the whole proceedings null and void. However, the two societies for the "Propagation of the Gospel" and the "Promotion of Christian Knowledge,"-evidently supported by Archbishop Longley,-chose to regard him as canonically deposed, and subjected him to various forms of ill-advised persecution.

     To the last, however, Bishop Colenso appears not only to have confounded his enemies by the seemingly unanswerable nature of the problems which he had suddenly presented to the Christian world; but he seems to have gained the respect and confidence of most of his own clergy (including Archdeacon Colley) in his incorruptible and fearless love of natural truth as his reason saw it. Even in the New Church, we find the Rev. Abiel Silver, of New York, in an able, general answer to Colenso's first two books, (see Silver's "The Holy Word in its own defense: addressed to Bishop Colenso and all other earnest seekers after truth." N. Y. 1863), saying: "We respect his noble frankness in declaring to the world his convictions, while he still retains a profound reverence for the Book.

291

Standing where the Doctor does, and looking with the eyes with which he sees, he is right in his conclusions that the 'Mosaic narrative...cannot be regarded as historically true, so far as regards all the natural events mentioned."

     We may add that Bishop Colenso's attitude immediately arrested the attention not only of Bishop Benade, but also of other early founders of the Academy who at once purchased and studied the first part of Colenso's book on its first appearance in 1863.-WM. WHITEHEAD.]

     The Deanery,
          Pietermaritzburg, Natal,
               October 4, 1880.

[Bishop William H. Benade,
Philadelphia, Pa., U. S. A.]

     I have read the correspondence in MORNING LIGHT touching the Degree of B. D. recently conferred by your University upon the Rev. Mr. Tilson. I have not been convinced by the arguments of his opponents to the honor, but rather the reverse. For I think the time has fully come for the New Church to authorize degrees in the Theology that must last for all time. The old degrees of D. D. and B. D. in the Old Church mean but the scant knowledge of their Theology, and are conferred hardly ever for proficiency in Doctrine, but really as complimentary degrees.

     Several of the Doctors of Divinity I have known as a Clergyman of the Church of England have been very poor theologians indeed. E. D. and D. D. are never examined for at Oxford. Clergymen usually leave with their Arts Degree, U. A. Then by accumulation of terms (non-resident), in two years they come up and without any more study receive straight off their M. A. degree. And if, in the course of their ministerial life, they attain a Deanery, as I have done, or an Archdeanery, the Chancellor of our respective University (mine is Oxford) does them the compliment of conferring the superior degree, E. D. or D. D.

     There was a great stir made in England about my coming out here to be Dean of Natal and our grand Bishop's Archdeacon. The Archbishop of Canterbury was badgered about his favor to me and my noble Diocesan, as also was the Bishop of Exeter and my own late Bishop, the Bishop of Worcester.

292

Perhaps you have seen the great stir there was in England and London, especially at the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. The upshot of it all was that I had to come out to my important work lacking the coveted D. D., or even B. D. For my New Church views, even before I left Oxford, had done me injury in a temporal Ray, though I let nothing hinder me from being a most outspoken advocate of New Church Truth and adherent to the Science of Correspondences.

     I cannot look to my own Church for Academical honors, but, as a New Church Dean and Archdeacon of the Church of England in the Diocese of Natal, I should esteem the honor, if you can confer it, of B. D. or D. D. Subscribing heartily to the grand truths, of which Swedenborg, under the Providence of the Lord, is the immortal exponent, believe me,
     Faithfully yours,
          (Sgd.) THOMAS COLLEY.

     P. S.-I have sent Paper by this mail, with two of my reported Sermons.

     REPLY.
                              110 Friedlander Street,
                              Philadelphia, December 4th, 1880.
The Very Reverend Thomas Colley,
Dear Sir:
     Your favor of October 4th was duly received. The paper containing your reported Sermons has also come to hand. Please accept my acknowledgments for both. The controversy in the MORNING LIGHT, teaching the degree conferred on Mr. Tilson by our University, had a deeper ground than that degree, and its so-called "foreign" origin. Our opponents, in making their points of attack, have followed unwise counsels. The Academy is the only really positive organization of the New Church at present existing, (excepting, of course, the publishing societies), and being also universal, in purpose and in form, it was folly to raise with this body a merely national issue or question of Academical usage. The members of the New Church are not to be distinguished by geographical lines.

293

There can be no "foreign" degrees in New Church Theology, unless, indeed, they will insist that one may be denominated a New Church English-man.

The injured geographical pride of our English brethren has led them to make a public nuisance of this private grievance, and to expose their ignorance, as well of the whole matter of degrees, as of the common usage of their own country.

But, apart from this, it has amused us not a little that our over-zealous friends have all the time been assailing a man of straw. Had they taken time, and exercised a little self-control, they would have examined the diploma sent to Mr. Tilson, and such an examination would have revealed the fact that the degree granted him was not a B. D., but a B. Th. There is no essential difference in the general understanding of the terms Divinity and Theology, but it was our desire that the degree conferred should express our estimate of Mr. Tilson as a Theologian, and our judgment that he was prepared to teach the Theology of the New Church. This, and nothing more. We desired to mark the fact that, in the New Church, the terms "Divine" and "Divinity" are not employed in the sense given to them in the Old Church. It certainly never occurred to us, nor should we now place any weight upon the consideration that persons in England, or elsewhere, who are ignorant of the manner in which degrees are generally conferred-night look upon Mr. Tilson as a man of "distinguished attainments in Theology," in consequence of the letters attached to his name. In his case, we conferred the degree of Baccalaureus Theologiae because we had sufficient reason to regard him as entirely worthy of what we regarded those terms to imply. This is our rule, and to this rule we shall adhere in all future cases, mauger the protests of ignorant New Churchmen, or the sneers of supercilious Old Churchmen. We believe, as you do, that "the time has fully come for the New Church to authorize degrees in the Theology that must last for all time." And we believe, also, that in our Schools and Universities, our modes and methods must be determined entirely by the doctrines of our Church, and not by the notions and customs of the World, as formed from the false Theology of the Old Church.

294

We may "spoil the Egyptians," but not carry the spoil with us out of this country; we may not worship the Lord in the land, "because we should sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians to Jehovah our God."

I was in Europe at the time of your appointment to the Archdaeconry of Natal, and had my attention drawn to the stir that was made about it in England. The subject interested me greatly, both on account of your pronounced advocacy of New Church truth and my knowledge of the course of your present Bishop,* whose works I had read. The result of the controversy in your case, as well as in that of your bold Bishop, surprised me, and I confess that I do not yet see on what principles of Church order you can be supposed to remain in the Priesthood of the Church of England. That the Ecclesiastical Law of your Church is not violated by your retention, I am aware; but it is a cardinal teaching of the New Church on this subject that Law is not always order; for laws, as enacted by men, are not always truths. Priests are to teach and preach the Word "according to the Doctrines of their Church;" and we of the New Church could not for a moment admit that one who holds to the doctrines of the Church of England, or of any one of the denominations of the Old Church, might be received into the Priesthood of the New Church. Some of our people maintain a sort of spurious liberality on this point, for which we find not a shadow of warrant in our Writings. The "Academy" represents that portion of the New Church which believes, without reserve or qualification, that the Second Advent of the Lord, made in the Revelation of the spiritual sense of the Word and of the nature and condition of the spiritual world, is for the establishment of a distinctively New Church, of a Church discretely new, both internally and externally, to succeed and take the place of the former Church, which is vastated and consummated. This Church is not a New Theology, but a new body of the Lord on the earth, formed by a New Theology; a body of which the Lord is the soul, and in which He will be acknowledged and worshiped, as He now appears in the opened letter of the Word.
* Bishop Colenso.-W. W.

295

     We have no quarrel with those who conscientiously believe that they can be of greater use by remaining in external connection with the Old Church, even whilst receiving the doctrines of the New, and we are entirely willing that they should make the experiment; but we are convinced that they will either be led to recede from their position, or that they will by degrees draw away again from the Theology of the New Church. A dead body may be galvanized; it cannot be resuscitated.

     Holding these views, you will see, my dear Sir, that we cannot consistently entertain the thought of conferring the degree of B. D. or B. Th. on a clergyman of the Old Church, gratified as we have been by your recognition of the justice of our position in respect to Mr. Tilson, and pleased as we are to know that you so heartily subscribe to the grand truths expounded in the Writings of Swedenborg. We wish that it were otherwise, and that we could count you externally also of the New Church, and know that this Church was being openly proclaimed and visibly established in the distant land in which you are now laboring.

     We hope, and hoping pray that the Lord may be with and lead you in rational freedom to see that He has come again, not to revive a dead Church, but to raise up a New Church in the place of the former, which shall be the crown of all Churches, and endure to eternity.

     In order that you may have the means of better apprehending our position, and the grounds of it, I take the liberty of sending by post some of our publications. Perhaps this will be a means of continuing the communication between us that has been so pleasantly opened, and lead to an interchange of views from which we may derive a mutual benefit. With best wishes for your welfare, believe me,
     Very truly yours,
          (Sgd.) W. H. BENADE.

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
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Editor                    Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
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     THE ORIGIN OF FAMILY WORSHIP.

     The holding of family worship, which was so general in the homes of the early Academy, was the revival of an ancient custom, the history of which, as given in the Writings, we shall here briefly outline.

     Under the patriarchal form of society in the golden age, the father of the family was priest in his own house, receiving revelation from the Lord through angels for the instruction of his own family and no other.

     "In the most ancient time, the human race was distinguished into houses, families, and nations; a husband and wife, with their children, and some of the family who were servants, constituted a house; a lesser or greater number of houses, dwelling not far apart, though not together, constituted a family; a lesser or greater number of families constituted a nation. . . . The cause of their so dwelling was that the Church might thus be preserved in its integrity, and abide in love and true worship." (A. C. 470, 471.) Thus the Most Ancient Church was made up of distinct families, each worshiping by itself as a lesser church, an order that is maintained to this day in the celestial heaven, where they still live as they did in the world. (C. L. 205; H. H. 50; A. C. 10814.)

297

From which it will be evident that the earliest form: of worship upon earth was family worship.

     In the Ancient Church it was similar, each nation being made up of a number of families acknowledging a common ancestor, and being distinguished from others by forms of doctrine and worship (A. C. 1258). They worshiped Jehovah as the one only God according to the Ancient Word, but personified His attributes and made images thereof. Yet, in spite of the varieties of belief and religious practice, they were all united under the bonds of charity, and thus made one Church. "The whole earth was of one lip and one word." (Genesis 11:1; A. C. 1285; N. J. H. D. 9).

     This family or national worship persisted when the Ancient Church declined and became idolatrous. Then each family had its own god. With the family of Terah, to which Abram belonged, this god was at first a spirit who admonished and instructed them, whom they called Shaddai-the "tempter and benefactor"-under which name the Lord therefore revealed Himself to Abram at the first. (Genesis 17:1; see A. C. 1992, 5628; Coronis 43)

     The worship of Jehovah was to be restored with Abram and his posterity, though only in external form. That a representation of heaven might be restored, "it pleased the Lord that the Jewish Church should be distinguished into houses, families, and tribes." (A. C. 471.) There was this difference, however, that they were forbidden to hold family worship, that they might be withheld from their household gods and idols. "Because the posterity of Jacob was most prone to idolatry, they were forbidden to erect statues, or to have groves, or to hold any worship upon mountains and high places; but they were congregated to one place, where the ark was, and afterwards where the temple was, at Jerusalem. Otherwise, every family would have had its own externals and idols which it would have worshipped, and so the representative of a church could not have been instituted with that nation." (A. C. 4580)

     But when the Lord came into the world, this restriction was removed, because the Christian Church was to be an internal Church, wherein the regenerate were to be the sons of God, worshiping the Lord as the omnipresent Father.

298

The woman of Samaria said unto Jesus, "Our fathers worshiped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. . . . The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship Him." (John 4:20-23.) He also said: "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them." (Matthew 18:20.) Such teachings as these warranted the practices of individual and family piety which had been forbidden the Jews.

The members of the early Academy, therefore, found cause for their family worship in the historical precedent of ancient times, in the "family prayers" among Christians, and in other teachings of the Writings. Among these we may note what is said in the Doctrine of Charity (175): "The externals of worship at home are, 1. Prayer morning and evening, also at dinners and suppers; 2. Conversing with others about charity and faith, and about God, heaven, eternal life, and salvation; 3. With priests, preaching, and also teaching privately; 4. And with everyone, the instruction of children and servants about such things; 5. Reading the Word and books of instruction and piety."

Among the uses of private devotions may be mentioned their benefit to the public services of the church. Worship administered by the priesthood in a House of God, set apart and dedicated as the Lord's dwelling place, is more fully and perfectly representative of heaven than individual or family worship; but its essential quality is according to the state of worship with the individuals who compose the congregation. And there is added excellence of use and representation where the individuals are those who worship God in their daily lives, in private-devotions of piety, and in the family circle. For the whole derives its quality from the parts: the church from the individuals who compose it. "Man is a church in particular, and a company of these men is what is called the church." (Coronis 8.) "The Word is present with man by his reading the Word, and is conjoined to man by His understanding, of the Word, and according to it.

299

And so far as the Lord is conjoined to man, so far the church is in him. The church is in man; the church outside of him is the church with many in whom the church is." (S. S. 78)
W. B. CALDWELL.
REBUILDING FROM THE FOUNDATIONS 1920

REBUILDING FROM THE FOUNDATIONS HOMER SYNNESTVEDT 1920

     There are two great curses resting upon us, the men and women of this age, and we cannot begin too early to break their influence upon us.

     The first to show itself, and the worst, is the desire to dominate over others, and to subject them to our pleasure. The second, which often remains somewhat in abeyance until adult age, is the greed of possessing the goods of others. The first, called the love of dominion from the love of self, leads to all manner of cruelty, to hatred and revenge. It is also at one with adultery, and every most gross and carnal indulgence. The almost universal prevalence of obscenity and unclean talk in the world is derived from the presence and unchecked influence of the hells of this kind. In our adult age; if by the reception of the truths of the Christian religion, we come to realize the enormous wickedness and danger of these things-both the inner hate and the outer filth-we shall, of course, check them at once; but we find it almost impossible to root them out of our inner thoughts and feelings.

     Hence we realize the great importance of bringing up our children in such a way that they shall not be steeped in these things in early years, when the tender vessels of the will itself are being minded by habits and by sensual delights into the form which characterizes them ever afterwards. not in one generation, indeed, shall we be able to root out the evil tendencies derived by inheritance from so many ages of backsliders. At first we seem to do little more than open the sores, and then begin to face the facts. Yet the success already attained should be to us a matter of sincerest and most humble gratitude.

300

For the charity and the faith developed with those brought up in our schools, such as it is, is at least genuine, and no mere pharisaical goody-good pretense-nor yet a polite veneer, for the sake of the world. Perhaps a little more of the varnish of polite good form, called Polish, would not hurt us!

In the brief history of the New Church, and even in the generation or so which covers the Academy's educational experience, we have probably tried going too far in every direction,-towards the East, in taking on more holiness than we could sustain; towards the West, by despising such things, and rather delighting in shocking the piety and goodness of our neighbor; towards the South, by becoming so intellectual, and so involved in philosophical sophistications, that we were about ready to move to Boston; and towards the North, by sweeping aside the accepted standards of intellectual attainment, abolishing memory drill-work and examination tests.

What our schools can do to remedy these conditions, restoring to the children their heritage of good remains, (obedience, good-will, love of being of service, even the love of use and delight in worship and instruction), will depend not only upon our teachers, their training, their wisdom, patience and zeal, but also upon the parents, especially upon the mothers at home. Foolish mothers, who begin in earliest infancy to subject themselves and the whole household to the whim and angry demands of their progeny, must expect increasing trouble as their children grow. The school may do something to train their demands to such reasonable dimensions that they can fit in with others, but it will be a constant fight, with frequent outbreaks. If the school does not succeed in undoing the mischief, sometimes the force of public opinion, backed by the civil law, saves the day, and they settle down and become "law abiding citizens." But only those are able to become citizens of some heavenly society who go back and tame their own will, so that they shun evils as sins against God, and thus do not tolerate these things, even in the will and thought. That is Christian civilization, the real thing, the kind that exists in heaven, and without which no one can dwell there.

301

     How clearly, as time goes on, we see the wisdom of Father Benade's teachings upon the subject, and the need of what used to be called the Academy principle of disciplining the young even from infancy. It might be added that the tendency of late years with scientific men too specialize in certain fields has led to a practice in regard to infants that is substantially in accord with our teachings. Only it omits the important matter of spheres.

     Let me add only this. Unless parents are willing to bring up their children aright, and according to a good and rational code, they will find themselves unable to endure the burden of such unmitigated nuisance; while those who do well by them, although it may seem harder at first, will find them a blessing, and will welcome as many as they are rightly able to have.
     HOMER SYNNESTVEDT.
TRADITIONS AND PROGRESS 1920

TRADITIONS AND PROGRESS GEORGE A. MCQUEEN 1920

One of the things we have always desired to see is a numerical increase in the membership of the New Church. In the General Church, while always hoping for an increase from outside, we have from the beginning believed that the surest source of increase would be from the families of our own members, if only they were faithful in bringing up their children in the sphere of the church. In spite of many difficulties and shortcomings, we have lived to witness the full confirmation of our belief in this means of promoting the growth of the New Church on earth. So satisfactory, indeed, has been the result, that we have become convinced that, whatever effort may be made by our body to spread the doctrines of the New Jerusalem, it must never be permitted to usurp the place of the simple but sure way of progress just mentioned.

At the same time, with this conviction well-established in the mind, may we not profitably take a more interior view of our progress, to discover, if possible, whether we have made equal advance in the affection and practice of those things which have made the General Church an entirely distinct body of the New Church?

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     It is taken for granted, of course, that all members of the General Church of the New Jerusalem are firm believers in the Heavenly Doctrines, because that is the basis of their membership. It is also assumed that in joining our body there existed the desire to support and promote its specific uses, both internal and external. Now the question may be asked, whether our progress in the direction of external increase and material prosperity is maintaining a like advance in those practices which have been considered essential instrumentalities for the upbuilding of the Church.

     It is beyond the province of any one of us to judge of the real spiritual life of our body, as this is known to the Lord alone. Probably at no time in the history of our movement could it have been said that all our members observed those practices and customs which affected much of the family life of the General Church. Nor can it be said that all of these practices were of a character which could usefully be continued at the present day. But, with regard to those things which were carried out because they were based on principles drawn from Divine Revelation, being therefore important aids in the growth of the Church, it can never be said that they have become of none effect.

     Take, for instance, Family Worship. In the early days of the Academy and the General Church, this ancient custom was revived, and became firmly established in many homes as an important means of advancing the spiritual life of the church. Reverence for the Word was increased by the custom of providing a repository, in which the copy of the Word was kept, and thus separated from all other books. Sometimes these repositories were dedicated to their sacred use by a priest, in the presence of all the members of the family. These simple ceremonies made impressions on the minds of the children which could never be obliterated.

     Then there was the habit of supporting the pecuniary needs of the church and its priesthood, by setting aside a definite proportion of income. This method of giving to the church was adopted by many, and took the place of the generally prevalent method of giving to the church what was left over when other wants had been satisfied.

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This custom was supported by the teaching- given in D. L. W. 333, that "All (spiritual) things are given by the Lord according to the acknowledgment that all things of the body are also from the Lord, and that man is only as a house steward, appointed over the goods of his Lord."

     Regular weekly meetings for reading the Writings was a recognized institution in the early days, and keen interest was manifested in the subject of the education of children in the home. The Conversations on Education, by Bishop Benade, was studied in classes, and it was realized that parents had responsibilities in this work as well as the teachers in our schools.

     Another feature in the early history of our body was the great interest taken in the work being done in the various centers of the church. The monthly arrival of NEW CHURCH LIFE was looked forward to, and the reports of new members were received with delight.

     The things just enumerated have always existed in the General Church, influencing it for good. In fact, they are instrumentalities which would seem to be essential to the progress of the church on earth. And if it can be shown at this time that these practices have increased, or even kept pace with our numerical increase, then we can indeed rejoice in the external progress we have made.
     GEORGE A. MCQUEEN.
PROGRESSION OF TRUTH INTO GOOD 1920

PROGRESSION OF TRUTH INTO GOOD 1920

"I have conversed with the angels about the progression of truth into good, thus of faith into charity, and it was said that the angels have joy when a man as an infant or child learns and acquires truths with affection, thus when the truths become knowledges with him; that they have a still greater joy when the truths pass from knowledge into the understanding for then the angels in the Lord's spiritual kingdom have joy; that there is a joy still greater when the truths in the understanding become of the will, for then the angels in the Lord's celestial kingdom have joy; and when from the will they become acts, there is joy with the angels of the three heavens. (Diary 6011.)

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SUPREME ADVENTURE 1920

SUPREME ADVENTURE J. B. S. KING 1920

     THE SUPREME ADVENTURE, by Sarah Lowe Twiggs. The Academy Book Room, Bryn Athyn, Pa., 1919. pp. 239; Cloth, $1.50.

     This poem is an important addition to New Church literature. It is a grave, serious, dignified account in poetic form of the pregnant events that happen, or may happen, to the newly resuscitated human being. It deals with what all the world is interested in,-the life after death,-especially so since the great war has taken so many loved ones to the other side of the inscrutable veil. The difficult task of telling the kernel of spiritual doctrines is done with surprising success, and without seriously checking the interest of the narrative. The descriptions are generally good, here and there excellent, especially of the scenery and accompaniments of the Inferno.

     If there is a fault, we should say it is a too free use of adjectives; as it were, ornamentation or decoration piled on too thick. Another fault is the adoption of stereotyped "poetic" phrases. Just as soon as an expression or even a word is dubbed "poetic," that moment it loses power. William Cowper occupies rather an humble station in the role of English poets, but always deserves honorable mention for his part in breaking up the so-called poetic diction of his period. Mrs. Twiggs has gone back to it, to a large extent. Such words and phrases as "me-thinks," "'Twere," "'is," occurring very frequently, give the text a dainty, artificial air, more remote from natural expression than either the idea or the verse requires. The frequent employment of elisions-especially when not needed to help the meter-have the same effect. Mrs. Twiggs is a great sinner here. "The" is almost always "Th'." Then we have "rev'rent," "giv'n," "'twill," "'tis," "riv'n," "'twixt," on almost every page, and once we have "'strom" for Maelstrom. Elisions not required by the meter become affectations, and mightily dilute and weaken the style.

305

     The meter is decasyllabic blank verse with four stresses or accents. It is well adapted to the subject. There are many unnecessary irregularities in the division of lines. For instance, we can see no good reason for printing "connate" and "old speech" in separate lines in the following:

Who are the wise? Angels of celestial
Heaven are but in lesser ignorance than
Thou. Much knowledge is in this life
     Connate.

Thou canst not now one word of thine
     Old speech
Recall; 'tis in thy mem'ry quiescent;

     "Connate" and "Old speech" clearly belong to their preceding lines, to fill out the ten syllables, and nothing is gained by displacing them. It rather spoils than improves the lines.

     When an emotion is objective, it has a much more profound effect upon the reader than when subjective. To illustrate: If a man says, "I am very angry; in fact, I am perfectly furious; my eyes are fairly sparkling with rage;" it does not impress one nearly so much as if he proceeds to spoil the physiognomy of his enemy by well-aimed punches. The first rage is subjective, the second objective. Now there is too much of subjective emotion in Mrs. Twiggs' poem; and it fails, more or less, to produce the strong impression that it should. But we will not find more fault. We enjoyed the poem; others will enjoy it. And it cannot fail to have an excellent effect upon those of its readers whose ears are open to Divine Truth. J. B. S. KING.
HISTORY OF THE NEW THOUGHT MOVEMENT 1920

HISTORY OF THE NEW THOUGHT MOVEMENT W. H. ALDEN 1920

A HISTORY OF THE NEW THOUGHT MOVEMENT, by Horatao W. Dresser. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1919. pp. 352, $2.00.

A sincere and friendly review of the New Thought movement,-from its beginnings with Dr. P. P. Quimby, through its development under the name of "Mental Science" with the Rev. W. F. Evans, who "belonged to the New Church, and appears to have been an average exponent of Swedenborg's teachings," and through its wide exploitation by Mrs. Eddy as Christian Science,-to its present status as The New Thought, with numerous organizations, an abundant literature, and a world-wide discipleship.

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The New Thought almost defies definition. It is spoken of as an "influence" rather than an institution,-the bringing into practical effect of the Christianity which otherwise has been only nominally believed. Its organizations receive those of all creeds and those of no creed, and it adds to each an incentive and inspiration, and a practical means to health, brotherly love, and the general welfare of mankind. Such, at least, are the claims made for it.

It has no creed. It "affirms" "The Good,. . . the supreme, universal and everlasting;" "Health, which is man's Divine inheritance;" "The Divine supply-he who serves God and man in the full understanding of the law of compensation shall not lack;" "The teaching of Christ that the Kingdom of God is within us, that we are one with the Father, that we should judge not, that we should love one another, that we should heal the sick, that we should return good for evil, that we should minister to others, and that we should be perfect, even as our Father in heaven is perfect." These . . . "not only ideals, but practical, everyday working principles." Furthermore, it affirms the "new thought of God as Universal Love, Life, Truth and Joy, in whom we live, move and have our being. . . ; that His mind is our mind now, that realizing our oneness with Him means love, truth, peace, health and plenty, not only in our own lives, but in the giving out of these fruits of the spirit to others." "We affirm these things, not as a profession, but practice; not an one day of the week, but in every hour and minute of every day, sleeping and waking; not in the ministry of a few, but in a service that includes the democracy of all; not in words alone, but in the innermost thoughts of the heart expressed in living the life." And "by their fruits ye shall know them." "We affirm heaven here and now, the life everlasting that becomes conscious immortality, the communion of mind with mind throughout the universe of thought, the nothingness of all error and negation, including death; the variety in unity that produces the individual expressions of the One-Life, and the quickened realization of the indwelling God in each soul that is making a new heaven and a new earth."

307

     All this sounds well. These word-visions seem highly desirable, and highly delightful to exemplify. "Health, peace, prosperity, happiness,"-if these were indeed to be obtained by the affirmation of them, how simple the redemption of the world! And if evil and disease could to be done away with by the mere affirmation that they do not exist, how simple the problem; of banishing sin and misery from the world!

     That such an affirmation in some cases does away with the appearance of evil and of sickness, must be admitted. That there are many who have, as to appearance, been so relieved from their sinfulness and their bodily ills, there is abundant evidence. But similar "proof" is to be found for the efficacy of "metallic tractors" and all manner of quack medicines. Great indeed is the power of the mind over matter; greater still the power of belief over the imagination!

     But the problem, is not so simple. True it is that health, and purity, and peace, are the birthright of map; but it is also painfully true that man has "sold this birthright for a mess of pottage," and can only regain it by the slow and painful process of regeneration, True it is that all power is in spirit, and done in matter; but it is not true that the individual man has power to change his physical state as to health or disease by changing his state of mind. True it is that God is the source of all life, and that He dwells in His fullness in that secret chamber of the soul which is above man's consciousness; but it is not true that man can call down at will from that secret chamber God's infinite powers to work His will as man desires. In brief, it is not true that man, at the inmost, is God, or that "God is the true self of man." We may not affirm things of man which are true of the Lord only.

     It seems to us, therefore, that one who affirms the New Thought dwells in a fool's paradise, shutting his eyes, not only to existing evils, but also to those essential goods which are not of the body and this world.

308

     It is strange that a professed New Churchman,-indeed, an ordained minister of the New Church-should produce such a friendly review of the New Thought as the book before us contains. The author formerly belonged to that cult, and was among its leaders, and there is little in the present volume to indicate that the New Thought is not still dominant with him. On a page or two, to be sure, he discusses the relation of the New Thought to the New Church, and in so doing quotes the protest of the Rev. Julian K. Smyth, who pays his respects to the "cult of affirming" in the following words:

     "Suppose, under influence, I impart to myself a suggestion which is not in the highest sense true. Thus I have seen the following offered as ideal suggestions: 'I am pure.' 'I am one with God.' 'I am in perfect harmony with all.' I am told that if I will hold these suggestions fixedly and in a sort of half-waking state, great benefits will result. A sense of quiet will be induced. Perhaps some nervous condition, or pain of body, will disappear. But for me, at least, these suggestions, although they seem highly religious, in fact are trot true. I am not pure; but need rather to cry out, 'God be merciful to me a sinner!" I am trot one with God:-He is Divine, I am human; and, in my self-centered life, I too often emphasize my separateness from Him. I am not in perfect harmony with all; for, if I am a man struggling for the good of all, I am well aware of contending evils which are as foes of my own mental household. Of what avail can it be to bring about some contented, quiet state of mind on a fictitious principle? Who is authorized to take the responsibility of imparting to our subconscious self, when we have laid ourselves open to the power of suggestion, the true principle for us?"

     Mr. Dresser himself says: "The question is, What shall become of the greater problems remaining unsolved when suggestion has been employed to the full,-those problems which pertain to our deeper spiritual nature? Such problems are surely held over by the partisans of suggestion...in any branch of the New Thought."

309

The author frequently contrasts the false conceptions of the old theology with the concepts of the New Thought, to the advantage of the latter. It seems strange that a New Churchman, and especially a New Church minister, should not have shown the greater contrast between the New Thought conceptions and the truth of the New Church, to the advantage of the latter. For all that is good, (and self-evidently good), in the affirmations of the New Thought, is axiomatic with the New Church. For the New Church affirms the Good, but recognizes it in Him who alone is good, even the Lord Jesus Christ; the New Church affirms health,-man's Divine inheritance,-but knows that man lacks it, trot because he has not thought it, but because he has perversely thrown away the means to it; the New Church affirms the "Divine supply," that it is infinite, but knows that life from this infinite fountain can be received only according to the vessels which are fitted to receive it; the New Church affirms all the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ, with a knowledge of their inner meaning that lifts them into heavenly light; the New Church also affirms the thought of God as universal Love, Life, Truth and Joy, in whom we live, move and have our being. The New Church affirms these things, "not as profession, but practice; not on one day of the week, but in every hour and minute of the day sleeping and waking; not in the ministry of a few, but in a service which includes the democracy of all; not in words alone, but in the innermost thoughts of the heart, expressed in living the life." And "by its fruits" the New Church is known. But the New Church does not and cannot affirm the "nothingness of all error and negation, including death;" nor can it affirm that "His mind is our mind now," and that "the quickened realization of the indwelling God in each soul is making a new heaven and a new earth."

The New Church is unpopular because it tells the truth regarding man,-that of himself he is evil, and that he must deny himself, obeying the Divine Commandments humbly, and with pain, by the compulsion of his outward life, in order that the Lord, who alone can do it, may give him new birth, and conjoin man to Himself.

310

The New Thought is popular because it asserts that man is God, that he has no evil in him, and that he has the springs of all good and truth within himself. It demands no repentance, no giving up of self, but leads man to hug the delusion that his self, when truly understood, is the very Divine itself.

     Thus the New Thought knows not God in Jesus Christ, evades the necessary combat against the evils within, and places undue emphasis upon physical ills and natural blessings. It affirms the Good without knowing what the truly good is; affirms Jesus Christ and His healing power, but simply as the healing power of a man like other mien, and with no acknowledgment of Him as Divine.

     The New Thought offers physical health, worldly prosperity abounding power. These things, of course, men want, and will come in throngs to obtain from one who claims to bestow them. Nor does the New Church deny that "these things shall be added," as the Lord sees fit. But it places them on a low level, where they are virtually of no account when compared with the real blessings that are granted to him who humbly seeks the Lord in the place to which the Lord has called him.

     We cannot help wishing that Mr. Dresser had given same fuller notion of these New Church ideas in his review. There is a hint of it, indeed, but veiled. Swedenborg and Swedenborgianism is credited, not the Lord who has made His Second Coming.
     W. H. ALDEN.

311

COMFORTING THOUGHT 1920

COMFORTING THOUGHT K. R. ALDEN 1920

     Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     While meditating upon Deuteronomy 7:7, a, very comforting thought occurred to me which I would pass on to your readers for what it is worth. In that verse we read these striking words: "The Lord did not set His love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people; but because the Lord loved you. . . ." So at this day, the Lord has not chosen those who belong to the New Church because they exceed in numbers the great religions of Christianity. When we allow our minds to dwell upon the fewness of our numbers, we become discouraged. When, for instance, we learn that there are more Catholic priests in the diocese of Philadelphia than there are New Churchmen in America, and more Protestant churches in Philadelphia than there are New Church societies in the-world, we may feel disheartened. Yet, when our thought is turned to the Lord, we realize that He is no respecter of persons, and that He has not chosen New Churchmen because they are greater in number than other religions.

     Why, then, has He chosen us? The words of the text say: "Because the Lord loved you." To the New Church is vouchsafed a love that is impossible to others who have not received the Truth of the Heavenly Doctrine, by means of which we may so prepare our minds and hearts that the true love of the Lord may dwell therein. It is according to the quality of this love with a few, and not the mere quantity of love with many, that the New Church shall exist eternally. And when we think of this quality, we see that it is by means of it that the New Church is conjoined to the heavens, and the heavens are all New Church! In comparison with the heavens, what do the few millions of men upon earth amount to? If the few of the New Church remain true to their principles, they will be actually conjoined to those mighty heavenly hosts. Comforted by this thought, we need not worry about the great numbers belonging to other religions.

312

"It is enough that there be a Church where the Word is, even if it consists of comparatively few; by it nevertheless, the Lord is present everywhere in the whole world, for by it heaven is conjoined to the human race." (S. S. 104.)
K. R. ALDEN.
MRS. TWIGGS' POEM 1920

MRS. TWIGGS' POEM LOUIS PENDLETON 1920

     To the Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     I find that in several instances within the New Church, and in at least one instance outside, I have been unaccountably and undesirably misunderstood in the matter of my estimate of the qualities of The Supreme Adventure, as given in the foreword to that poem. In the true interests of a book that ought to perform useful service in the New Church for years to come, it may be worth while, therefore, to ask you to publish the following correspondence:

     Bryn Athyn, Pa.,
          March 15, 1920.

Literary Editor of The Journal,
     Milwaukee, Wis.
Dear Sir:
     Is it not more pleasing to think of angels as real men and women of the best and highest type, living lives of happy usefulness hi a great variety of employment, than to think of them-according to Milton's idea-as strange, unreal creatures with wings on their backs, who do nothing but pray and sing, some of whom for rebellion were cast out of heaven and fell headlong thousands of miles into a literal lake of fire? I think it is vastly more pleasing, and that is all that I meant when I wrote in the preface to The Supreme Adventure, by Sarah Lowe Twiggs, that the picture of the future life therein presented was "more human, far more alluring, than that of the creed-burdened Milton or the medieval Dante. Though I regard The Supreme Adventure as highly pleasing also as poetry, it was far from my purpose to give it a literary rating approximating these two great classics, let alone to place it above them as a work of art. Milton and Dante were mentioned because they covered similar ground, and the preference I expressed was only for the kind of future life presented in The Supreme Adventure.

     I think that it you will refer to die book and re-read what I wrote in the foreword, you will see that you misunderstood me, and recognize that you inadvertently did me an injustice in your brief review in the Milwaukee Journal.

313

     It may interest you to know that The Supreme Adventure was not, as you too hastily supposed, inspired by the Michigan soldier's remarkable letter which the Literary Digest published and an extract from which I made use of in my foreword to the poem. Work on The Supreme Adventure was begun before that soldier was born. But the author, who is now eighty-two years old, was inspired by the theological works of Emanuel Swedenborg, whose general idea of the future life is faithfully presented in her poem.
     Very truly yours,
          LOUIS PENDLETON.

     Milwaukee, Wis.,
March 18, 1920.
Mr. Louis Pendleton,
     Bryn Athyn, Pa.
My Dear Mr. Pendleton:
     Your very kind letter concerning the review of The Supreme Adventure is duly appreciated. We ate very sorry if our review staff did you an injustice, and we are always glad to know first-hand from an author just what the facts are. In our literary notes we shall endeavor to correct the error.

     We do try to give a just estimate for our readers of the books we review. I have instructed my staff not to incorporate wholesale the reviews that are furnished us ready-made, but to look at the work earnestly, sympathetically and at the same time with intellectual honesty. Yours very sincerely, LITERARY EDITOR, THE MILWAUKEE JOURNAL.

     This indirect intimation that what appeared in the MILWAUKEE JOURNAL was a "ready-made" review seems to render it probable that the same review, in substance, if not quite the same in form, was sent; or is to be sent, to a number of other newspapers. Publishers' literary assistants usually do this sort of thing merely with a view so secure free advertising not otherwise obtainable. But in the present case, as the Bryn Athyn publishers are wholly innocent of any such commercial forehandedness, having sent out no ready-made "dope," either flattering or critical, what is the explanation? It might be hasty to assume a veiled attack from some unknown quarter upon The Supreme Adventure because of its Swedenborgian propaganda, but such a possibility inevitably suggests itself.
     LOUIS PENDLETON.

314

Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA.-During our Pastor's three months' absence on his visit to Bryn Athyn, the services, Wednesday night doctrinal class, and Sunday School, were conducted by Mr. Charles H. Morgan. The Society is grateful to him for his care during this period.

     Our Pastor returned on December 2nd, and a social of welcome was tendered him on the following evening. On December 11th, the Sunday School children gave an entertainment as their welcome to Mr. Morse. The teachers assisted, but the choice of songs and recitations was left mainly to the children. Their choice proved good, and all enjoyed their efforts.

     Since June, 1919, a hall has been rented at Hurstville-a suburb, about nine miles south of Sydney-to hold Sunday School in. The School was held fortnightly, but arrangement have now been made to have it every Sunday. The results are very promising; the older children especially show so much interest in their lessons. There are sixteen names on the roll, twelve of these being the children of New Church parents, the remaining four belonging to strangers who have come without request. In the future, we hope to enlarge the Sunday School by missionary efforts among the people of Hurstville.

     Christmas afternoon and evening were devoted to the children. We had our usual Christmas tree, and this time the gathering was held at the above-mentioned hall. A tea was provided, after which games were played in the open until it became dark enough to light the tree. After the marching, and, the distribution of gifts, the children sang Christmas hymns, these being interspersed with three addresses. The Pastor spoke on "The Two Advents," and showed the necessity of the First for the sake of the Second. Mr. Morgan told the story of the shepherds and the wise men, pointing out the necessary distinction in time between the two events. Mr. Kirschstein told the reason of the Lord's coming, that it was to save the human race.

     The first annual Sunday School picnic was held at National Park on the 26th of January, which is a public holiday in commemoration of the founding of the Colony. Needless to state, the children enjoyed this outing very much, and I think the adults did also.

     We have had the great pleasure of a visit from the Rev. Reginald W. Brown, of Bryn Athyn, who called here on his way to South Africa. As many of the friends as were able attended the welcome given him on the evening of January 28th. On the following Sunday, Mr. Brown assisted the Pastor in the service and preached the sermon, the subject being "The Broad and Narrow Ways." This sermon was much appreciated. In the afternoon, a visit was paid to the Sunday School, and it may be mentioned in passing that Mr. Brown has hopes of our School. In the evening, instead of the usual doctrinal class, Mr. Brown gave us a talk on Swedenborg's theory of creation, as set forth in the Principia. At the following Wednesday night meeting, he read his paper on "The Fundamental Concept of Substance, and of its Form and Activity," which was published in the New Philosophy for July, 1919. He found congenial spirits amongst us, as the conversation revealed the fact that the ideas of the members here, on the above and allied questions, were similar to his own.

315

     To us, who are so far from the center of the Church's activities on earth, the visits of those who come from that center give much profit and pleasure. We hope to see others of our friends on their way to and from Africa in the future.
     M. M. W.

     LONDON, ENG.-On the advice of Bishop Pendleton, regular Sunday services have been maintained since the death of our Pastor, being conducted by members of the Society, who have taken turns in the use of Reader. The sermons have usually been chosen from New Church Life, though occasionally from the sermonettes sent out by the Academy War Service Committee. In this way the necessary spiritual recreation has been provided, while incidentally both the hearing and reading of these discourses refreshed the memory of the rich treasuries of exposition which the New Church possesses.

     On Sunday, January 4th, the Society had the pleasure of meeting the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal, who stayed in England for several weeks while en route to Durban. Mr. Gyllenhaal officiated on this occasion, and administered the Communion. During the service, the rite of Confession of Faith was performed for two young ladies of the Society,-Miss Dorothy Waters and Miss Iris Elphick.

     Mr. Gyllenhaal visited us again on January 18th, and when he paid his final visit we had an exceptionally busy and bright week-end. On Saturday afternoon, January 31st, the wedding of Miss Gladys Bedwell and Mr. Edward Waters, Jr., brought together a large circle of the London and Colchester friends. After an impressive ceremony, a reception, provided by Mrs. Bedwell, was held. Mr. Gyllenhaal acted as toastmaster, and a convivial gathering celebrated the happy event-the first wedding in this Society since the war.

     The celebration of Swedenborg's Birthday, on February 1st, attracted a record number of friends. The service was held at 4 p. m., conducted by the Rev. Theodore Pitcairn and the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal. This was followed by a feast of charity, at which there were 110 participants. On the invitation of Mr. Gyllenhaal, who presided, addresses were made by the Revs. G. C. Ottley, W. H. Acton, Albert Bjorck and Theodore Pitcairn, on subjects relative to Swedenborg's mission and preparation, and on topics of current interest. Quite a number of our isolated members had made a special effort to attend, and the guests of the evening included friends from the Colchester, Kensington, Willesden, and Burton Road Societies.
     F. W. E.

     PHILADELPHIA, PA.-In our Doctrinal classes, which are considering the "Genesis Glorification Series," we have now arrived at the land Chapter of Genesis, and the 3rd Chapter of Vol. III. of the Arcana. The study has, indeed, been a profitable one, and will run over two years. It has introduced the members of the class into a great fundamental scheme by which their thoughts concerning that majestic event have been clarified; and step by step they are getting a universal idea into which all the particulars can later be assembled. In connection with the classes, the Pastor has recently commenced a series of sermons on the life of King David, treating of the subject from the standpoint of the glorification, with particular reference to the incarnation of Divine Truth. The series casts much light upon the Genesis Series, and together they made a concentrated whole.

     The fourth Scout entertainment was held at the Church, on February 26th, and about forty persons were present.

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The Scouts provided the entertainment in the form of Vandeville and Moving Pictures. Something over five dollars was realized for the benefit of their summer camping fund. It is our plan to take the entire troop to the Delaware Water Gap, and there live together, have worship and religion together, and implant remains such as we cannot do in our weekly Sunday School. A number of wealthy persons have contributed various sums toward our fund, and the outlook is very bright for accomplishing our plans.

     On Saturday evening, March 13th, we held an unusually successful dance under the auspices of the Ushers' Committee. The decorations were the most elaborate ever tried here, and the music was unsurpassable. Under its charming strains, the youth of the Society and some guests from Bryn Athyn danced until Sunday morning, when the orchestra went on a strike. Especial credit is due to Mr. Artol Soderberg, the Chairman of our Ushers' Committee, and it would be well to state, also, that Mr. Soderberg has done splendid work in reorganizing the ushers and putting their services on an efficient basis. Their work has become a very vital part of our Sunday worship.

     The Men's Club met at the home of Mr. Green, on the night of the 16th and listened to a paper, entitled "Adolescence of Boys," by the Pastor. In his talk the Pastor tried to arouse interest in this most sensitive period, and to point out the care and responsibility which rests upon the shoulders of all men in their contact with boys of this age. Delightful refreshments were furnished by the host, and the evening soon turned into a rehearsal of the things "I used to do when I was a boy," all the men giving some interesting experiences of their youth.

     The following Thursday, the ladies met at the home of Mrs. Royal Davis, and planned some big surprises for the Church which will later be made known. "The good old bunch" was there, and they had a very delightful evening.

     Every month has its BIG event, and this month it was the talk on the "Battle of Verdun," by Major Caldwell, of Bryn Athyn. The talk was given as the fifth Scout entertainment, and was by far the most successful event to date, more than ten dollars being realized from the occasion. The Major had lantern slides showing the various positions of the opposing armies throughout the battle, and it was a great eye-opener to most of us. Then he showed us many of the typical war scenes, together with an interpretation of them which his living experience had given him. He also showed us the American drive, in which so many General Church boys had participated. Our thanks go to the Major.

     On the 28th of March, Palm Sunday our Society adopted a custom which is unique here, so far as we know, namely, a joint children and adult's service. There were 80 persons present, about filling our Chapel to capacity, all of them Philadelphians, showing in a concrete way the great future ahead of us, when we shall fill all the seats every Sunday, and the late comers will have to stand. Some of us have the idea that this is now it ought to be. On Palm Sunday everyone brings a flower. The service opened with a procession by the children, which was very pretty indeed with their waving palms and fragrant flowers. Then, after the first lesson, the entire congregation filed by the chancel and placed their flowers in a jardiniere, which made a very beautiful ceremonial. K. R. A.

     GLENVIEW.-In our February report we referred to the article in the Lift about the Immanuel Church, which was written by Mr. Charles Francis Browne.

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We now have to record the departure to the spiritual world of this earnest and loyal Newchurchman which occurred on March 29th at his home in Waltharn, Mass. Our brother in the Church exemplified in his life the characteristics of that great doctrine of "use" which is frequently described as peculiar to the New Church. He was painter who loved his art for its own sake; and we can only imagine what is in store for him amid surroundings which afford uninterrupted facilities for the expression of his love of the good and the true.

     Notwithstanding tornadoes and blizzards, which, happily, did little damage in Glenview, our Easter services were greatly enjoyed. On Palm Sunday the choir carried palm branches and were followed by the children with their offerings of flowers, which were placed around the altar. During the service, three grandchildren of Dr. J. B. S. King were baptized. On Good Friday the Holy Supper was administered, and on Easter Sunday our Pastor preached a sermon which was the climax of wonderful series of spiritual expositions of the life of our Lord prior to His complete Glorification.

     The "New Church Life" Coffee Meeting continues its weekly sessions, and, on March 16th, the Immanuel Church held such a meeting in its Library. The subject for conversation was one which was supposed would attract the ladies. Mr. G. A. McQueen opened the meeting by reading a short paper on "The Love Stories in the Life." This was followed by the reading of extracts from the stories by Mr. S. G. Nelson, Dr. Starkey, Mr. W. H. Junge and Mr. Harold McQueen. The meeting was greatly enjoyed by all.
     G. A. MCQUEEN.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-March 29th and 30th, were spent with Mr. and Mrs. Harold Pitcairn at CRYSTAL CITY, Mo. The first evening, a class was held at which six persons were present, among them an Episcopal minister. Our subject was conjugial love and its eternity, and the teaching given seemed to be quite affirmatively received. On the second evening, we had services, including the Holy Supper.

     At CINCINNATI, the circle had a social on Thursday evening, March 29th, at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Merrell. Besides our members, there were present Mr. and Mrs. Harry Hilldale of Bryn Athyn, and Mrs. Hugo Odhner, of Kitchener, Ont. On Easter Sunday, the day was celebrated by the Sunday School. The pastor gave an address on the Lord's glorification. As a part of the service, a flowering plant was given to each of the seven pupils. The regular services which followed were likewise a commemoration of the Lord's resurrection, and closed with the celebration of the Holy Supper.
     F. E. WAELCHLI.

     THE CHURCH AT LARGE.

     The Bath, Maine, Society suffered a catastrophe on March 1st, when the roof of its house of worship, by reason of the excessive weight of snow thereon, collapsed and was precipitated to the basement, carrying with it the main floor and pews. The two side walls also fell, but the chancel wall at one end and the organ at the other survived. The building was erected in 1843, being patterned after a Greek temple, and had a seating capacity of two hundred.-New Church Messenger.

     A recent issue of the Los Angeles Times contained a picture of the church and parish house which the congregation of the New Jerusalem is to erect in that city. The buildings will be in the Spanish style of architecture and cost $50.000.

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SWEDEN.-The Rev. C. J. N. Manby, President of the Swedish New Church Society, Pastor at Stockholm, and Editor of Nya Kirkans Tidning, passed into the spiritual world at Djursholm, a suburb of Stockholm, on Sunday. March 7th, 1920. An account of this life and labors in the New Church will appear in a later issue of the Life.
SKYSCRAPERS IN GEHENNA 1920

SKYSCRAPERS IN GEHENNA 1920

     "There appeared to many on this side of Gehenna a great city with high buildings, where many seem to themselves to dwell. Some who were there declared to those who were above that they are in a tranquil city, where they perform nothing but civil offices to one another, and where all things are done in an upright manner, so that one does not injure another, but desires what is right. Such are suffered to dwell in that city, but no others.

     "The city was also seen by me, the buildings being high, and the streets sometimes dark, owing to the height of the buildings; yet so that there appeared a continuation of streets,, and the sky visible, and thereby also the continuous outline of the city, as in other great cities. . . . Then the view was intercepted, and there was represented to me a continuous line of most lofty buildings, the roofs of which I did not perceive, perchance because they terminated in the clouds. They had many windows, and were so continued from side to side as to form a quadrangular area. Externally, the buildings were clearly of a brick color, or dark brown.

     "This city, and these buildings, seemed to be a continuous whole, not divided into houses, thus constituting one city, and, as it were, one building, extended in every direction; and it was told me that the rooms were also continuous, so that they could pass through, along the inside, from one room to another, and thus throughout the whole city, as through a building of great extent.

     "This city seems to be the judgment of Gehenna, since they who dwell there desire to live from their own righteousness, and seem to themselves to be able to condemn to Gehenna all who do not live and act justly, according to their phantasies. From this could be known their quality of mind, namely, that they think themselves to be most righteous, not from a true faith, but from their own phantasy. Hence this city is called the judgment of Gehenna. 1748, 18th February." (The above is taken from the Spiritual Diary, nos. 843-855, which may be consulted for a further description of the city and its inhabitants. See also no. 1221.)

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ORPHANAGE FUND 1920

ORPHANAGE FUND Various 1920

     Announcements.

     TO THE MEMBERS OF THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM.

     Dear Friends:
     At a recent meeting of the Orphanage Committee, the Treasurer's report showed that the total contributions to the Orphanage Fund since the beginning of the fiscal year, June 10th, 1919, amounted to only $234.26.

     As the cash on hand at the beginning of the fiscal year was $311.13, and to this has been added the yearly interest from the Henderson Bequest, $125.00, the Orphanage Fund has a present cash balance of $550.39. But considering that the uses of the Fund now require a monthly outlay of $122.50, it is most desirable that contributions be increased, and far this we appeal.

     The Orphanage Fund is now contributing to the support of eight children, all of whom are being instructed in the schools of the Academy.

     The Treasurer, Mr. Walter C. Childs, No. 1 Livingston Ave., Yonkers, New York, will be pleased to receive, and will promptly acknowledge, contributions in any amount.

     Bequests should be worded as made "To the General Church of the New Jerusalem for the uses of the Orphanage Fund."
     Sincerely yours,
          WALTER G. CHILDS, Treasurer,
          ALFRED ACTON,
          ANTON SELLNER,
               Orphanage Committee.
New York, March 20th, 1920.

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MISSION OF THE DISCIPLES IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD 1920

MISSION OF THE DISCIPLES IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD Rev. ANDREW CZERNY 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL          JUNE, 1920           No. 8
     (Delivered at the Celebration held in London, England, on the 19th of June, 1919.)

     At the very beginning of His ministry on earth, the Lord selected twelve men, and prepared them for the work of teaching and preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom. He sent them out from time to time to such places as He Himself would come, that they might prepare the way for Him. Three of them He kept constantly with Him; the rest accompanied Him much of the time during the three years of His ministry, thus to the end of His life on earth.

     A short time after the Lord's ascension, they received the gift of the Holy Spirit; in other words, the gift of inspiration; and from that time their ministry proper commenced. Before His ascension, the Lord commanded them to go into all the world and preach the Gospel of repentance and belief in Him. Seventeen hundred years later, it pleased the Lord to call them together again, and to send them all forth into the whole spiritual world, with the command to Preach the Gospel anew. This memorable event we are celebrating today. Swedenborg must have been an eyewitness of the same. He must also have witnessed the devotion of the disciples to their holy mission, for he says: "This command they are executing with all zeal and industry."

     Thus they were sent on a mission similar to that on which they were sent in the world. But the field in which they were to work was of far greater extent.

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And the results of their labors, we may be sure, were of proportionately greater extent than those which followed their efforts in the world. The conditions under which they prosecuted their labors in this world were adverse in the extreme. Both the civil and the religious powers were hostile to the cause for which they labored. And the number of those who favored it was exceedingly small. But in the spiritual world, the conditions were very different when the disciples were sent forth on their new mission. Order had been restored in that world by the Last Judgment. The enemies of the Church had been judged and cast into the hells. Those alone escaped this fate who were not deaf to the preaching of Divine Truth.

The extent of the field into which they were now sent, it is impossible for any mortal to estimate. The statement that they were sent "into the whole spiritual world" is so general that it is not quite clear what is meant by it. It may mean merely that region which is occupied by angels and spirits from this earth. If it means more than that, then their mission field was of truly vast extent. For the spiritual world, (in the strict sense of the term), includes the spiritual regions of all the earths in the universe. These, taken together, are literally "the whole spiritual world." Yet the statement that the disciples were sent forth into the whole spiritual world is true in some sense, and cannot be doubted, for it is made in the crowning work of the Revelation of the Second Coming. But in what sense is it true? That is the question; and how twelve men could cover such a field.

Now there is teaching that throws light upon this problem. To begin with, the idea of space must be entirely excluded, for there is no space in that world. There is the appearance of space but no actual space. Nor are angels and spirits, when sent on missions, under the necessity of traveling from place to place. They remain where they are. This may seem like a contradiction; nevertheless it is a fact. They accomplish their task by a communication of influx. And by influx it is possible to communicate with entire societies,-numbers of societies of angels and spirits,-at the same time.

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Furthermore, there is the wonderful phenomenon of apparent presence; that is to say, the presence of the semblance of some angel or spirit, as if he were actually in the place where this representative form of him appears, and the effect is as if he were actually there. Such is the teaching. (H. H. 121.)

     This may have been the mode in which the disciples performed their mission. Each of them may have thus appeared, (as if present), in a number of societies simultaneously, and proclaimed the New Gospel. But even so, it would have been through communication by influx, through these representative forms. And there seems to be scarcely any limit to the number of spirits and angels that can be reached at the same time by this mode of communication. Thus we read: "The thoughts of the angels flow almost in an instant to a great distance, because they flow according to a form infinitely perfect." (A. C. 6607.)

     Again, speaking of an experience he himself had, Swedenborg says: "That the spheres of thoughts and affections extend themselves round about into the spheres of societies that are afar off, was made manifest to me from this, that when I was thinking from affection concerning such things as particularly moved a society at a distance, they instantly discoursed with me on that subject. One society was at the right at a considerable distance, the other a little nearer." (A. C. 6602.) On another occasion, he was meditating on the creation of the universe, and this was perceived by an angelic society above him. (T. C. R. 76.) In neither case was there any attempt on Swedenborg's part to communicate his thoughts to the angels of these societies. And if whole societies are affected by the mere sphere of thought proceeding from anyone whose mind dwells on a subject in which they are interested, into how many societies may not the sphere penetrate when the thought is consciously directed to them. And when we consider that the disciples were charged with a mission that concerned the whole spiritual world, the sphere of their thought must have extended into innumerable societies at the same time.

     The statement that they were "sent forth" is apt to limit our idea.

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It suggests the idea of journeying from place to place. In the spiritual world no one travels, no one goes from place to place. What appears as change of place is merely a change of state, that is to say, a change of the affections, and the thought thence. Whenever such a change occurs, the spirit or angel in whom it occurs disappears from the society of those with whom he is at the time, and appears among others. Sometimes these translations are effected in a moment. At other times, by a slower process. In the latter case, the spirit or angel seems to be walking, or journeying from one place to another. Thus there are ways or modes of communication in the spiritual world by which the New Gospel could be communicated to the whole of that world in a comparatively short time,-ways and modes of communication wholly unknown in our world. If angels and spirits had to depend upon any of the modes of communication in use in this world, ages would have elapsed before the disciples could accomplish their mission.

     The effect of their labors must have been sufficiently great to produce a change of state in that world. For any new truth, when received interiorly, produces a change of the state, particularly a truth of such importance as the one which the disciples were sent to proclaim. Besides, their being sent by the Lord on this mission implies that they were filled with His Spirit, or that the Holy Spirit as it were spoke through them which could not but interiorly affect all to whom they were sent.

     And now another thing. Assuming that the preaching of the New Gospel had the effect of changing the general state and thus sphere of that world, the question suggests itself: Would this new sphere affect the human race on earth? If so, in what way?

     The spiritual world is the world of causes, the natural world the world of effects. And we have the teaching that all things in the spiritual world seek something ulterior, in which to be, and to act out their cause in the effect. (A. C. 5373.) This would imply that everything that exists and takes place in the spiritual world produces some effect in the natural world, the effect being produced by some sphere emanating from that world, and flowing into suitable ultimates.

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These may be the material substances of the earth and its atmospheres, or the souls of plants and animals, or human minds, according to the kind of sphere that is active. For every kind of sphere seeks such ultimates as can be serviceable to the end or use to which it tends.

Now, since the case is such with spiritual spheres, it is plain that the sphere produced by the preaching of the New Gospel must likewise have some ultimate, in which to be and to act out its cause. And these ultimates could have been no other than human minds. In fact, some such Power or sphere seems to have become active soon after the event we are celebrating today. Little groups of receivers of the Heavenly Doctrines began to be formed in different parts of the world, all animated with an intense desire to spread a knowledge of that Doctrine. In Sweden, their efforts were so successful that some of the bishops became alarmed at the rapid spread of what they considered a heresy, and warned the clergy against it. Soon, in other countries of Europe, were to be found students of the Doctrines, besides isolated receivers. And before many years had passed, distinctive New Church worship had been instituted in London, and at Demerara, in South America.

Can anyone mistake this sudden interest in the Doctrines of the New Church, and this activity in spreading a knowledge of the same in different and widely separated parts of the world, for anything else than an effect of the operation of some influx emanating from the spiritual world,-the influx of a new sphere? Before the year 1770, scarcely any interest was taken in the Doctrines. All the Writings had been published before that year, excepting, of course, the True Christian Religion. Eight of the works had appeared ten years before;-time sufficient to enable people to acquaint themselves with their contents, had they desired to do so; perhaps we had better say, had men been permitted to receive them. For there is teaching to the effect that men were withheld from receiving the Doctrines until the Dragon had been cast out of the world of spirits and the New Heaven was approaching completion.

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All these considerations seem to point to this, that after the sending forth of the disciples into the spiritual world to proclaim the New Gospel, there was an influx into the minds of men on earth, different from that which operated before that memorable event, which influx tended to a specific end, namely, the establishment of the New Church among men on earth.
CHURCH IN PHILADELPHIA 1920

CHURCH IN PHILADELPHIA Rev. RICHARD MORSE 1920

     "And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: These things said He that is holy, He that is true, He that hath the key of David, He that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth;

     "I know thy works; behold, I have set before thee on open door, and no man can shut it; for thou hast a little strength, and had kept my word, and has not denied my name.

     "Behold I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them; to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee.

     "Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.

     "Behold, I come quickly; hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.

     "Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out; and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the New Jerusalem which cometh down out of heaven from my God; and my new name." (Apocalypse, 3:7-12.)

     We know, from the more interior Revelation given to the New Church, that the Seven Churches in Asia, to which John was commanded to communicate what he saw "while in the spirit on the Lord's Day," were not seven separate religious organizations in the Eastern world, but that they signify "all who are in truths derived from good, or in faith from charity" (E. 18); or, as stated in the Apocalypse Revealed, n. 10, "All who are in the Christian world, where the Word is, and through it the Lord is known, and who accede to the Church.

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If these live according to the precepts of the Lord in the Word, they make the Church itself." Which is the same thing as before, namely, all who are in faith which originates in genuine, or spiritual charity. Moreover, by each of the Churches is to be understood "something which constitutes the Church in man (E. 130).

     Truths which originate in genuine good are what constitute the Church with man, whether in a number of individuals, or in one; for we are taught that "they who are not in truths derived from good, though born within the Church, yet are not of the Church, because there is no Church in them; hence it is that the Church of the Lord consists of all those, wheresoever they are, who are the Church, that is, who are in truths derived from, good" (E. 20); and who, therefore, are individual forms of the New Heaven and the New Earth.

     Nor does "Asia" mean the part of our world so named, but all who are in the light of intelligence, in which are those who live according to the truths derived from good, for when Asia is in the thought of the member of the Church, the angels understand the South, which spiritually is truth in light; also wisdom. The reason for this perception respecting Asia is because the Ancient Church was there.

     "As 'seven' signifies all, by the 'seven candlesticks' are not meant Seven Churches, but the Church in the whole complex, which in itself is one, but various according to reception. Those varieties may be compared to the various jewels in a king's crown; also to the various members and organs in a perfect body, which still make one. The perfection of every form exists from various things suitably arranged in their order. Hence it is that the universal New Church, with its varieties, is described by 'the Seven Churches.'" (R. 66).

     The "seven golden candlesticks," in the midst of which was "One like unto the Son of Man," "we the seven Churches;" and as the candlesticks signify the New Heaven and the New Church, therefore the Seven Churches are the New Heaven and the New Church.

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"The Son of Man is the Lord as to the Divine Human, from which Divine Truth proceeds, and which is the all in all of heaven and the church" (E. 62). We are told that "in the spiritual heaven there also appear to the inhabitants candlesticks in much magnificence, by which their heaven is represented" (E. 62).

     The name "John" signifies the good of love. Only to those in the Church who are in this good can Divine Revelation be made; for such have spiritual perception, and receive it with affection. But in the supreme sense John signifies the primary doctrine of the Church-the doctrine concerning the Lord; "for to know the Lord is the principal of all things of doctrine, or the first and last thereof; for the primary thing of the Church is to know and acknowledge its Divine; for it is conjoined with the Divine by acknowledgment and faith, and without such conjunction all things of doctrine are of no account I which also is the reason why the Divine has revealed Himself" (E. 45).

     The Revelation made to John "was in the isle that is called Patmos." We are instructed that all persons who are treated of in the Word of the Lord, also those persons by whom the Word was written, were led to places of particular significations, in order that everything might be significative of spiritual things. The same applied in the case of our Lord Himself when in the world. "For the same reason, also, John was commanded to betake himself into the isle of Patmos, that the things which were to take place at the end of the Church might there be revealed, because an isle signifies a nation about to receive the truths of doctrine" (E. 50); or revelation to the Gentiles.

     The Church in Philadelphia is the most perfect of the seven written to by John; for it is comprised of those who are in the faith originating in charity, consequently in the life of charity. It is the matured fruit of the whole; for it signifies the same as the seven, namely, "all who are in truths derived from good, or in faith from charity;" and to it no reproof is given, as in the case of the others, with the exception of Smyrna, or those who are in goods as to life, but in falsities as to doctrine.

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     The Church in Ephesus had left its first love, which is charity, or a life in accordance with Divine law, and was merely "in the knowledges of good and truth from the Word." It was told, therefore, to remember from whence it had fallen, and to repent and do the first works; otherwise it would be separated from heaven, and no more be a Church.

     The charge against Pergamos-those who place the all of the Church in good works, and not anything in truths of doctrine-was that some held the doctrine of Balaam, and of the Nicolaitanes. Though of enlightened understanding, and able to teach truths, they nevertheless loved to destroy by stratagem those who are of the Church. Also, contrary to Divine order, they separated charity from faith. They were told to repent, as otherwise they would be condemned at the judgment.

     The Church in Thyatira-those who are in faith from charity, and thence in good works; also those in faith separate and in evil works-was not blameless. The woman Jezebel was permitted to teach, and to seduce the Lord's servants to commit whoredom, and to eat things sacrificed to idols. Which means, in the spiritual sense, that the Church became perverted by the delight of the love of self and the world, resulting in the falsifications of truth and the adulterations of good, and the appropriation of evil, in things belonging to the Church.

     The Church in Sardis signifies "those whose life is moral but not spiritual, because they make light of the knowledges of spiritual things, and thence of wisdom and intelligence." It was in dead worship, and was warned to "be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die;" for their works were "not found perfect before God." They were told to "hold fast" and "repent."

     The Laodiceans are those who are in faith separate from charity. They are neither cold nor hot; in neither infernal nor spiritual loves, but between both; for by the things of the Word they turn themselves toward heaven, and by the things which are of their real life or character they turn themselves to hell; the ultimate result of which would he the dreadful lot of the profaners, the worst lot of all unless they repent.

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     But the church in Philadelphia is free from blame. The Divine message to this Church is wholly commendatory and comforting. Nevertheless, it was counseled to "hold that fast Which thou hast, that no man take thy crown." Spiritually understood, the message to this Church is, that the Lord in His Divine Human, who alone has omnipotence to save; knows that the true members of the Church are in faith originating in charity, or in truth from good from Him; which faith has opened heaven to them, and no evil can hurt. They know that they have no power of their own; that all power is from the Lord alone. They obey the Lord's commandments, and therefore are in the true worship of the Lord. Many who are in falsities of doctrine, but in the will of good, will embrace the New Church, and will see that those who are in truths and goods from the Lord are loved by Him and received into Heaven. Those meant by the Church in Philadelphia will continually fight against evils and reject falsities, remaining steadfast and patient during temptations, and thereby grow in intelligence and wisdom. They will become regenerate, and be judged to eternal life among those who sustain the Lord's Church in the heavens. So will they fulfill the Lord's purpose regarding them. The Divine Truth of the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Jerusalem will be written in their hearts; and they will worship the Lord alone in an endless life of happy activity in use.

     The Lord as to Divine Truth, who alone has omnipotence to save, speaks to the Church in Philadelphia. This is what is meant in the Divine characteristic prefixed to the message given, and which reveals the quality of the Church: "These things saith He that is holy, He that is true, He that hath the key of David, He that openeth and no man shutteth; and shutteth and no man
openeth."

     The faith originating in charity is a spiritual faith, which in its essence is charity, and it is this faith the member of the New Jerusalem should endeavor to attain during life in the world. It can be attained only through much tribulation; through constant reading of the Word of the Lord; for all are born with tendencies to all evils, and with no tendencies to love truth for its own sake.

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The member of the New Jerusalem must pass through all the states represented by the six other Churches in Asia:-The states of deficient charity, of Ephesus, when the Heavenly Doctrine is loved as a mere intellectual thing, and not as means to regeneration; the state signified by Smyrna, when false principles are practiced, owing to deficient understanding of the Lord's Word; the states of temptation represented by Pergamos; of immersion into the delights of the love of self and the world, as in Thyatira; of a merely dead worship, represented by Sardis; and even of the states of profanation which afflicted the Church of Laodicea.

     But there are remains of good and truth stored in the mind by the Lord during the innocent period of childhood. These are the saving quality in a mind otherwise hellish, and which would plunge headlong into hell if the Lord in His Mercy did not restrain by the secret and wonderful ways of His Providence. In these remains are the promptings to follow truth, and to love the neighbor as one's self. They are from the Lord in man. By continual obedience to the laws of spiritual life, as revealed by the Lord, a new will is gradually formed in the regenerated understanding, and a new man is born; a spiritual man; an angel of heaven.

     When this faith-the faith grounded in charity-has been attained as the result of spiritual warfare, it must be held fast; clung to, and fed continually from the Revelation to the New Jerusalem, so that spiritual intelligence shall not diminish. "Behold, I come quickly; hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out; and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the New Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God; and my new name."

     This portion of the Divine message to the Church in Philadelphia is specially, urged for your attention at this time. The General Church of the New Jerusalem has come through much conflict and many temptations into remarkable spiritual light. We now reap the fruit of the labors of others.

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May we unflinchingly and faithfully enter into their labors; into the labors of many who will not again work with us in the Church on earth, and who have joined with those who support the Lord's Church in the heavens! When a great work has been accomplished, or a crisis surmounted, there is a tendency to slacken, to rest on the oars and permit the ever-present natural loves freer scope. Those only who fought in the battle can truly appreciate the fruits of victory, and the real danger of states left behind. The higher positions gained ought not to be sacrificed; and ours is the work of consolidation and of advance. Keeping ever fresh in our minds the Principles of the Academy, and going daily to the Lord's Revelation for guidance in the shunning of evils as sins against: God in all the intricate affairs of our daily life, we surely shall not go astray. We shall overcome, because we permit the Lord to lead. The name of our God, of the New Jerusalem, and the Lord's New Name, will be written in out hearts, and we shall become coworkers with the angels in the Lord's kingdom in the heavens, and in an eternal life-worship of the Lord in His Glorified Human.

As the human race develops more and more from marriages truly conjugial, the burden of evil heredity will diminish, and we of this nascent New Jerusalem, of the "few" to whom the Lord has entrusted His "crown of Churches," may look into the far distant future; and, by the light of the Holy City which our understandings can bear, see a people innocent and wise, see a race grown into the beauty of youth, and crowned with the wisdom born of love to the Lord. Amen. Lessons: Deuteronomy 8; John 15; A. E. 204.

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NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL 1920

NOTES ON THE SERVICE AND ON RITUAL IN GENERAL W. F. PENDLETON 1920

     XII.

     PRIVATE OR INDIVIDUAL PRAYER.

     Public worship needs to be supported and sustained by private or individual prayer, and by worship in the acts of life. Without these, worship in public will degenerate into a form without life. Family worship will also contribute its share.

     Prayer by the Lord when in the World.

     If the Lard prayed when He was in the infirm human, if He was in need of prayer to the Father, man certainly should do likewise, and is in great spiritual need of individual prayer to the Lord. For, as we are taught, the regeneration of man is an image of the glorification of the Lord. (A. C. 5688, 7793, 10021). We are to understand what the Lord did, and do in like manner, under our finite limitations.

     The Prophets and Psalms abound with evidence of prayer by the Lord to the Father for help in the combats of temptation, and we find the same set forth strongly in the Gospels. We read that "He went up into a mountain apart to pray." (Matt. 14:23, Mark 6:46), that "He went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God" (Luke 6:12), that "rising up a great while before day, He went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed" (Mark 1:35), and that "He withdrew into the wilderness and prayed" (Luke 5:16). Who has not been moved by His prayer to the Father as described in the seventeenth chapter of John, and more by His prayers in great agony in Gethsemane and on the cross?

     He Taught His Disciples to Pray.

     The Lord not only prayed Himself, but He taught His disciples to do in like manner. "But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. . . .

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After this manner therefore pray ye." (Matt. 6:6, 9.) He then gave them the prayer of prayers. And in Luke we read that, "as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, one of His disciples said unto Him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples." (Luke 11:1.) In answer, He taught them the Lord's Prayer, as it is given in Luke. We may note here that a form of prayer is given in the Writings, (A. E. 1148), and has been used in the Liturgy of the General Church. (p. 378, no. 261.)

     Worship of the Divine Human.

     All worship, to be genuine, and to be heard in heaven, must be addressed to the visible God, the Divine Man, who is the Lord God our Savior, Jesus Christ; and He invites all to approach Him in prayer. (Matt. 11:28-30; John 4:10, 14; 5:40; 6:37, 45, 51; Rev. 22:17.) For "everyone is allowed to approach the Lord by prayers, and He hears everyone, and it is He alone who ought to be worshipped." (D. Min. 4603.) Thus we are not to address ourselves to an invisible God; we are not to worship, nature, nor idols, nor saints, nor any man, living or dead,-no one but the Lord Jesus Christ. "Wherefore, if anyone hereafter comes from Christendom into the spiritual world and does not believe in the Lard, and go to Him alone, he is repelled at his first approach to heaven. . . . And every man in Christian countries who does not believe in the Lord is not hereafter heard with acceptance; in heaven his prayers are like ill-scented odors, and like eructations from ulcerated lungs; . . . his prayer ascends to the angelic heaven no otherwise than as the stroke of a fire, which is driven back by a violent tempest into his eyes." (T. C. R. 108.) And we are told that the Lord's Prayer "was commanded for this time, in order that God the Father may he approached through His Human." (T. C. R. 112.) For the Divine Human is our Father in heaven.

     Prayer for Spiritual Ends.

     All prayer must have in view not natural but spiritual ends. If there be prayers for temporal good, such prayers with the regenerating man will look to what is eternal as an end, and to natural blessings only as instrumental means.

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For we read that the Divine Providence never has for an end merely the temporal good of man, but that it gives or withholds according to what is best for his eternal welfare. (D. P. 214, 215, 219). And so we are given the Divine model for our prayers; and we know that the burden of the Lord's Prayer is that His kingdom may come, and that man is to have part in that kingdom when He is delivered from evil and glorifies the Lord. Hence, if there be prayer for temporal things, let it be for the end that we may be furnished for the combats of temptation, and for the uses through which salvation is given.

Prayer for the Spiritual Good of Others.

The man who is progressing in the regenerate life will desire the spiritual good of others, and this desire may take form in prayer. But he knows that, in looking to the good of the neighbor, the prime essential is the removal of his own evil; for without this, he is not able to minister truly to the spiritual good of his fellow men. This is in view in the Lord's words, "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you, and persecute you. (Matt. 5:44) There is no better way, no other real way, to love and bless others, than to remove the wish and thought of evil toward them; and prayer is but the expression of this action of the mind and heart. The Lord also taught the same in many places, as where He said, "When ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have aught against any; that your Father in heaven may forgive you your trespasses" (Mark 11:25) The Lord did this when He was in the world. His last prayer on the cross was for His enemies, that is, for the whole human race, and their Spiritual good (A. C. 1690), and we art to do likewise in our finite measure. The same teaching follows the Lord's Prayer in Matthew. The measure of the Divine forgiveness is in the measure of our forgiveness of those who trespass against us. To forgive is to remove the desire and thought of evil towards another, and pray the Lord for help so to do. In this prayer we are not praying for ourselves alone, but for others also.

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Thus the spirit of the desire and prayer for those who have trespassed against us is in the removal from our minds of anything of retaliation, revenge, or personal enmity. Hence we read that the celestial angels never consider anyone as an enemy. (A. C. 6365.)

     Prayer for the Church.

     As the church is the Lord's heaven on earth (a. C. 9166, 9808, 10131), by which salvation is effected, its establishment and increase may properly become a subject of prayer. We find that the Lord Himself, when in the world, prayed for His church, that it might be established; for example, where He said, "I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever." (John 14:16.) "I pray for them; I pray not for the world, but for them which Thou hast given me." (John 17:9.) "I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from evil." (John 17:15.) "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word." (John 17:20.)

     The Lord also taught His disciples that they should pray for the increase of the church, as where He said, "The harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few; pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that He will send forth laborers into His harvest." (Matt. 9:37, 38.) And, in the Lord's Prayer, they were to say, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, as in heaven so upon the earth." (Matt. 6:10.) In the Apocalypse Revealed, the teaching is clear that the men of the New Church should pray that His new spiritual kingdom should be established in the world. It is where the internal sense is given of the words, "And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come," which "signifies that he who knows anything of the Lord's coming, and of the New heaven and the New Church, thus of the Lord's kingdom, should pray that it may come; and that he who desires truths should pray that the Lord may come with light." (A. R. 956.) And in the same number we are told that "the words in this verse have the same signification as the following in the Lord's Prayer: 'Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, as in heaven so upon the earth.'" (See also A. R. 839)

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It is thus made plain that he who loves the New Church will desire its establishment, and pray for it to take root and grow on earth.

     Prayer for What We Need.

     Prayer is asking, and it is asking for what we need. Men and children ask, are always asking, for what they need, and usually for what they most need, or for what they think they most need. The natural man is prone to think that what he most needs are the blessings of this world. But when we discover that our great need is not in the things of this life, but in those of the life to come, these latter will become the chief object of prayer to the Lord. This is the guide in all prayer,-the asking of the Lord for that which we most need; and we should ask the Lord to show us that which is our greatest need. The Lord knows what we need, and He knows this before We ask Him, (Matt. 6:8), and our prayer should be that He, in His mercy, will grant us to know that which He knows before we are born, and even from eternity. Prayer is love asking for what it loves, as with the Lord when He prayed to the Father for the salvation of men, whom He loved. Salvation was the need of His love, and it was granted to Him that all should be saved who were willing to fulfill the conditions of salvation.

     Prayer is Revelation.

     All prayer that is sincere and genuine is in itself revelation, or the opening of heaven, and consequent spiritual enlightenment. For what should a man more desire in praying than some truth to guide him in the difficulties and trials of life? This point receives illustration in the Gospels. We read that when all the people were baptized, it came to pass, that Jesus also being baptized, and praying, heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended and a voice came from heaven, and said, Thou art my beloved Son; in Thee I am well pleased." (Luke 3:21,22.) "And Jesus took Peter, John and James, and went up into a mountain to pray.

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And as He prayed, the fashion of His countenance was altered, and His raiment was white and glistening," and Moses and Elias appeared in glory. (Luke 9:28, 29.)

     That prayer is revelation, is taught in the Writings: "If a man prays from love and faith, and only for celestial and spiritual things, there then comes forth in the prayer something like a revelation. . . . It is from this ground that 'to pray,' in the internal sense, signifies to be revealed." (A. C. 2535.) In the same number, the two above passages from Luke are quoted in illustration, and also the one where the Lord prayed, saying, "Father, glorify Thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again." (John 12:28.)

     We, read that, on one occasion, Swedenborg prayed to the Lord, and the answer came with the sudden opening of the interiors of his mind, and he saw a wonderful representation in the spiritual world, given for his instruction, and in answer to his prayer. (A. R. 926.) On another occasion, the angels said to him, "Let us pray to the Lord, that we may descend and approach, that we may perceive what the falses are, which with them thus smoke and burn;" and leave was granted. (T. 159.)

     This, then, is the one essential to be looked for and hoped for in prayer,-the opening of the interiors of the mind, and the perception of some needed truth in the heavenly light then granted.

     Prayer not Beard Except When Evils are Shunned.

     The prayer that is called the prayer of faith, to be genuine, must be founded upon actual repentance, or the shunning of evils as sins against God; and so we are taught that "the evils which are of hell must first be removed before a man can will the goods which are of heaven; for no one can be adopted by the Lord before he is separated from the devil. . . . Hence, before washing or purification from evils, prayers are not heard." (T. C. R. 329.) And further, we read that "prayers are of no avail unless a man abstains from thinking and doing evils, and, by truths from the Word, leads himself, as of himself, to the goods of life; when man does this, he makes himself receptive, and then his prayers, adorations, and external acts of worship avail before the Lord." (A. E. 248).

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Put in the affirmative form, these words teach that prayers are of avail when a man abstains from thinking and doing evils, and, by truths from the Word, leads himself to the good of life.

     Prayer to be Followed by Doing.

     If prayers are of avail when man has been abstaining from evil, the spirit of that abstaining will be in the prayers, and the purpose to continue the fight will be there, followed by actual repentance, or repentance by doing. "Actual repentance is to examine one's self, to know and acknowledge one's sins; to make supplication to the Lord, and to begin a new life." (T. 528)

     That the purpose and will to do, followed by actual doing, should be in all prayer, is plainly taught by our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount: "Not everyone that saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father in heaven." (Matt. 7:21.)

     Praying Always.

     This spirit of prayer, the spirit of doing, must not be merely temporary, not once or twice, but it must be perpetual. Some have been disturbed by the teaching of the Lord oil this point, not understanding His words, where He says, "that men ought always to pray, and not to faint." (Luke 18:1.) Also, "Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to stand before the Son of man."(Luke 21:36.) Paul also exhorted the Thessalonians to "pray without ceasing. (I Th. 5:17) Early in the Christian Church, the disposition manifested itself to carry out literally these words of Scripture, under the belief that they signified to be perpetually engaged in prayers and the forms of external worship; but a more enlightened view came with the Reformation; and the spirit of the Lord's teaching is now made plain in His Second Coming. "Moreover, man is continually praying when he is in the life of charity, although not with the mouth still with the heart." (A. E. 325) "For heaven is insinuated by the Lord into the actual piety of man, and not into the era) or external Piety separate therefrom." (Ibid.)

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The praying always, as here set forth, is what is signified by the perpetual fire. (See A. C. 934, also 2177, 10177, and elsewhere.) That is, there must be an internal of love and charity in all external worship, based upon repentance of life; otherwise, prayers and the adoration of praise avail nothing. Love is always asking, seeking, praying, for that which is loved.

     Prayers in Temptation.

     In the midst of temptations, trials, difficulties, distress of any kind, natural or spiritual, man is prone to offer up prayers for relief and safety, especially when there is present any danger to natural or spiritual life. But, shall we pray for the temptation or trial to cease, or shall we pray for the cause of it to be removed! Spiritual temptation is the anxiety resulting from the active presence of some evil within, which threatens the existence of spiritual life. Shall we pray for the removal of the anxiety and distress, or for the removal of the evil? When these two things are placed clearly in juxtaposition, the question answers itself. But, in the midst of trial, we are not always in a state of reflection, and the obvious thing is the desire that the pain may be removed rather than the disease which causes it. This is not wise; and so the instruction given is that "the prayers of those who are in temptations are but little heard; for the Lord wills the end, which is the salvation of man, which end He knows, but not the man; and the Lord does not heed prayers that are contrary to the end, which is salvation. Wherefore, the suppliant submits the hearing to the Lord, and supplicates that the will of the Lord, and not his own, be done, according to the Lord's words in His most grievous temptations in Gethsemane." (A. C. 8179.) This is the soul and life of all prayer.-Thy will be done.

     Supplication for Help.

     Prayer for help, the recognition of the need of help, and the acknowledgment of no power of our own are presented as fundamental in Scripture and in the Writings. In the Psalms alone, the direct appeal for help appears more than forty times, and indirectly throughout.

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And we learn from the Writings that "he who lives the life of faith performs repentance daily; for he reflects upon the evils that are with him, bewares of them, and supplicates the Lord for help (A. C. 8391); and further we are told that "confession ought to be made before the Lord God the Savior, and then supplication for help and power to resist evils." (T. C. R. 538, 539) But we are also taught that "the angels do not attend to the supplication, but to the humiliation in which a man is when he supplicates; for supplication without humiliation does not come to the hearing and perception of the angels." (A. C. 7391.) Furthermore, we are told that supplication from the heart is heard as a cry in heaven, but from the love of self, it is heard in hell (A. C. 9202; A. E. 803, 936, 938: S. D. 4821); and also, that we should supplicate the Lord for enlightenment of the understanding. (A. C. 8993)

     Prayer and Reading.

     In a number quoted above, (A. C. 248), we art told of two things essential in the preparation of man to resist evil, namely, prayers and the acquisition of truths from the Word. The need of reading the books of Scripture and the Writings should be continually in the forefront of our thought, for this is the purpose for which they are given. The neglect of this duty may indicate indifference, or a state of simplicity like that of children. But the man of the New Church will realize the dependence of rational and spiritual growth upon the performance of this duty. Prayer inspires to do, and reading gives intelligence in the doing, and also inspires. Prayer removes indifference to public worship, and reading prepares for the instruction that is given in the sphere of worship. The hope of the future is in the growth of a spiritual rationality in the men of the New Church.

     Final.

     In closing these Notes on Ritual, the writer would express a Word in grateful appreciation of the labors of those in the past who have studied this subject, both in the New Church and in the Old.

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In the latter, volumes have been published that will amply repay discriminating study and investigation. In the establishment of ritual in the New Church, a number have labored; but there are four names which figure large,-Robert Hindmarsh, Richard de Charms, William Henry Benade, and Frank Sewall;-Hindmarsh, as the initial organizer of the Church and its ritual; de Charms and Benade, as insistent upon representatives in worship; and Sewall, as pointing out the importance of selecting the best which the Christian dispensation has to offer, as handed down from the Apostolic Church. From the beginnings thus made, a ritual is to come which, in its spirit and life, will be such as the world has not seen.

THE END.
MINISTERING TO OTHER EARTHS 1920

MINISTERING TO OTHER EARTHS 1920

"The inhabitants and spirits of our earth have relation to the external sense, and are corporeal and consequently approach nearer to the nature of brutes than of human beings; as the spirits of Saturn also said concerning the spirits of our earth. But although they are such on this earth, nevertheless they have the knowledges of the truths of faith, which serve as ground in which the spiritual and celestial truths of faith can be inseminated. Without such a ground they are not easily inseminated; and in this manner the truths of faith grow. Wherefore also such spirits enter more easily into the interior and more interior heavens, after their exteriors have been devastated. And because some of them bring with them such knowledges from the life of the body, they also serve as ministering spirits to instruct others who do not possess such knowledges from revelation. Wherefore the Lord has loved our earth above others; for, to the end that order may be perfect, celestial and spiritual truths ought to be enrooted in natural truths." (Diary 1531.)

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CARL THEOPHTLUS ODHNER 1920

     AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

     (For previous instalments, see New Church Life, January to May, 1920.)

     1888.

     January 3rd.-Dedication of the Academy School Buildings on Wallace Street, with imposing ceremonies. On the 29th there was a great celebration of the Bicentennial of Swedenborg's Birthday in the Cherry Street Temple. Gorand feast, and a cablegram was received from Stockholm. I read a paper on "The Royal Academy of Sciences in Stockholm," which was published in the LIFE (p. 40).

     February-Wrote a review of Swedenborg, the Buddhist, by Philangi Dasa, (H. C. Vetterling, a former Academy minister, now a Buddhist saint and missionary.-See LIFE, page 24). The review made Mr. Vetterling frightfully angry, and in SWEDENBORG BIFRONS, a London publication, he hurled anathemas at the anonymous reviewer. I also wrote a biography of old Dr. Kahl, of Lund, who had just died.

     March.-At this time I was preaching regularly at Brooklyn, in German. Met my old playmate and cousin, Gosta Peterson, in New York, and also his sister, Elizabeth Lundborg. Tried to do some work among the Swedes in Brooklyn, but failed.

     June 10th.-On this day, Price, Waelchli, Hyatt, and I were ordained into the first degree of the Ministry of the New Church, and were invested with the insignia of our sacred office. I was immediately engaged as tutor in the Academy Schools, but was to spend my vacation at Allentown.

     July.-Head over heels in ministerial work at Allentown. Preached every Sunday, in English and in German, conducted Sunday School and two doctrinal classes every week, besides one on Saturday evening at Mrs. Bachman's in Bethlehem, where I had to teach the doctrines in Pennsylvania Dutch. Taught Chaldee and Greek to Mr. Glackmeyer. Delivered public lectures on Egyptian and Assyrian Mythology, illustrated by my own drawings.

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Baptized seven infants. (Alma Waelchli, my first baptism).

     An article of mine on "The Study of Hebrew in the Light of the New Church" appeared this month in the LIFE (p. 101).

     Kept up the work in Allentown during July, August, and September, besides my daily correspondence with Lulu, who was now with the Wells's at Paul Brook (now Meadowbrook).

     September.-Articles on the "Pre-Adamites" in the MESSENGER, and a study of the name "Jehovah" in the LIFE (p. 129.)

     October.-Returning to Philadelphia I was engaged by the Academy as teacher and librarian at $600.09 a year. Was made Secretary of the Faculty. Preached once a month at Brooklyn and Allentown. Worked like a beaver. Kept up my Assyriology at the University of Pennsylvania, and acquired a knowledge of Arabic.

     Article on "The Literal Signification of the Name Jehovah" in the LIFE (p. 151). Also a review of Wilkinson's Oannes, according to Berosus (p. 155)

     December.-During the month, Lulu and I were betrothed. The ceremony was performed by the Bishop at the Wells' house. All of our younger friends were present it was a beautiful, a sublime occasion. Lulu in her betrothal dress was like an angel of heaven. Was there ever a more beautiful girl? We exchanged rings with Hebrew inscriptions on them.

     On the 27th, I went from Brooklyn to Allentown to be present at the wedding of brother Price to the beautiful Lily Waelchli, Lulu's comrade at school, as I had been Price's at the same blessed institution. It was a pretty wedding, but had an unfortunate interruption by a band of serenaders, who became violent when ordered off the premises, with the result that several of our party were injured.

     At a meeting in Philadelphia, we decided not to have any Christmas Tree this year, on account of the heathenism of the institution, and the general correspondence of the tree without roots to the faith-alone of the Old Church!

     1889.

     Began to deliver a long series of lectures on "Mythology in the New Church," illustrated by magic lantern slides drawn by myself.

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The lectures were well attended, much appreciated, and afterwards published in the LIFE. It is probable that I myself derived the greatest benefits from them. They were also published in India, in the INDIAN NEW CHURCH MESSENGER. How I did work on those slides!

March 2nd.-The great day of my life,-Lulu's and my own Wedding Day! It was said to be the prettiest wedding that had been celebrated in the Church up to that time-as, indeed, the bride was the prettiest bride in the history of the world! She was dressed in "soft, cream-white- woolen stuff," called albatross, cut in pure Greek style, as became her Creek ancestry and my own classical tastes. On her head she wore a crown of myrtle and small Bennett roses, in genuine Swedish fashion. The hall on North Street was decorated for the occasion. As we entered, the girls and boys of the School sang the Swedish wedding march by Soderman. What I felt, as we plighted our troth for time and eternity, I am unable to describe, for I was so excited that I forgot to kiss my newly-wed wife. Bishop Benade, who had baptized me, instructed me, and ordained
me, now crowned his blessings by consecrating our marriage. After the ceremony, there was a social reception at the Wells' home. We had toasts, of course-no end of them-and dancing, and Mr. Boren read a poem composed in our honor, a really inspired poem, too long to be quoted here, but preserved among the most precious of the family papers. We were poor indeed-poor as "Church mice"-and had no home of our own at first, but bearded with Mr. and Mrs. Wells. But we were not poor in love; and I, for one, felt the richest and happiest of mortals. What a foretaste of heaven that beginning of an untried life!

However, the wedded bliss did not interfere with work, but only spurred me on. I kept at the grindstone more than ever-grinding out lectures, magic lantern slides, and maps of ancient Egypt and Chaldea. At the same time I kept up my visits to Brooklyn, where things were going from bad to worse. The split came in April. The last time we were together was at a horribly frigid social.

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A few weeks afterwards I began to conduct services, now in English, at the home of Mr. Andrew Klein, where the congregation was woefully small, but intensely earnest.

     May.-I had also been taking my turns preaching to the Advent Society, in Glenn's Hall on 17th Street; but Mr. Jordan, who arrived from San Francisco about this time, relieved us from preaching.

     The Wells family moved to Bethayres this month, and we with them. I worked like a slave in the garden,-the first of my always unsuccessful attempts at horticulture. But how we did enjoy living in the country!

     June 19.-Lulu and I were made members of the Academy,-an honor which did not impress me much, as it had been too long delayed, for purely external reasons. The meeting was held at Knight's Hill-now Cairnwood, Bryn Athyn-and we had a royal good time, of course.

     July.-Soon afterwards, Bishop Benade left for Europe, but was taken ill on his arrival at Liverpool. Mr. Schreck had gone to Switzerland, leaving the management of the LIFE in the hands of Mr. Price and me. This was my first experience in editorial work, and we went for our opponents hot and heavy.

     September.-After a very cold and wet summer-the summer of the Johnstown flood-lulu and I moved back to Philadelphia, and began housekeeping for ourselves in a little room on 19th Street, just above Fairmount Avenue. The whole house was occupied by students of the Academy.

     October.-School opened on the 1st, and I was kept pretty busy, teaching Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Religion, Botany, and History, besides keeping up the lectures on Mythology, assisting in the translation of the Word, keeping the Library, and writing for the LIFE and the MESSENGER. Wrote for the MESSENGER a series of articles on the "History of the New Church in Sweden," treating of Dr. Beyer and Rosen, Nordenskjold, The Exegetical Philanthropic Society, etc.

     November.-On the 21st, the General Church of Pennsylvania met in Philadelphia, and virtually settled upon separating from the Convention. We had great times socially at the home of Mr. Walter Childs, who had now come to live in Philadelphia.

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     December 10.-A great day in my life, when I first felt the joys and pangs of fatherhood Our little boy, Sanfrid Pendleton Odhner, was born-a fat and bouncing baby, the sweetest of morsels-and immortals-that ever was born! We started in to "educate" him at once, and I considered it my sacred duty to spank the poor little fellow whenever he cried. But such a boy! He had the bluest of blue eyes, the most kissable mouth, and a brain almost too big for his own good. We dragged him about to every social!

     As a Christmas offering, I presented to the School a Chaldee-Latin Concordance, containing all of Swedenborg's translations of Chaldee words. It represented an enormous amount of work, but is now in limbo!

     1890.

     January 29.-Lectured on the Life of Swedenborg to the Schools-for the first time. The LIFE now became the organ of the Academy, and Mr. Asplundh was appointed Manager of the Book Room I was relieved of the work in the Library. I now began to write the "Notes and Reviews" and the "News Notes" regularly for the LIFE.

     February-Wrote a review of Mr. Buss's translation of Volume IV of the Diary.

     April.- I was now much interested in the reproduction of Swedenborg's manuscripts in Stockholm, and wrote the editorials on this subject for the April LIFE. Worked like a beaver, trying to get a clear idea of the various codices.

     May.-Wrote an article classifying all the MSS. of Swedenborg. The Convention made this the basis for a circular calling for aid in starting the work of phototyping the MSS.

     June.-Worked a great deal of the history of the Tulkite heresy, and wrote an account of it for the LIFE.

     Moved out to Huntingdon Valley, where the Asplundhs and we shared a house on the pike, opposite the toll-gate near Cairnwood. With the usual enthusiasm of spring fever, I began digging and planting, but to no purpose Bishop Benade lived at the "Willard" house. Mr. Schreck had gone abroad to hunt for MSS. in Holland, and I was appointed Editor pro tem. of the LIFE.

348

     The Convention met this month in Chicago, and rejected the Report of the General Church, condemning Mr. Benade for having ordained Mr. Pendleton a Bishop.

     July 24.-After a short illness, our darling little boy, Sanfrid, passed suddenly away. The agony of that day shall never be forgotten. The despairing cry of my wife will always ring in my ears, but his sweet kisses will always remain upon my lips.

     At this time we were much interested in the conflict that was taking place in the Canada Association. There was a similar crisis in England. A separation was pending there, as in America.

     September.-Moved back to Philadelphia, to a house on Wylie Street, taking our meals with Mrs. Moir, who had opened a boarding house for New Church people. I acted as paterfamilias of the large family.

     November.-Meeting of the General Church in Pittsburgh, where we decided upon separating from Convention. A momentous occasion! At a social gathering at the home of Mr. Macbeth, I composed the song "Vivat Nova Ecclesia," which became the "Marseillaise" of the new independent body.

     December.-Worked on the "Ten Years' Index" to the LIFE. It made me familiar with the history of our movement.

     (THE END.)

349

IMMEDIATE AND MEDIATE INFLUX FROM THE RATIONAL INTO THIS NATURAL 1920

IMMEDIATE AND MEDIATE INFLUX FROM THE RATIONAL INTO THIS NATURAL Rev. E. E. IUNGERICH 1920

     The Arcana Coelestia sets forth that Isaac and Rebekah correspond to the good and truth of the rational, respectively; and that their twin sons correspond to the natural, Esau to its good and Jacob to its truth. The relation of Isaac to Esau is called one of immediate influx; and that through Rebekah to Jacob (and then to Esau) one of mediate influx. We read:

     "It is first to be known what is the nature of the influx of the rational into the natural; namely, that it is immediately from the good of the rational into the good of the natural, and that it is mediately from the good of the rational through the truth there into the good of natural truth. Rebekah is the truth of the rational, (no. 3012, 3013, 3077); Isaac, the good of the rational, (no. 3012, 3194, 3210); Esau, the good of the natural out of immediate influx from the good of the rational, or Isaac; and Jacob, the good [truth of the natural], or the good of natural truth out of mediate influx through the truth of the rational, or Rebekah. As to this mediate and immediate influx, see no. 3314, 3573." (A. C. 4563)

     Referring to these two latter numbers, we notice from A. C. 3314 that the relation of the good of the rational to the truth of the natural is called mediate and may be through two different avenues: "The good of the rational inflows without truth, thus immediately, into the good of the natural; and also through truth, thus mediately. But the good of the rational inflows through the truth of the rational into the truth of the natural, thus mediately, and also through the good of the natural into the truth there, thus also mediately. Hence it is that there is a closer conjunction of the good of the rational with the good of the natural than with the truth of the latter." (A. C. 3314.) In A. C. 3573, the term "immediately" qualifies the avenue from Isaac through Esau to Jacob; the term "mediately," that through Rebekah to Jacob and then to Esau: "The natural is not regenerated before it is conjoined to the rational.

350

That conjunction is effected through immediate and mediate influx of the rational into the good and truth of the natural; namely, from the good of the rational immediately into the good of the natural, and through this into the truth of the natural; and mediately through the truth of the rational into the truth of the natural and thence into the good of the natural." (3573) Almost the same words occur in A. C. 3616: "For when the end or conjunction is attained (or when truth concords with good, and thus subordinated truth serves good), then the good of the rational inflows immediately into the good of the natural, and thereby into its truth; and also mediately through the truth of the rational into the truth of the natural and thereby into the good there."

     AN ERROR NEEDING CORRECTION.

     At this point we may note the error in A. C. 3969 where the words "good" and "truth" have been interchanged: "Then the interior and exterior man enter into the heavenly marriage; . . . for the good of the interior man then conjoins itself with the good of the exterior, and thereby with the truth there; and also the good of the interior man through the affection of truth there with the good [? read truth] of the exterior man, and also with the truth [? read good] there, thus immediately and mediately, concerning which see no. 3313, 3573, 3616."

     That there are two errors here, is plain from the fact that the two numbers referred to in confirmation would thus contradict this teaching, as will be seen above, where we have quoted them. (See also Index of A. C. under Bonum and N. J. H. D. 23.)

     In A. E. 222:4, where A. C. 3969 is referred to, the caption reads: "That the spiritual were saved by the advent of the Lord into the world, and were then conjoined with those who were of the Lord's celestial kingdom to make one heaven." This is interesting as indicating that immediate influx is celestial and mediate influx is spiritual. Note also A. E. 4407 where we read: "Spiritual good inflows into natural good immediately, but into natural truth mediately, as may be seen in A. C. 3314, 3573, 3616, 3969, 3995, 4563: and hence there is a parallelism between spiritual good and natural good, but not between spiritual truth and natural truth."

351

This passage aligns A. C. 3969 with the same set of passages we have already cited. A. C. 3995, which is included in this series teaches on this point: "For good inflows from the Lord through an internal way, or through the way of the soul, and truth inflows through an external way, or through the sensual way, which is of the body. The truth which enters by the latter way is adopted by the good which is within, and is conjoined thereto, and this even until the man has been regenerated."

An examination of various translations and Latin texts, including the one with Tafel's emendations, and also the photoype of the MSS. Arcana Coelestia, shows that these two errors in A. C. 3969 have not been noted hitherto.
WHY THE SCIENCES AND ARTS ON THIS EARTH 1920

WHY THE SCIENCES AND ARTS ON THIS EARTH 1920

Since the spirits of a distant earth "wondered that I could describe such things in writing, I spoke with them concerning our earth that such things are known on our earth, but not on others, so far as is yet known; also that on this earth there are sciences, which have been increased by being inscribed on paper, and thus left to others and to posterity, whence have arisen many arts on this earth, as shipbuilding, etc. It was granted me to tell them the reason; namely, that from the first time they wished to be wise in such things on this earth, and that this was represented by the tree of knowledge in paradise. And, because they had eaten thereof, therefore they cannot be healed otherwise than by knowledges, thus by the scientifics which are of faith." (Diary 46639.)

352

NEW AFFECTION OF LOVE TO THE LORD AND CHARITY 1920

NEW AFFECTION OF LOVE TO THE LORD AND CHARITY WILFRED HOWARD 1920

     We learn from the Writings that the New Church, which is to become the Crown of all the Churches that have hitherto existed in the world, is new, first, because of its new Doctrine;-the Revelation given through Emanuel Swedenborg,-which is distinctly superior to all former Revelations; secondly, because a new affection of love to the Lord and charity will be present with the men of this Church; and finally, because of a new life that will become more and more an ultimate expression of the things of heaven and the church.

     The phase of the subject upon which I have been asked to speak is "The New Affection of Love to the Lord and Charity," represented by the "woman clothed with the sun." (Rev. xii.)

     The whole of the 12th chapter of the Apocalypse, in its internal sense, treats of the foundation of the New Church in heaven and on earth; the difficulty of its reception; the opposition to its doctrines; its reception by few; its slow growth; of the powerful forces of the Dragon and his hosts, ever tending to destroy the Church, especially in its beginning; and of the final triumph of Michael and his angels, who, from the rational doctrine of the New Church, are to "rule the nations with a rod of iron."

     Such is the history of the Church in its beginning. And how clearly does experience confirm the truths of Revelation!-its beginning with the remnant, the few in the dead Christian Church who are able to receive its doctrines; its exceedingly slow growth; the difficult reception of its doctrine, both in the church as an organization and in the church with the individual.

     We ask ourselves: In what manner is there to be created in the church a new affection of love and charity?

     To love the Lord, in the spiritual sense, is to love the truths of the church and do its goods. With men on earth this love finds expression or ultimation in the zeal for the establishment of the church,-the church specific,-with whose members all the uses of life look to the establishment of the church as an end.

353

     We read in A. E. 707: "The 'woman encompassed with the sun' signifies the church with those who are in love to the Lord and thence in love towards the neighbor, as is evident from the signification of 'woman,' as denoting the spiritual affection of truth, from which alone the church is a church. Thus the new affection of love to the Lord that is to be established with men upon earth is a spiritual affection of truth, the intensity of which will ever increase in the progress of the church.

     It is because of this essential thing, namely, that the Lord's presence with us is measured by our affection of truth, which is the presence of the church with us, that we are so vitally concerned over its progress as an organized body among men. We rejoice over its history, its combats and victories; we strive to maintain the glorious standards of the past; in our gatherings we rejoice when the spirit of the church is with us, and are saddened when this spirit,-the spirit of happiness itself,-withdraws its inspiring presence from our midst. We become anxious of the present, and ask, perhaps unwisely, What of the future? But the Writings give us abundant assurance of the growth and development of the church in the future. Let us ask ourselves, then, What is involved in the establishment of the church upon earth?

     The history of the decline of the four churches is well known to us. In brief, it is the story of the gradual turning away from the things of heaven to the things of the earth, and of the constant struggle between the forces of good and evil. In the beginning, the things of heaven,-the world of causes,-were realities in the hearts and minds of men. But, in the course of the ages, the ascending- periods which marked the establishment of churches were followed by descending periods, or periods of decline,-a slow descent with each succeeding church. Heaven, and the realities of the spiritual world, were gradually removed from the sight of men; they became distant visions or phantasies, were finally lost, and are now denied. Men proclaim aloud that there is no God, no spiritual world,-that the things of the earth alone exist.

354

     Such is the heritage of the minds of men today. As the result of a long process of involution, extending back through ages, we find ourselves as it were chained to the earth, bound to the plane of the senses. Appearances, or the inert substances of nature, are as realities, and the eternal realities of the spiritual world are seen only in vague outline, regarded as of uncertain value, and are received with difficulty.

     To reverse this spiritual chaos,-the work of untold generations of spiritual decline,-is, in the mercy of the Lord, the task of the New Church. That its progress will be slow is obvious, and can be seen from an examination of the truths regarding the regeneration of man, who is the church in least form. Regeneration is the process of a long-continued struggle throughout this life. The first stage of the church with men is one of intense enthusiasm, a period of inspiration, during which heaven seems present in all its fulness, and we imagine, perhaps, that it is of ourselves,-the intensity of our own spiritual love. The reception of the church then seems an easy, not a difficult, matter. But in the periods that follow, the forces which, of Providence, have been Tendered temporarily quiescent, make their appearance. The hereditary proprium, generations in the making, struggles to destroy the new thing that has been born. The peace and confidence of the early stage is followed by a long-sustained warfare.

     Through this period the man knows only that he is to hold fast to that which he has. The heaven of the early days must never be really lost. He must struggle on as of himself, knowing that the end is certain. We are told in the Writings that there are some men so bound, so chained, as it were, by hereditary evils, that even a struggle throughout life cannot remove them. "But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved."

     Now this slow progress of the church with the individual man mirrors the progress of the church as a larger man. The heaven of the early stage is past, and the period of struggle and infestation is upon us. The forces of the Dragon strive with all their might to destroy that which has been born. With cunning and persuasive arts they hold our minds to the plane of sense reality.

355

The unnumbered interests of a materialistic and scientific age crowd upon us as realities of major importance, and would lead us by subtle reasonings to seek first the things of the earth. But we are told that such infestations cannot in the end prevail, though they may cover long periods of distress, as in man's regeneration. "For it is the work of the Michaels, of whom the New Church consists, to destroy these reasonings in all their abundance, so that they fall to nothing before spiritual truths rationally understood." (A. R. 561.)

     It was well said at a recent gathering that every member of the General Church would be willing to give up his life for the sake of the church if it should be in imminent danger of destruction. Where, then, is the enemy with whom we would engage combat? Where are the forces of destruction with whom we are willing to fight even unto death?

     The answer is clear. The enemy can be discovered only by means of "spiritual truths rationally understood." Our affection may be strong; but if the mind be not enlightened from the one only source of spiritual truth, the enemy will escape us; or, finding us unarmed, prevail against us. The fundamental test of our loyalty, therefore, rests not in a vague willingness to die in combat with an unknown and undiscovered enemy, but that test will come in the quiet study of the revealed truths of Revelation, by which alone we will be led to see the many enemies of our spiritual progress. Only from the affection of truth so derived can we be led to oppose the evils of our self love.

     The Writings, therefore, are the Divinely appointed means whereby a new affection of love to the Lord and charity will be established in the hearts of men,-a love that sprang into being with the early founders of the Church, that stamped its impress and quality upon the succeeding generations,-the fundamental love of that Church which is to be the Crown of all the Churches.

356

Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA.
Editor.               Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager      Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, changes of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager.

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     AN INTERSTELLAR CHURCH.

     That the Christian Church was to be a universal or world-Church, thus international, was recognized from its earliest days, whence arose the term "catholic," meaning general or universal. For, had not the disciples been commanded to teach and baptize "all nations," to "go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature," thus to make known the Lord as the one true God to all men upon the earth? Had not the Book of Revelation spoken of a time when "the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and His Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever?"

     It was of Providence, however, that many nations and peoples were not converted by the first Christian Church, but were protected from the contagion of its falsities and evils as spread by Christian missionaries. (Diary 4777.) But, with the Second Advent of the Lord and the Revelation of the True Christian Religion, explaining the former and removing its falsities, the promise of a universal, international Church, founded upon the Heavenly Doctrines of the New Jerusalem, must in time be realized. Yes, more than this. The disciples are now to evangelize the "universal spiritual world." (T. 791.)

357

Angels and spirits from this earth are to proclaim the Kingdom of the Lord in His Divine Human to those of all other earths. (Diary 1531; 4663; E. U. 118.) Thus the New Church is to be more than world-wide, more than international. It is to be an interstellar Church.
"TESTIMONY OF THE WRITINGS 1920

"TESTIMONY OF THE WRITINGS 1920

     A REVIEW.

     TESTIMONY OF THE WRITINGS OF THE NEW CHURCH CONCERNING THEMSELVES. Compiled from the Theological Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg, by the Rev. C. Th. Odhner; Second Edition, revised, and furnished with an Appendix, by Theodore Pitcairn, William Whitehead, and William Hyde Alden. Academy Rook Room, Bryn Athyn, Pa., 1920. pp. 45 Paper 35 cents.

     The credibility of anything that claims to be Divine Revelation is to be established by two or more witnesses. "That all truth must stand on the ward of two or more witnesses, and not on that of one, is founded on the Divine law that one truth does not confirm good, but a number of truths." (A. C. 4197.) "Thus saith the Lord" was the testification of the angels, of Moses and the Prophets, to the Jewish Church; confirmation by miracles and signs was the second witness. The truth of the Gospel, taught by the Lord Himself, understood and acknowledged by receivers, confirmed by miracles and by life, established the Christian faith by two witnesses. At the Second Coming, the first witness is the Divine Truth Itself of the Heavenly Doctrine, seen and acknowledged in the rational mind. "Nothing enters the internal man except by intellectual ideas, which are reasons, for the ground there is the enlightened rational." (A. C. 7290) The internal man is in the light of heaven, and we are told that tin heaven the truth itself hears witness of itself, because it is the very light itself of heaven." (A. R. 6.) This, then, must he the first witness of the Heavenly Doctrine,-the Divine Truth testifying and convincing of: itself in the internal rational mind.

358

     But we are taught further that "in the world the Truth must be borne witness to, and then it is acknowledged." (A. R. 6.) And hence it is that the Divine Rational Truth revealed in the Writings is there confirmed by Scripture, by natural truths, by experience, and by the testimony of Swedenborg, the servant of the Lord. All these are a second witness.

     In the little work before us, passages have been collected in which the Writings testify concerning themselves, or in which Swedenborg gives testimony as to the nature of what he had written in his Theological Works. If these Works are a Divine Revelation, he is one credible witness. For the Lord's instruments in the giving of all former Revelations of Divine Truth have so testified, and their declarations of "Thus saith the Lord" have been one of the two witnesses on whose word the truth was established.

     Moreover, it is a canon of the laws of evidence among men that everyone has the right to testify in his own behalf-as one witness of his own deeds. That this is also a spiritual law, is evident from the individual judgment after death, when everyone bears witness to his own state of innocence or guilt. By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." (Matthew 12:37.) Indeed, this is a Divine Law, according to which the Lord Himself, when in the world, so often declared His own Divinity. "It is also written in your law, that the testimony of two men is true. I am one that bear witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me." (John 8:17-18.) To those who could perceive that the Divine was in Him, that He spake Divine Truths, to whom "The Father had borne witness," this declaration of the Lord concerning Himself was the second witness. "My doctrine is not mine, but: His that sent me. If any man will do His will, he shalt know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or I speak of myself. He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory; but he that seeketh his glory that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in him." (John 7:16-18.)

     How, then, does Swedenborg testify concerning his mission as servant of the Lord?

359

Almost in the above words of the Lord Himself, "My doctrine is not mine, but His that sent me, Swedenborg asseverates: "As regards myself, I have not been allowed to take anything from the mouth of any spirit, nor from the mouth of any angel, but from the mouth of the Lord alone." (De Verbo 13.) These, and similar declarations, are brought together in The Testimony of the Writings. In addition, many of the passages in which the Writings describe the nature of the Revelation given to the New Heaven and the New Church are quoted in a logical series, establishing in the very language of the Writings the following propositions, which are included in a Resume on p. 31:

     "Since the Writings of the New Church were written by the command of the Lord; since Swedenborg enjoyed a complete Divine Inspiration; since the Writings of the New Church are an Immediate Revelation of Divine Truth, and are the Lord's own works; since they are from the Lord's own mouth, and are the same as the internal sense of the Word; since they contain and constitute the Doctrine of the New Jerusalem, and thus reveal the Internal Sense of the Word; since the Internal Sense of the Word is the Word; Therefore the Writings themselves are the Word, and are the Crowning Revelation of the Word. And since, as such, they constitute the Second Advent of the Lord, it follows: That these Writings are the Lord Himself in His Second Advent, revealed in His Divine Human to the men of the New Church."

     THE APPENDIX.

     From the earliest beginnings of the organized New Church, there have been receivers of the Doctrines who accepted the Writings at their own valuation; namely, as Divine Revelation,-the Lord's Word as truly as any former Revelation. Many, however, have been content with something less than this full acknowledgment, being unable or unwilling to see the Writings in their own refulgence of light as Divine Truth, or even in the light of Swedenborg's own claim to have received command, inspiration, and revelation from the Lord alone. There is a clear line of cleavage between these two opinions.

360

Either the Writings are the Lord's, and are of Divine Authority, or they are Swedenborg's, and are subject to human interpretation. There is no halfway position for those who are sufficiently informed to make a choice, and The Testimony of the Writings, together with the Appendix, is calculated to present this choice to the reader.

     While these two views, with more or less definiteness, have been held in the Church from its early days, it was not until comparatively recent times that they were set forth as a clear, distinct, and powerful issue, when the Rev. W. H, Benade and his followers proclaimed in unmistakable terms the doctrine of the Divine Authority, and initiated the movement which has resulted in a distinct body of the Church, founded upon the acknowledgment of the Writings as the Lord's Word, in which He has made His Second Coming to the New Church.

     Outside of the General Church are to be found the same varieties of belief with respect to the status of the Writings that have existed from the first, yet with this line of division usually visible, that to some they are the Lord's works, to others they are Swedenborg's. Many, indeed, claim to accept them as Divine Revelation, but not as the Lord's Word, a distinction that is illogical, and contrary to the very teachings of the Writings themselves, which specifically declare that all Divine Revelation is the Word. But we find many writers plainly exercised to find a circumlocution that will avoid the recognition of this fact. The little volume under review should clear away this attitude of compromise. For the Writings are there permitted to testify in their own behalf, so that the open, unprejudiced mind cannot escape the conclusion that they come with the full force of Divine Authority, as fully as the Scriptures,-yea, more fully, because testifying in Divine Rational Light to the rational understanding of man.

     Mr. Odhner performed a valuable service when he made the collection of such testimonies from the Writings, and published them in the book which has now appeared in a second edition, the editors of which have performed a like service by adding a new feature in the form of an Appendix. This presents, by quotations in parallel columns, "The Two Views concerning the Writings" which have been held in the Church from the beginning.

361

Thus the testimony of men is added to the testimony of the Writings themselves,-a well-conceived plan, in harmony with the laws of evidence we have cited. In this way, the reader is afforded a freedom of choice between divergent views, that the truth may be established on the word of more than one witness.
ANOTHER REVIEW OF "THE PALACE OF WISDOM." 1920

ANOTHER REVIEW OF "THE PALACE OF WISDOM." 1920

     The February number of THE NEW AGE (Australia) contains an appreciative review of Mr. Iungerich's book, The Palace of Wisdom, the salient points of which are embodied in the following passages:

     "This is a remarkable book, very far removed from the ordinary style of our collateral literature It is indeed a great book in a small compass. In the author's own words, he has aimed 'not only to vitalize positions which are universally accepted, but also to cut a pathway into the unknown, whose vastness is to what we know as a huge ocean to a few drops.' Such an aim would be almost impossible of any approach to achievement, save in a community like that at Bryn Athyn, where many minds appear to be concentrated on spiritual subjects, and to have no pressing urgency to consider any others. The work betokens extensive, almost exhaustive reading of Swedenborg; profound study and independent thought. . . . The present writer, whilst freely acknowledging the enlightenment and pleasure which he has received in the perusal of the work, prefers to see what can be said on the other side before pronouncing an opinion on the whole of the conclusions set forth. Most, and the moist important, certainly appear to be soundly established."

     Yet the reviewer also questions, and we believe rightly so, Mr. Iungerich's conclusions with respect to the "most important" doctrine of the nature of the Lord's glorified body. He refers especially to the statement in the book (p. 127) that "the Lord has a garment of gloriously active finites of every degree in creation, which furnishes Him with the requisite temperings for immediate entrance on every human plane."

362

Quoting also the similar statement (p. 130) that "He has an associated strand of finite entities which serve as means of tempering and accommodation to finite men and angels, who, as cells, constitute His body," the review says in closing:

     "A word of caution may not be amiss, to the effect that although the successive 'temperings,'-or hidings-of His Activity are finite in relation to the Infinite Divine in its Essence, yet to us the present all that is possible to be conceived or known of the Infinite, and demand our supreme reverence and loyalty accordingly. 'No man hath seen God at any time; the Only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath brought Him forth to view.' (John 1:18.)"

     The fairness of attitude shown in this review is highly commendable, and we regard it as a very just estimate of The Palace of Wisdom, as well in its expression of warm appreciation as in its frank questioning of some of the conclusions arrived at, in these studies. Mr. Iungerich has entered a field of deeper investigation and interpretation of doctrine, of reverent inquiry into sublime and holy mysteries,-a very proper field for the New Church student,-and we should welcome the results of every such effort. But unanimity of belief in these matters must depend upon clear and unmistakable demonstration, must await full consideration and discussion and the ripening influences of time. Our friend in the antipodes will be pleased to know that even the concentration of Bryn Athyn minds upon these subjects,-lacking "pressing urgency to consider any others," as it appears to him,-does not always yield such a unanimity, though we trust it always moves in that direction. For a genuine growth in the understanding of Divine mysteries should bring interior enlightenment and confirmation to the fundamentals of doctrine upon which we are agreed, and "vitalize positions which are universally accepted."

     In the same number, THE NEW AGE comments upon the Dedication of the "Great Church at Bryn Athyn," and remarks: "Evidently the General Church has a vigorous life of its own, and a large circle of members. . . .

363

We may differ on some points from our friends of the Academy, but that the institution promotes the worship of the Lord Jesus Christ, in a world that is largely estranged from Him, there can be no reasonable doubt."
IN JUSTICE TO THE REV. PERCY BILLINGS 1920

IN JUSTICE TO THE REV. PERCY BILLINGS Editor 1920

The installment of Mr. Odhner's Autobiography published in the LIFE for March, 1920, contained a statement concerning the Rev. Percy Billings, who now informs us that it arose from misapprehension, and that its publication has done him an injury. We regret that such should have been the effect, and need hardly say that it was quite unintentional on our part. In printing the item, we did not anticipate that anyone would apply it adversely to Mr. Billings at the present time.-EDITOR.
REV. C. J. N. MANBY 1920

REV. C. J. N. MANBY 1920

     With the death of Mr. Manby on March 7th, 1920, a notable figure in the development of the New Church in Sweden passed from the scene of earnest and energetic labors which covered a period of sixty years. We are indebted to Mr. Alfred H. Stroh for a translation of the following biographical account, which appeared in the STOCKHOLMS-TIDNINGEN for March 10th:

     "Carl Johan Nilsson Manby was born on June 29, 1839, near Linkoping at Mantorp, where his father was tenant, and from which he took his name. Having completed his studies at the Linkoping School and Gymnasium in September, 1852, he was inscribed at Upsala University as a student of the Ostrogothia Nation. There, with great diligence, he pursued his studies for the philosophical degree in rather varied subjects, such as physics, chemistry, astronomy, philosophy, and the classical languages. Being without means, he had to support himself by private activity as a teacher and preacher, although he did not intend to become a priest. He appeared as a preacher for the first time at the age of twenty years.

     During a visit to his home in the summer of 1862, he happened to read Atterbom's Swedish Seers and Poets, and the monograph on Swedenborg which he found there proved to be nothing less than a revelation to him.

364

On returning to Upsala in the autumn of 1863, he saw in the Academic Bookshop the first volume of the Arcana Coelestia, in a Swedish translation. He purchased a copy, and from that hour became an enthusiastic believer in the doctrines of the New Church.

     A continued, eager study of the Writings convinced him that his calling lay in another direction than that in which he had hitherto proceeded and he dedicated his life to work for the Lord's New Church. However, he kept up his ordinary studies in Upsala, varied by activities as a teacher, until 1869, when he left the University and resided for a time in Glomsta, Huddinge, where he began the manufacture of garden furniture, and also devoted himself to apiculture.

     In July, 1875, Mr. Manby was chosen leader of the Society of the "Confessors of the New Church," which had been instituted in October, 1874. At the beginning of 1876, he was one of those who founded the SCANDINAVIAN NEW CHURCH MESSENGER, which, under the name of NYA KYRIANS TIDNING, has appeared without interruption ever since, Mr. Manby being the Editor except from 1880 to 1890, when the Rev. Albert Bjorck filled that office.

     At this time, also Mr. Manby began to publish his valuable translations of Swedenborg's Writings, a work maintained until his death. Among his translations were volumes VIII. to XVII of the Arcana Coelestia, Heaven and Hell, and three volumes of the Apocalypse Revealed.

     On February 1, 1885, he was ordained [by laymen] as a New Church minister and first served the Society in Gothenburg. He was one of those who founded the New Church Society in Stockholm, and in May, 1887, became its pastor, residing by turns at Stockholm and Gothenburg until the year 1900, when he moved to Stockholm as the regular Pastor there. In the year 1911, the Gothenburg Society received State recognition, and, in the following year, there assembled in Stockholm the first "General Convention,"-an upper Council for the two societies. Mr. Manby elaborated a comprehensive liturgy for the Church, which contained 400 hymns and was endorsed by the General Convention."

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     Sorrowing on account of the present depressed condition of Christendom in all countries, and especially in Sweden, Mr. Manby, in May, 1919, addressed an Open Letter to the Archbishop, with the title: "How raise the Church from its Fall?" In a warmhearted and eloquent way he showed therein how the doctrines of the New Church could be used as a means for reconstruction. This attracted general attention, (the letter appearing along with a reply from Archbishop Nathan Soderblom, who refused to acknowledge Swedenborg as an inspired prophet), and was the closing act of his long and fruitful labor in the service of the New Church.

     Throughout his life, Mr. Manby traveled a great deal, delivering numerous missionary sermons and lectures, and distributing New Church literature all over Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. He also visited Germany, France, and America. In 1910, he was a Swedish representative at the Swedenborg Congress in London. Mr. Manby died at the home of Commodore Nils Sundstrom in Djursholm, near Stockholm, on Sunday, March 7th, thus in his 81st year. He was unmarried. With his departure, the New Church in the North loses its foremost, oldest, and most active champion, a man widely known, at home and abroad. His childlike piety, his unusual disinterestedness, his sincere and steadfast character, leave with all who knew him an impression not easily forgotten, peace over his memory!-F. G. L."

     When it is recalled that the departed missionary, pastor, translator, and editor not only founded the Society of the "Confessors of the New Church" in Sweden, the Swedish Society, and numerous other institutions, but also performed the exceedingly difficult task of translating many of Swedenborg's theological works into Swedish,-a language more remote from the Latin than either French or English,-spreading the" personally through every city and most elf the towns of Sweden, we may realize the extent of Mr. Manby's long-sustained effort in behalf of the New Church.

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In his theological views he differed decidedly from the position of the Academy, especially on the subject of New Church Baptism, the state of the Christian world, New Church education, and the interpretation of the teachings in Conjugial Love.
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

We have received a copy of the Second Edition of the pamphlet, entitled The Bryn Athyn Church, which was distributed at the General Assembly last October. As a frontispiece, it contains a new photograph of the Bryn Athyn edifice, followed by a Description of the Symbolism and an account of its History and Construction. A simple outline of the Faith of the New Church has been added, and also a brief description of Bryn Athyn Borough as a community established for the sake of the ecclesiastical and educational uses of the Church. In view of the many strangers visiting the cathedral, there has been a distinct need for such an informative book, though the scope of its use may well be more extended, as it contains matter of interest to all New Churchmen. Copies are on sale at the Academy Book room at the price of 25 cents.
BRYN ATHYN POST 1920

BRYN ATHYN POST 1920

THE BRYN ATHYN POST is the name of a new four-page contemporary, published weekly by the Boy's Club of the Elementary School under the guidance of the Principal, Mr. Otho W. Heilman. Its avowed purpose is to "serve the Bryn Athyn public," which has been efficiently done by its regular appearance with a Calendar of events, announcements, programs, general information, and occasional editorials. We wish it a continued and expanding usefulness.
Title Unspecified 1920

Title Unspecified 1920

     Arraignments of the Old Church are not entirely out of fashion. Witness the following editorial from the march 18, 1920, issue of THE NEW CHRISTIAN MINISTER (Rev. William R. Reece, Portland, Oregon, Editor):

     Are We Accused of Dragon Baiting.-We Glory in it?

     THE NEW CHRISTIAN MINISTER is in receipt of several letters which take issue with our statements about the criminal university of that thing called the "Christian Church."

367

Particular reference is made to the editorial of last week on "The Meaning of the Book of Revelation for the New Christian Age."

These honest but rather startled readers seem to have put us down as a fire eater of the most ferocious type,-a dragon baiter, if you please, who fights for the mere thrill of the thing. We protest that we are nothing of the sort. Our friends vouch for our mildness in private life, and public audiences testify to our good nature and tolerance.

There is one thing, however, which we must insist be clearly understood: WE PROCLAIM A DISTINCTLY NEW TYPE OF CHRISTIAN TEACHING AND LIFE. The prevailing "Christian" Church we regard as so indescribably false in its teaching and life that it has, unwittingly, of course, turned the earth into an arena of spiritually instance animal-men, mad with greed, adultery, war, poverty, and unholy lust for power. We affirm that this hideous thing called the Christian Church, in both its branches, Roman Catholic and Protestant, is directly responsible for these infernal conditions. We say this, not of ourselves, but because the opened Word teaches the painful truth so clearly that we were coward did we fail to proclaim it. The man of the New Christian Church (and the New Christian Church is not an organization, but an age of new light and life) cannot fail to recognize,-he cannot forget,-that the church is the most powerful factor for good or ill in human society. If it be true to the one Divine Human God, if it unflinchingly insist on individual and corporate life in accord with His commandments, then order and true progress become everywhere evident. But, since the first three centuries of its existence, the Christian church has been criminally false to both these fundamentals. It has divided the One Only God into three pagan non-existent deities; it has invented and preached a "scheme of salvation" found nowhere in the Divine Word; and, most pernicious of al, it has measured man's chances for heaven by his readiness to swear to a creed rather than to live a life of loving self-sacrifice. It is against this kind of spiritual harlotry of the Christian Church, as an institution, that we protest.

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God says to all who lament the church's miserable unfaithfulness to the One Divine Human God, Jesus Christ, and her violent perversion of the Divine Word of truth: "Come out of her; she has become the hold of demons, and of every unclean and hateful bird." Again He says: "Come to the supper of the great God,"-the Word opened as to its inner sense by Him whose Names is the Word of God. Only so can we escape wrath, present and to come,-the wrath of self-inflicted evil brought upon humanity by unthinking acceptance of the teachings of the now almost universally discredited: Old Christian Church.

The October and January Issues of THE NEW PHILOSOPHY have come to hand under one cover, and: bear evidence of the indefatigable labors of the Editor, the Rev. Alfred Acton. The translation of one of Swedenborg's treatises on The Brain is continued in these numbers, and A Philosopher's Note Book is begun, this being the title given by Mr. Acton to the material found in Codex 36 of the Swedenborg Manuscripts, two short extracts from which have already appeared inn the pages of the LIFE, (July, 1919, and January, 1920). Of the contents of Codex 36, Mr. Acton says: "For the most part, they consist of hundreds of citations from ancient Greek and contemporaneous European philosophers on psychological and theological subjects, all arranged under general headings. The manuscript also includes a small work on algebra, besides notes on musical harmony, and a work on Correspondences. . . . In the present translation, we have undertaken a work that will be unique in the literary annals of the New Church, namely, the translation of a miscellaneous manuscript exactly as it occurs, and with practically no attempt at rearrangement of the contents." The publication of this material promises to be of special interest and value as showing the source of ideas that appear later in Swedenborg's works.

In these numbers of THE NEW PHILOSOPHY we also find a "Summary of the Minutes of the Meetings of the Swedenborg Committee," which was appointed by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to determine the extent to which the Swedenborg manuscripts found in the academy's Library should be printed.

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Mr. Ernest Pfeiffer contributes extended; revisions of the Clissold translations of the Principia. Editorially, a tribute is paid to the late Professor Gustaf Retzius, one of the greatest of Swedish students of cerebrology, to whose enthusiasm and generosity we owe the Royal Swedish Academy's edition of Opera Quaedam, the three volumes of which were published at his expense. Professor Retzius died at Stockholm on July 31st, 1919, in his seventy-eighth year.
CLASSIFIED LIST OF THE WORKS OF EMANUEL SWEDENBORG WRITTEN PRIOR TO 1746, INCLUDING A FEW OF LATER DATE 1920

CLASSIFIED LIST OF THE WORKS OF EMANUEL SWEDENBORG WRITTEN PRIOR TO 1746, INCLUDING A FEW OF LATER DATE 1920

     Compiled by Alfred Acton. M. A., B. Th. Swedenborg Scientific Association, Philadelphia, Pa. 1911) pp. 16. Price, 20 cents.

     This pamphlet should be in the library of every New Churchman. It is the first tabulation of the kind, and includes everything that Swedenborg is known to have written prior to 1746, conveniently grouped under general subjects, as follows: Literature, Art, Poetry; Politics and Economics; Mechanical and Physical Sciences; Mineralogy and Chemistry; Mathematics; Cosmology and Astronomy; Physiology; Philosophy, Psychology and Theology: Under these headings we find the titles of every treatise and fragment-many still remaining in MS.-as well as the greater and lesser works that have been published at one time or another, a large number now out of print. A perusal of the list brings striking evidence of the all-inclusive range of Swedenborg's studies during this preparatory period. One is filled with astonishment at the quantity and variety of his literary productions. The preservation of his ideas on so many subjects we owe to his habit of committing everything to paper,-a habit which may be regarded as a most important factor in his preparation to record his spiritual experiences, as begun in the Adversaria and Spiritual Diary in the year 1745.

     The compiling of the detailed information contained in the Classified List represents much painstaking labor, with years of investigation behind it, for which we owe Mr. Acton a debt of gratitude.

370

A meeting of the Swedenborg Scientific Association is to be held in Brooklyn, N. Y., on June 4th, and we understand the following addresses are on the program: "A Primer of Swedenborg's Philosophy," by President Hite; "The physiology of Primitive Man," by Professor E. E. Iungerich; "Confirmations from Modern Science of Swedenborg's Philosophy in the Realm of Physics," by Mr. Wilfred Howard; and "The Creation of Man," by Professor Alfred Acton.
Title Unspecified 1920

Title Unspecified 1920

     We have received from the New Church Society at Lausanne, Switzerland, of which the Rev. Gustave Regamey is Pastor, the notice of a meeting to be held at Lausanne on July 29th, 30th, and 31st, 1920, for the purpose of organizing a Congress, the chief object of which will he "the creation of an Association of all the French-speaking societies and members of the New Church, in view of the intensification of the spreading of the Doctrines in French-speaking countries." The announcement continues:

     "This Association is to be similar to those existing in England and the United States, but it should at the same time be adapted to the seeds and mentality of the in populations.

     "Present times seem favorable to such a scheme for there is actually a great want of new light in matters of religion. It therefore appears necessary to bring together all those who are scattered in various parts of the French-speaking countries, (France, Belgium, Switzerland, Egypt, Morocco, the French Colonies, Mauritius, etc.), who believe in the Second Coming of the Lord identified in Swedenborg's Writings, and to form a strong Association, with powerful means of action, able to develop and intensify the spreading of the New Church Doctrines in those countries.

     "The English associations, which have been established over a century, have now the great privilege of being able to propagate efficaciously the Doctrines of the New Church. There are now hundreds of societies in England and the United States, with thousands of members.

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They have at their disposal numerous and powerful means of action; amongst others, a rich literature, many philosophical and religious newspapers and periodicals, three or four publishing agencies, committees of propaganda, philanthropic institutions, many colleges, two or three theological schools, and a considerable staff of pastors and laymen who are entirely devoted to the work. "To succeed in our enterprise, we need the support of all the members of the New Church, wherever they are, and we take pleasure in inviting you to attend our Congress, as your presence and your expenence will be of the greatest value.

"Should you be prevented from coming to Lausanne, may we count on your generosity to help us with a small gift to cover the expenses incurred, and to create a special fund for the work of the future Association?"

The Councils of the General Church, which are to meet at Bryn Athyn from June 21st, to 27th, will be of exceptional interest and importance this year, owing to the expected attendance of five of our ministers from Europe: namely, the Rev. Messrs. R. J. Tilson, G. C. Ottley, E. Deltenre, F. Hussenet, and Gustaf Baeckstrom. The program makes provision for a number of evening sessions of the Council of the Clergy, on which occasions there will be public addresses by our friends from abroad. Mr. Ottley is to deliver the Commencement Day address on June 15th.

372

NEWSPAPER CLIPPINGS 1920

NEWSPAPER CLIPPINGS HOMER SYNNESTVEDT 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     An announcement was made in the January, 1882, number of NEW CHURCH LIFE to the effect that the Editors had undertaken to collect and preserve all newspaper articles and notes which in any way related to the New Church. What they said then applies now: "If such a collection had been begun years ago, it would be exceedingly valuable today, as showing the drift of public sentiment. Recognizing the importance of this work, we ask our readers to help us by sending everything of the kind they map meet with. . . . Our collection will always be open to anyone who may wish to consult it."

     I write to ask what has become of this undertaking. Are such clippings still being collected and preserved? If so, by whom? I, for one, feel that it ought to be done, probably by the historical department of the Academy. The present wave of spiritism is causing so much mention of Swedenborg, usually laudatory, and in striking contrast to the mediumistic practices, that it would seem very desirable to preserve these documents for our future students. Of course, not all of these articles are helpful to the cause of the New Church, because the spiritualists are claiming Swedenborg as one of themselves. We should make every effort to counteract this impression, lest we be carried down in the ruin that is certain to befall those who deal with "spirits that peep and mutter."
     HOMER SYNNESTVEDT.

     REPLY.

     The Academy Library has been preserving all such clippings that have been sent in. They are classified and filed in the Archives. No systematic or thorough effort has been made to obtain such references to the New Church in the literature of the day, owing to the time and expense involved, which the Library has not been able to afford.

373

But the Librarian will he glad to presence in the manner described all such matter that is contributed.-EDITOR.
HOW THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH IS TO BE REVIVED 1920

HOW THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH IS TO BE REVIVED RICHARD MORSE 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     The permeationist is rather fond of quoting from Conjugial Love, no. 532; the remarks of the angels about the revivification of the Christian Church. The passage reads:

     "The angels rejoiced exceedingly that it had pleased the Lord to reveal this great arcanum, so deeply concealed for some thousands of years; and they said that it is for the end that the Christian Church, which is founded upon the Word, and is now at its end, may again revive and draw breath through heaven from the Lord."

     The permeationist sees in this statement the revivification of the Old Christian Church, which is no more meant than the revivification of a deceased king, in the utterance: "The king is dead; long live the king!" He ought to know that the first Christian Church lost the knowledge of every essential of the Church, and that therefore "it follows there is no religion, no church, no worship, no ministry:" and that that Church came to its end with the last judgment in 1757. Also that it will "continue in its external worship, as the Jews do in theirs, in whose worship it is well known there is nothing of charity and faith, that is, nothing of the Church" (A. C. 1850); and, further, that "falsities and evils grow continually in the Church once perverted and extinct." (A. C. 4503.)

     Those who come out of that empty shell of a Church into the New Church which is the only Church-are much hampered with its heredity, and therefore should neglect no aid that will cause the separation from it to be definite and complete. One of these aids, undoubtedly, is re-baptism, willingly received at the hands of the New Church priest, and into the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

374

The reception of baptism must necessarily be followed by diligent acquisition of the truths of faith, to the end that the recipient may be regenerated by their means. And the truths of faith are to be found only in the opened Word of the Lord, in die Church which is the Bride of the Lamb,-the New Jerusalem, the Crown of Churches. For we read:

"He who does not know that waters signify the truths of faith, cannot know what baptism signifies; for he believes that this external rite saves man, when yet this external thing effects nothing, but the internal thing that is signified, which is regeneration by the truths of faith. For they who are of the Church are distinguished by baptism from all others in the whole world, because they can be regenerated by means of the truths of faith, but not those who are outside of the Church, seeing that within the Church is the Word, in which are the truths of faith." (A. C. 10238.)
RICHARD MORSE, Sydney, N. S. W., Australia.
CORRECTION 1920

CORRECTION Editor 1920

The name of our correspondent whose communication on "Celestial Spiritism" appeared in this department of our April number, (p. 237), is Mr. Preston M. Bruner, not "Bonner," as there printed by mistake.-EDITOR.

375

SIXTH PHILADELPHIA LOCAL ASSEMBLY 1920

SIXTH PHILADELPHIA LOCAL ASSEMBLY WALTER A. CRANCH 1920

     The meetings were opened on Friday evening, April 9th, with an address by Bishop N. D. Pendleton. He spoke on the nature of the spiritual world contrasting very effectively the fundamental difference between matter and substance. His remarks were essentially a summary of a series of sermons recently delivered in Bryn Athyn. It is remarkable to what an extent the views held by the opposing factions in the controversy of some pears ago were harmonized by the Bishop, especially as the results were arrived at from an entirely independent study. Among the interesting points brought out by the Bishop may be mentioned the absolute uncertainty as to what may be the nature of matter as well as of substance in themselves, and that sense impressions are, as a matter of fact, a reaction; that the spiritual and the natural are associated by influx; and the only reason we cannot see the reality of spiritual substance while living in this world is that our spiritual senses are not consciously attuned to such reaction until after the death of the body. It is difficult for us to get away from the three elements of the fixation, periodicity and dimension of matter. We must remove the idea of an "appearance" as something not real. A spiritual appearance is in fact the most real of all, as it is directly from the sun of heaven which is the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom going forth from the Lord Himself.

     The Bishop's talk was followed by a brief but interesting discussion.

     On Saturday, the 10th, the men assembled to the number of 50 at the St. James Hotel for an old-time Academy Stag Banquet. After a very enjoyable feast, Mr. Wm. H. Alden, Jr., the toastmaster, presented the subject of the afternoon, "A Voice from the Pews:" The speakers were Mr. Donald Rose, (who was introduced as taking the place of the wine; Mr. Rose, however, refusing to "whine"), Mr. Geoffrey Childs, who came over from New York particularly for the occasion, and Mr. Hubert Hyatt.

376

The object of the meeting was to bring forward the problems of church life, with particular reference to attendance at service, and to the conduct of the service from the layman's point of view, and of what the layman's attitude should be in cooperating with the pastor. In this brief review we will not attempt to present the humor of Mr. Rose's speech. As to laxity in church attendance, he ascribed it partly to human perversity, partly to the personality of the minister and the length and quality of his sermons, and partly to seemingly more important engagements.

     Mr. Childs attributed it largely to human weakness,-a lack of resolve to get up in time on Sunday morning. He spoke of the mistake of merely compelling children to go to church, so that when they come to their majority they stay home just because they can. As a remedy he suggested that parents, instead of impressing upon their children so much the "duty," might arouse an affection and love for going to church, explaining to them the benefits to be derived, which would result in forming the habit of going and an uncomfortable feeling in staying away. He also spoke of the sermon, and warned against the purely philosophical kind that goes over the heads of the average layman, and, on the other hand, the danger of underestimating the intelligence of those in the pews. In other words, care should be taken to make the sermon interesting, applicable to life, and not too long.

     Mr. Hyatt, in presenting the subject of the career of a minister from the business man's point of view, read a letter purporting to come from a member of the clergy pointing out the great number of organizations within the church, and suggesting that if the uses of some of these organizations could be taken over by others, thus reducing their number, there would be more money to go around, with the result that the ministry would he better supported, which would be of material benefit to all.

     A lively discussion, which was entered into by a large number of those present, resulted in the feeling that all had mutually benefitted therefrom, and that the church attendance in the centers represented would be materially increased.

377

     At the Assembly Ball, on Saturday evening, about sixty young folks (of all ages) were present. The decorations, arranged by Messrs. Doran Synnestvedt and Marshall Fuller, were the most effective and pleasing ever experienced by the Advent Society, and, together with the music, formed a setting that could hardly be surpassed, even in Bryn Athyn. The ceiling was festooned with strips of crepe paper of all colors, intermingled with balloons. The orchestra was partially concealed by palms, and at the far end of the room the moon shone brightly, lending an air of mystic enchantment to the scene. The young people of mature years began to wend their way homeward about 10:30, and the Bryn Athyn guests reluctantly left in time for the midnight train, but the dancing continued in full swing up to twelve o'clock.

     The Sunday morning service was conducted by the Bishop, assisted by the Rev. Karl Alden. There were 65 present, which comfortably filled our little church, and the Holy Supper was administered to 40. We are indebted to Mr. Raymond Pitcairn and Miss Creda Glenn for their assistance in playing the viola and cello, which added much to the sphere of worship. After church the Bishop addressed the Sunday School, and this was followed by a brief lantern review of the year's work.

     At six o'clock the crowd began to gather for the Assembly Banquet. This was held in the new part of our building, which comfortably accommodated the 98 who attended. After the banquet itself and before the speeches, we enjoyed a couple of very beautiful selections on the violin, 'cello, and piano, by the Rev. Karl Alden, Miss Creda Glenn and Mrs. Roydon Smith. The speeches that followed were by Mr. Raymond Pitcairn on "New Church Architecture," the Rev. T. S. Harris on "New Church Ritual," Mr. Fred Cooper on "New Church Music," and Bishop N. D. Pendleton on "New Church Doctrine." The trend of all of the speeches was to show the relationship and contrast of the Old and the New Church with respect to the various topics discussed, and how the new forms, filled with the life of the New Church, are evolved from the dead and relatively meaningless forms of the Old.

378

A discussion of the speeches, unfortunately, was made impossible by the lateness of the hour, as it was necessary for our Bryn Athyn guests to leave for their train.

Thus came to a successful conclusion our Sixth Local Assembly. Mr. Wm. H. Alden, Jr., Chairman, and the other members of the Assembly Committee, are deserving of the highest praise for what they achieved in planning and working out the program. WALTER A. CRANCH.
PROGRAM OF THE ANNUAL COUNCIL MEETINGS 1920

PROGRAM OF THE ANNUAL COUNCIL MEETINGS 1920

To BE HELD AT BRYN ATHYN, PA., JUNE 21-27, 1920.

Monday, June 21, 10:30 a. m. and 3 p. m.-Consistory.
Tuesday, 10:00 a. m. and 3 p. m.-Council of the Clergy.
8:00 p. m.-Public Session-Address by the Bishop.
Wednesday, 10:00 a. m. and 3 p. m.-Council of the Clergy.
8:00 p. m.-Public Session-Address by Visiting Minister.
Thursday, 10:00 a. m.-Council of the Clergy.
4:00 p. m.-Joint Council.
8:00 p. m.-Public Session-Address by Visiting Minister.
Friday, 9:30 a. m.-Executive Committee.
10:00 a. m.-Council of the Clergy.
4:00 p. m.-Joint Council.
8:00 p. m.-Public Session-Address by Visiting Minister.
Saturday, 10:00 a. m.-Council of the Clergy.
4:00 p. m.-Joint Council.
8:00 p. m.-Public Session-Address on "Church Architecture," by Mr. Raymond Pitcairn.
Sunday, 10:00 a. m.-Divine Worship.

The Annual Joint Meeting of the Faculties and Corporation of the Academy of the New Church will be held on Saturday, June 12th, 1920, at 10 a. m. and 3 p. m. The public is cordially invited to attend.

The regular annual meeting of the Swedenborg Scientific Association will be held at 1011 Arch Street, Philadelphia, Pa., on May 29th, 1920, at 2:30 p. m., for the election of officers and for such other business as may come before the meeting. The meeting will adjourn to meet in Brooklyn, N. Y., on Friday, June 4th, at 5:00 p. m., to hear the President's Address and other papers, and for the consideration of matters of interest to the Association.

379

Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     TORONTO, CANADA.-The Twelfth Ontario District Assembly was held in Toronto from April 16th to 19th. A detailed account will appear later in the Life, so we shall only report certain phases here.

     The opening banquet, on the 16th, was held at Mr. Hicks' Hotel, on the Lake Shore Road, an arrangement that was something of an innovation, as it entailed an individual charge of $1.50 However, Mr. Hicks, whose two oldest children attend our school, granted us the use of the dining room for dancing without extra charge; and the arrangement seemed to give general satisfaction, as the banquet was attended by nearly 140 people. After we had partaken of a bountiful repast, we listened to especially instructive speeches on the subjects of "Heavenly Love" and "Self Love." We drank the toasts in fruit punch, though the real "punch" was not in the liquid but in the speeches. In due course the tables were removed, and the pretty dining room became a hall room, where the youthful and otherwise tripped the light fantastic toe until the wee sma' hours to the strains of a good three-piece orchestra.

     On Saturday morning the Bishop conducted a short service for the children, and told them in simple language how the Ten Commandments had been given them for their rules of life.

     The first session of the Assembly came on Saturday afternoon, when the Bishop, delivered his address on "The Nature of Spiritual Substance." It was a wonderfully enlightening address, and made the other world very near and real to us all. We hope to have it in printed form for future study. The Bishop and each succeeding speaker seemed to give us of their best, and the wonderful sphere of earnestness and good will continued throughout the meetings. At the first session, six ministers were present: Bishop Pendleton, the Revs. Alfred Acton, Hugo Lj. Odhner, E. R. Cronlund; the Rev. Mr. Small, of Toronto, and the Rev. Lewis Slight, of Kitchener, ministers of the General Convention Societies in those places.

     At the session on Saturday evening, Mr. Cronlund read an interesting and timely paper on "The Principles of the Academy." In the ensuing discussion we were shown that we should cultivate a spirit of charity towards one another, and towards those who are outside of the Church, though, as the Bishop stated, the principles of the Academy remain unchanged.

     Divine worship was held on Sunday morning, when the Bishop delivered the sermon. The attendance was 147, and the Holy Supper was administered to 84 persons. A session of the Assembly was held in the evening, when Mr. Odhner read a most interesting and comprehensive paper on "The Church and Salvation."

     On Monday afternoon, Bishop Pendleton gave an informal talk to the ladies of the society; the evening was devoted to a men's meeting, while the ladies had a euchre party at the home of Mrs. Charles Brown. Thus ended three busy days, but the strenuousness of attending meetings did not prevent informal social gatherings in between, when church friendships were renewed. There is but one regret to record, namely, that one of our oldest and most earnest members, Mr. Robert Carswell, was unable to attend the meetings, owing to an injury he received when he fell from a moving street car.

380

However, he is making a good recovery, and we hope to see him soon again in his accustomed place.

     This Assembly has left us grateful to our priests for the instruction received. Their addresses lifted our minds into higher planes of thought, from which we can view life more clearly and make new efforts in the path of regeneration.

     We were especially glad that Mr. Acton could attend the Assembly, his earnest and enthusiastic speeches adding much of life and instruction to the discussions. He remained after the meetings, conducting our Wednesday doctrinal class, and preaching the sermon on April 25th. As usual, he gave us many new ideas to reflect upon.
     B. S.

     KITCHENER, ONT.-Since last heard from, this society has had the pleasure of witnessing and participating in the festivities of two weddings:-that of Mr. Harold Kuhl to Miss Evangeline Roschman on the evening of March 4th, and that of Mr. Fred Stroh to Miss Mabel Clarke on the evening of April 14th. The chancel was beautifully decorated on both occasions; for the first wedding with ferns and daffodils, for the second with palms and Easter lilies. An impressive sphere of holiness and reverence attended both ceremonies, and the brides with their attendants made pretty pictures. Miss Roschman's bridesmaids were dressed in white, carrying bouquets of colored flowers; a little boy and girl, as flower children, were also in white. Miss Clarke's bridesmaids wore shepherdess dresses of mauve and yellow, and carried crooks with bouquets of violets attached. The little flower children, again a boy and girl, were also dressed in mauve and yellow. Both ceremonies were followed by receptions at which refreshments were served and toasts offered, the Pastor acting as toastmaster; then came dancing, during which the bride and groom made their escape amidst showers of confetti. It may be of interest to add that for the wedding on April 14th we managed to gather from among our members an orchestra consisting of organ, piano, violin, viola and flute; and this worthy organization played the Mendelssohn wedding march with much spirit as the bridal party left the church.

     The Easter season, as usual, was a busy one. On Good Friday evening a service was held in the chapel to commemorate the Lord's Passion. Easter morning, at 9:45, saw the children entering the church in procession, with the Pastor leading, to participate in a children's service appropriate to the day. The chancel was suitably decorated, and quite a number of adults attended. A 11 o'clock the regular Easter service followed, during which the Holy Supper was administered. On this occasion the choir sang the 22nd psalm.

     On the evening of Easter Monday our annual kirmess took place in the school room, commencing with a supper served at little tables on the European plan. After this a candy booth and fish pond were opened, and it was not long before both sources of supply were exhausted. An interval then ensued, during which we were asked to place our chairs so as to witness a mirrorscope picture of some of us as we looked way back in-? We were then shown some interesting postal card views brought by some of the boys from England. The evening then turned to dancing, which lasted until all were ready to depart for home.

     The Twelfth Ontario District Assembly opened in Toronto on April 16th, with thirty-seven Kitchenerites in attendance. Everyone seemed to be keenly ready for an Assembly, and the whole affair proved an unqualified success. We felt most fortunate in having with us throughout the meetings both the Bishop and the Rev. Alfred Acton.

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The Assembly was characterized by spiritual thought of a deeper nature and a sense of brotherhood in the Church. We all returned home feeling that we had spent a most useful and enjoyable time.

     During the week following, the Bishop visited us in Kitchener, and we had something resembling another assembly, with a ladies' meeting, a men's meeting, Friday supper and social, and a Sunday service at which the Bishop preached. At the ladies' meeting, which was held in the school room and was quite informal, the Bishop read the paper on the subject of salvation and immortality which he had read to the ladies' meeting in Toronto. Those who had attended the former meeting enjoyed hearing the paper again, and the questions and replies it called forth naturally took a different turn, and thus added new interest to the subject. At the Friday supper the Pastor gave an account of the Assembly, and the Bishop read another most interesting paper on a different aspect of the subject of immortality. Remarks were then made by various speakers, including the Rev. Lewis Slight, Pastor of the local Convention society. At the men's meeting the Bishop spoke informally, giving an interesting account of his experiences in Basutoland which was greatly appreciated by all present. It has been so long since we had a visit from the Bishop, that we are grateful to him for making this extra trip to come to see us.
     F. V. S.

     GLENVIEW, ILL.-On the Sunday morning following Easter, our Pastor preached on the subject of "The Resurrection of Man," this being especially appropriate as a preparation for the memorial service that was held in the afternoon in memory of Mr. Charles Francis Browne. The service was held in the parish hall and was attended by a large gathering of our own members, and from Sharon Church, Chicago, as well as a number of Mr. Browne's artist friends. Mr. Smith's memorial address was greatly appreciated, and was followed by remarks from several of our friends who had known Mr. Browne for many years, all testifying to the lovable and sterling character of our departed brother.
     G. A. MCQUEEN.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-April 10th to 14th, were spent at WINDSOR, ONTARIO, and DETROIT. On Sunday morning, the 11th, services were conducted at Windsor, with thirteen persons present, of whom nine partook of the Holy Supper. In the evening, at a gathering of several New Church people in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Field, at Birmingham, near Detroit, we spoke on the distinctiveness of the New Church. This led to a discussion of the question whether the New Church should take part in the Inter-Church Movement, and views were expressed on both the affirmative and the negative. On Monday evening a doctrinal class was held at Windsor, and on Tuesday evening, at Detroit. Also, during the afternoon, at Detroit, instruction was given to six children.

     The next place visited was ERIE, PA. On arriving here, I learned that Dr. Cranch, for many years the leader of the society, is seriously ill. His many friends throughout the Church will share the deep sympathy for him felt by the Erie members. A doctrinal class was held on Thursday evening, April 15th. On Saturday afternoon a children's service was held in the evening of the same day there was a delightful social at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Edro Cranch. On Sunday morning, at services, a new receiver, Mr. Clarence Urban, was baptized. Twenty-one persons were present, and at the Holy Supper there were sixteen communicants.

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In the evening a class was held at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Miltiades Glenn. Preceding the class, the infant son of Mr. and Mrs. Glenn was baptized. After the class we had an enjoyable sociable time. This gathering was full of encouragement for the future of the Erie Society. The attendance was the best we have had at a class for some time, seventeen persons being present, including Mr. and Mrs. Eric Nilson, formerly of Bryn Athyn, and of the Philadelphia Advent Society, who have now made their home at Erie, adding to the strength of the Society. During the social hour, the determination was reached to hold meetings more frequently.

     From Erie I went to BARBERTON, OHIO, where three of the Bryn Athyn young men now reside:-the Messrs. E. T. Asplundh, Bertram Smith, and Cyrus Doering. In the evening we had a doctrinal class, at which Mr. Hobart Smith, of Bryn Athyn, was also present, being in the city on a business trip. Unfortunately none of us knew the address of Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Behlert, who live in the adjoining city of Akron.

     The last place visited was COLUMBUS, OHIO, Where two days were spent with Mr. and Mrs. Wiley. With them lives Mrs. Allen, Mrs. Wiley's mother. And Miss Emme McQuigg, of Pomeroy, was visiting there at the time. On two afternoons instruction was given the children, and one evening we had class, at which, besides the above mentioned persons, a friend of the family was present.

     The members and friends of the General Church everywhere expressed their pleasure in the Weekly Sermons now being sent out. Their important use was considered at each place visited. It was pointed out that there should be not only the reading of the sermon, but also worship. The General Church, by these sermons and the suggestions for worship accompanying them, is providing the means for regular services for all its members. It is ministering, or seeking to minister, week by week, to all its members, wherever they may be. One person by himself can have the provided Sunday worship, or a family can have it, or several families can unite in it. And all who do it are worshiping, not by themselves alone, but as part of a large congregation, all having the same service and hearing the same sermon. This means a great strengthening of spiritual life with all the isolated, and in consequence with, the entire body.
     F. E. WAELCHLI

     TEN DAYS ON THE CONTINENT.

     After a breezy passage across the English Channel, we entered the harbor of Ostend, where we could see one of the British warships that lad been sunk there during the war now dragged to one side. Wooden sheds now serve for the railway station, only the skeleton of the former fine structure having survived the airplane bombardments. In Brussels we found few signs of the war. There were fewer taxicabs, and the street cars were not running normally, but otherwise there appeared to be little change.

     It was pleasant to find the Rev. and Madame Deltenre looking about the same as when I last saw them, and feeling in good spirits and optimistic about the work of the mission. The chapel has undergone a transformation. The two adjoining rooms have become a richly beautiful mass of color, culminating in a glorious burst of red and gold around the repository. I had previously seen a photograph, but it gave me no idea of its great beauty, which depends largely on the color for its effect. This little chapel has awakened a widespread public interest, insomuch that the Queen of Belgium has expressed a wish to see it.

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The painting is in modern style, and was done by M. Jean Jacques Gailliard, a young and enthusiastic convert of M. Deltenre, who devoted eight months to the designing and execution of this work without any recompense. He is now generally known as "The Swedenborgian Artist, and I hope that his collection of paintings will be exhibited in America. They portray a most interesting series of scenes from heaven, the world of spirits, and hell; also from the earths in the universe; every detail being a representation according to correspondences.

     M. Deltenre has recently received two new converts, one of whom was baptized while I was there. Unfortunately for the Brussels mission, forty per cent. of his converts have moved to other places. A friend in Malines, whom I had the pleasure of meeting, has interested a number of people in the New Church. The baptism of the young man, followed by the Holy Supper, was the most impressive service I ever attended, excepting only the dedication at Bryn Athyn. Whether this has due to the beauty of the chapel, to the impressive administration by M. Deltenre, or to the earnestness of the six persons present, I cannot say. The young man himself was deeply moved, as were all who were present.

     From Brussels I went to Paris, where I spent a delightful day with the Hussenets. M. Hussenet shows signs of the great strain he was under during the war. I had supper with a few of the enthusiastic young people of the society, among whom was a Mr. Boyeson, son of the well-known New Church minister of Sweden.

     Leaving Paris, I took the night train for Lausanne, Switzerland, where I spent three very interesting days with the society that is under the leadership of Pasteur Regamey. I had intended going on to Trieste, but owing to railroad strikes, was obliged to give this up and return to England.
     THEODORE PITCAIRN.
REFLECTION 1920

REFLECTION Rev. W. L. GLADISH 1920

     Announcements.


NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL          July, 1920           No. 7
     Writing in the Spiritual Diary, Swedenborg said: "I have now been in conversation with spirits and angels respecting reflection, to which [subject] do not know whether men sufficiently attend; but if they do attend to it, they will find more arcana in the doctrine of reflection than in any other whatsoever." (D. 733.)

     This is a remarkable statement. The Writings are filled with new doctrines,-doctrines vital to human salvation, opening the mysteries of heaven and revealing the wisdom of the highest angels. Yet, among all these new revelations, it is said that the doctrine of reflection contains "more arcana than any other doctrine whatsoever."

     He adds: "The doctrine of reflection is an entire doctrine, without which no one can know what the interior life is, and not even what the life of the body is; yea, without reflection from the knowledge of truth, "no one can be reformed." (D. 739) And still further: "The doctrine of faith effects nothing with man unless the Lord grants that he should reflect." (D. 737.)

     But what is it to reflect? What is the meaning of the word?

     Reflect is directly from the Latin, and means: "to turn, throw, or cast back." Rays of light are reflected from a mirror; are reflected, indeed, from all surfaces upon which they fall by this is sight. A man is said to reflect upon that to which he turns back his mind. Reflection follows knowledge. It is a turning back of the mind to something seen, heard, or felt, that there may be meditation upon it. Reflection involves comparison with other experiences and other knowledges, and the establishing of some relationship between them. In reflection, regard is had not only to that which is immediately under the mind's view, but also to those things, as it were, at the sides, so that their light is thrown upon the incident reflected upon.

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     The Arcana Coelestia says: "Reflection is the mental view of a thing, how it stands, and what is its quality; from this is perception." (3661) The Writings testify that very few reflect concerning the things of spiritual life: "At this day there are few who are being regenerated, and still fewer who reflect." (A. C. 4245.) "Those few who are being regenerated do not reflect upon such things [i. e., upon the relationship between natural and spiritual things] and cannot reflect, for they do not know what spiritual good is." (A. C. 4366.) "(Such states of regeneration) are unknown now because even those being regenerated do not reflect upon such things." (A. C. 5224.)

     Among the arcana of the doctrine of reflection are these: 1. That without reflection there is no truly human or rational life, and that both the quantity and quality of such life is according to the reflection. 2. That reflection, from which comes self-knowledge, must first be gained from others; afterwards it may be given through the Word. 3. That without reflection man remains in mere phantasies. 4. That although spirits and angels seem to themselves to reflect much more than men, yet reflection properly belongs to man in the world.

     Concerning the first proposition,-that without reflection there is no rational life,-note the following: "What reflection performs may be sufficiently evident to anyone when he considers that he perceives no sense of the body or any of its parts, nor does he know that he has a sensation, unless he reflect upon that part of his body; it is only then that he perceives heat, cold and pressure; yea, feels that by which he was before affected. If he reflect on his respiration, he then knows that he respires . . . besides innumerable other instances. In like manner, when man does not reflect upon those things that are in his mens or animus, namely, how he thinks, and what he thinks, what he does, and whence he acts. Without reflection he knows nothing except that a thing is, nor does he know anything else, thus not its quality." (D. 733, 734.)

     When engaged in thought, one will hear a clock strike the hour, will hear a bell, even a gun if it is an accustomed sound, and yet be all unconscious of these sounds. If there is no reflection upon it, no memory of the sound remains. Men in battle are sometimes wounded without being conscious of it.

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All those things to which no attention is given are to the man as if they had never been. They are not fixed in the memory. They form no part of his conscious life.

     As to those things upon which man does not reflect he is as if asleep. As this is true of bodily life, so also is it true of his mental life. If man does not reflect upon his own thoughts, he knows nothing of their quality. If he does not reflect upon his animus, he knows not what feelings rule him, whether good or evil. If he does not reflect upon the ends which prompt him, he is borne along by currents whose source he knows not, nor whither they tend. His life is then like that of the brutes. Like the beasts, he is, as it were, asleep as to any rational human life. He acts from a kind of instinct only, without any rational thought or choice of his own life.

     Reflection is wakefulness. He who reflects is awake, is vigilant, looks, as it were, all about him. The absence of reflection is a kind of sleep. One acts as in a dream, or like a sleep-walker. One man, therefore, may be vigilant concerning bodily life, but asleep concerning his mental life, and still more profoundly asleep concerning spiritual life; while another man, reflecting on internal things, may be as if asleep concerning the life of the body. This man is awake, is conscious, lives a human life, to the extent that he reflects; and his life is such as is his reflection. He lives the best balanced life who is awake on all planes, who reflects on external and natural things and at the same time on those interior and internal things which correspond to them. Such a man approaches toward the Divine vigilance which is the same on all planes, from inmosts to ultimates.

     The Word imparts this wakefulness on all planes, because so written that earthly things therein correspond to spiritual and celestial things, and because it is the very presence of God Himself with men. Swedenborg notes that it was given to him to be in both external and internal thought at the same time.

     These considerations perhaps sufficiently show that human or rational life is according to reflection; that the power to reflect is properly a human power, possessed only to a very small degree by brutes; and that, according to the quantity and quality of reflection, such is both the quantity and the quality of man's life.

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     As to the second point,-that reflection upon one's self must at first be from others, and that afterwards it may be from the Word,-consider the following teaching: "But if man reflects in himself from others, or if he suffers others to reflect upon him, and to say of what quality he is, then first can he know that he is of such a quality; otherwise he can never know it, but remains in his phantasies, and from them he reflects upon others; thus he considers truth n to be falsity, because he judges from phantasies; for such as is the principle from which we judge, such is everything thence derived." (D. 734.) Again: "A certain spirit who would fain arrogate merit to himself from his acts and his doctrine in the world, proceeding to a great distance in front, came to those who constitute the internal sense, or to the spirits of the planet Saturn, and said that he was nothing, and that he was desirous of serving them. But, at his very first approach, they replied that he wished to be great, and that they, being small, could not be with the great, thus intimating how much he arrogated to himself." (D. 1583.) "This spirit was made to pass into another state, in which he could reflect upon his life and see himself as it were in a glass, and then he confessed that he beheld himself deformed, defiled, overflowing with vileness, even to the point of utter loathing. In this manner spirits can be carried, as it were, out of themselves-or into themselves-and thus made to know themselves." (1586)

     No man can from himself know himself. The reason is that the spirits with a man are like himself. They rest within his sphere, and are of similar quality. All thought comes to man through his associate spirits. All the spirits with a man think of him as he thinks of himself. Nothing can come to him from the spiritual world without passing through his sphere and taking quality according to that sphere. Man, therefore, inevitably thinks of himself from self love; and, according to self love and its delusions and phantasies, he thinks of everything else, even including the Divine Word. He sees in the Word nothing contrary to his self love. He regards all other persons from his own self esteem.

     This is true until he suffers others to reflect upon him, and to say of what quality he is. Then first can he see himself as others see him. By his suffering others to reflect upon him, and to say of what quality he is, is meant that he listens and gives heed to what they say of him, reflects upon it, and believes it.

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No one can prevent others thinking of his quality, but he can refuse to receive criticism, can refuse to believe it even when forced to hear it. On the other hand, he can compel himself to listen to criticism of himself, and profit by it. By coming out of his own sphere into the sphere of others, he can get out of himself, or, rather, as it is said, can be enabled to "enter into himself" and see justly what is there.

This shows how important it is for us not to live alone. Only by association with others do we learn to know ourselves. And the more closely and intimately we live with others in true friendship, loving truth, the more intimately may we know ourselves. Our friends, no matter how warm their friendship, are rarely blind to our faults; but we ourselves are, by the very nature of the case, almost wholly blind to our own faults. And since self-knowledge is the beginning of wisdom, the need of initiating growing children into an acknowledgment of their faults is suggested. They may be taught by clear-sighted and loving parents and teachers to see and confess their faults, before they are blinded by the love of self. It is hardly necessary to say that this can only be done from a tender affection that does not arouse the spirit of opposition in them. When this is aroused, their light is gone, because heaven is closed to them, and they are no longer able to see and confess their faults. Children so reared come to maturity without the ability to see and confess their evils-a faculty that can be acquired only with difficulty by the adult.

After one has learned from others to see his evils, he can then begin to see them from the Word. As we read again: "It may also be stated that the doctrine of faith effects nothing whatever with man unless the Lord gives him to reflect. Wherefore, men learn what is true and good from the Lord's Word, in order that they may thereby reflect upon themselves, whether they are such. This reflection is awakened in them at certain times, especially in times of trouble. Wherefore, to know truths is of the greatest moment, for without the knowledge of truth there can be no reflection, and consequently no reformation." (D. 737.) Again: "Wherefore, to the men of this earth, because they live in a perverse state, written truths are delivered by the Lord, whence they may derive, as from a fountain, the knowledge of truth, from which they can reflect upon themselves, or, more properly, from which, inscribed on their memory, the Lord can give them reflection upon their own falsities and other things of like sort.

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Wherefore, without knowledges there can be no reformation." (D. 739.)

     There are two purposes, therefore, in all reading of the Word, in all study of doctrine, in all preaching and teaching from the Word. These are, on the one hand, the knowledge of the good and the true, and, on the other hand, the knowledge of self. The first accomplishes nothing without the second. One may have the arcana of the highest heaven, but if he does not know himself, he knows nothing to any purpose. The two kinds of knowledge must go side by side, with equal step.

     Christendom has had the Word for nineteen centuries, and although the externals of life are in some respects improved, it is to be feared that her deep-seated evils still retain all the power they had in the beginning of our era. And so we learn from the Writings that the men of the Church enter the other life breathing forth revenge and lust, and yet regarding themselves as pure, and fit for heaven. They had the truths of the Word, but failed to reflect upon their evils and shun them.

     In the New Church, we have rejoiced in the beauties of the New Revelation, but it is to be feared that we have not yet learned to reflect upon ourselves as we ought. There is no rainbow without a cloud. We cannot know and love light unless we know darkness. As the Word is opened, over against the Divine mercy appear the evils of the Jewish people. These evils are our evils, and they are placed in the Word to the end that men and angels may know to eternity the nature of the human proprium.

     It was said (3) that without reflection man lives In phantasies. We read: "I have been taught from manifest experience that the rational and intellectual can be taken away either almost entirely or partially from souls and again restored to them; for the rational and intellectual is a gift of God Messiah Alone. When this is taken away, the souls are devils, and act solely from a certain natural instinct, and are, as it were, in sleep; and when it is restored to them, they know no otherwise than that they have been in sleep. These things were shown to me for several days. When they are in that state, they act according to their root evil, each according to the quality of the root, and, indeed, contrary to order, to heaven and its truths-in a word, they are devils of various quality.

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That the intellectual principle was taken away from them, was manifestly shown, and also their natural instincts, which are not like the instincts of brute animals, but are from a diabolical principle; inasmuch as they then continually act against spiritual and celestial things, and think that they can do all things from themselves." (D. 372.)

     Let us notice especially two points in this number. 1. The intellectual and rational is the gift of God Messiah Alone, i. e., the gift of the Lord through Revelation-in Christendom through the Word. 2. When the intellectual is taken away from spirits, they are mere devils, acting from a kind of natural instinct, yet not like brutes, but from a diabolical principle.

     The reason that this is true will be apparent to every instructed New Churchman. Since the fall, man's natural is perverted, turned away from God to self and the world; therefore the Divine life inflowing into it is turned into its opposite, into insanity and hatred. So far as man has any rational life, it is from his growing up in the sphere of the Word and imbibing thence sound principles of thought. When the Word is taken away, that is, when truths from the Word are taken away, man is no longer man, and has nothing human; for the human is added to him by the Lord after birth. We are not born men, but animals, with the faculty of becoming men by education, i. e., by the Word.

     Now the truths of the Word are in the memory by education, but they only become man's own by reflection-by reflection upon himself, as to whether he is such as the Word teaches he should be.

     Only by reflection does he reject his hereditary life and permit the Lord to engraft a new life from the Word upon the old stock of his own proper life.

     This shows (4) the great difference between the reflection of men in the world and that of spirits and angels. Man in the world has the Word in the letter; has also his natural and corporeal memory, thus the memory of the past and of all he has gained by past experience. With spirits and angels this memory is closed, and they have not the letter of the Word. Instead of memory they have what the Writings call indoles, or disposition; that is, they have all that they have made their own by life, but no store-house of truths in the memory not yet incorporated in the life, as man has.

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     Reflection, as we know it, is from the memory, and from truths there. This kind of reflection spirits and angels have not. Their reflection is only such as is the quality of their life, accompanied by a perception and continual revelation of the particulars involved in the truths they have lived. But notice this interesting teaching. Spirits can also be given reflection from men with whom they are associated. And this reflection can also be given to angels when, for purposes of amendment, they are let into their natural, and thus descend to the world of spirits.

     When a man meditates upon the Word, the spirits who are with him meditate upon the Word. When he sees his evils, especially When he reflects that they inflow from spirits who are with him, the spirits are driven to reflect upon their own nature. The man's reflection upon them-from the Word-passes to them and becomes their own. If they are capable of amendment, they are corrected, reformed, through the man's reflection as a means; if not capable of amendment, they are exposed, judged, and pass to their own place, ridding the world of spirits of their pestilential sphere-and this through man's meditation from the Word.

     In this manner, the man who reflects upon his evils serves not only himself but also the spiritual world, thus mankind in both worlds. And yet he should know that of himself he can do no least part of this work. The Word, whence he thinks, is the Lord's, and is implanted in his memory solely of the Lord's mercy; and the power to think is the Lord's, inflowing into that Word the ability to see himself as evil is wholly the Lord's gift. It is the Lord inflowing from within into what is Divine from the Word with man. Indeed, it is the Lord who thinks in the man, and yet imparts that thought to man as his own. Consequently, the work of man's own reformation and regeneration, and all the work for others that is done from the Word through him, is solely the Lord's work. If we but yield ourselves to Him, and co-operate with Him, He works in us, and through us, and, of His great mercy, gives us to feel it as our own, that we may enter into the joy of our Lord.

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MAN BORN BLIND 1920

MAN BORN BLIND N. D. PENDLETON 1920

     "One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see." (John 9:25.)

     The man was blind from his birth. The disciples said, "Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents?" Jesus answered, "Neither," but that it was so allowed in order that the "works of God should be made manifest in him." The Lord then made clay of spittle, anointed the eyes of the blind man, and commanded him to go and wash in the pool of Siloam, after which "the man came seeing." This was done on the Sabbath day. The Pharisees, hearing of it, questioned the man, and he told them what Jesus had done to him, saying, "He is a prophet." The Pharisees, not believing, questioned the man's parents, who affirmed the truth. Again they called the man that was blind, and said to him, "Give God the praise: we know that this man is a sinner;" and the man answering them, said, "Whether he be a sinner, I know not: One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see." Then the Pharisees reviled him, saying, "Thou art His disciple, but we are Moses' disciples. We know that God spake unto Moses: as for this one, we know not whence he is." Then the man whose eyes were opened said, "Why herein is a marvelous thing, that ye know not from whence He is, and yet He hath opened my eyes. . . . Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind."

     To be "born blind" signifies a state of enforced ignorance, which, because enforced, is blameless. Neither the man nor his parents had sinned. It was so allowed in order that the "works of God" might be "made manifest." Enforced ignorance is blameless because of the lack of opportunity, as with those born without the pale of the Church,-who have not the Word and know not the Lord. Being removed from the source of spiritual enlightenment, they may not be measured by the high standards of the Church. Their obscurity cannot be counted against them, since they are in a region beyond the penetrating lays of direct Divine Revelation.

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It is otherwise with those born within the pale. These have, or should have, a superior spiritual conscience, a higher moral code; and a more enlightened civilization. Certainly they have the opportunity of developing genuine spiritual life, being, as they are, within the compass of the light proceeding from God-Man. This light makes for a distinct spiritual life. It is the same as the light of heaven derived from the Sun thereof. Men in the world, who adapt their lives to the sphere of that light, after death become angels of the new heavens,-those interior heavens that are formed of the worshipers of God in the Human, which worship is the highest the human mind is capable of. These enter upon a distinctly spiritual life even while in the world. Their advantage is that spiritual seeds have been implanted in their natural, superior truths of a direct Divine origin. Such men enter the life to come with a formed spiritual-natural capable of receiving and reacting to the inflowing of the Divine in a distinctly broader and more fundamental way. Their life hereafter may be enlarged beyond those who have not this ground of influx. Such is the potency which lies in the rays of direct Divine Revelation when received during life in the world. Such are the possibilities open to those who love the Word and know the Lord.

But along with this possibility of higher spiritual development and greatest good, there is the liability of greater error and deeper wrong. Herein is the saying true that much is expected of him to whom much is given. With knowledge comes power, and with power a higher freedom and increased responsibilities. The Lord said to the Pharisees, who knew the Scripture, "If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, 'We see,' therefore your sin remaineth." Every man's responsibility is measured by the knowledge that has entered into the formation of his conscience. And his knowledge depends upon his providential opportunities and the use he makes of them. Like opportunities are not given to all, nor do men utilize those that are given to an equal degree. One will make much of the priceless possession-the Word-another little; some nothing. Of the latter it is said that their "sin remaineth." They have despised the healing waters of "Shiloah that go softly." "Having eyes, they see not." They have the Word, but know it not.

It is otherwise with the "born blind," whose lack of knowledge whose ignorance of the Lord, is a circumstance of Providence.

395

It was once believed that these were lost by an arbitrary dictate of the Almighty. The inhumanity of this dogma has caused it to fall into disrepute. It is felt that there must be a better fate in store for the Gentiles. Besides, some of them are not so unenlightened as has been supposed. They have not the Word, it is true, and therefore cannot know the Lord; but there lingers with them an afterglow of spiritual light from the vanished ancient churches, from which certain nations have derived profound philosophies, as well as moral codes of a high order. Their spiritual sun is indeed below their mental horizon, but they enjoy a spiritual twilight, now deepening into night; but it is a night which goes before the morning of a new day. The awakening of the nations into this day is represented by the man born blind, whose eyes were opened by a Divine miracle, and who answered all doubts, saying, "One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see."

This awaking to the light will occur in accordance with the significance of that miracle, namely, when the clay is mixed with spittle and rubbed upon their eyes by the Lord's hand; that is, when they come into the knowledge and acknowledgment of the letter of the Word. It is so revealed. The man born blind typifies the Gentiles. The ground upon which the Lord stood,-that is, Canaan,-signifies the Church, where the Word is. Upon this ground the Lord spat, and taking with His hand, He shaped a mold of clay, and anointed the eyes born blind. And the man, after washing in Siloam, "came seeing." The clay thus mixed, and applied by the hand of the Lord, signifies the reformation of the Gentiles by truths from the letter of the Word; for the clay was of the soil of Canaan, and the moisture from the mouth of the Lord. The mold for anointing, thus made, signifies "the ultimate Divine forming," (A. E. 239). It is a type of the whole creation and the Divine forming therein; it is also a type of the Word, the literal Word, which is an image of creation in ultimates. This Word, therefore, is that ultimate Divine forming and formed, by means of which the eyes born blind may be opened to see the glory of the Lord in His Second Coming.

To this end, there is the obvious leading of Providence, the worldwide movement to place the Word in every land, to transpose it into every tongue. There will be no sudden conversion. In matters of such moment, Providence works through ages.

396

Christianity is not yet prepared to inaugurate and truly sustain a great conversion of the Gentile nations. Yet the truth stands that this is the work of the future. And, as preliminary thereto, the letter of the Word must be received before the light of the Second Advent can dawn. Before a conversion of the nations can occur, Christianity must he made over, made new, by a reception of the regenerating truths of the Second Advent, whereby it will be purified of falsities and cleared of evils, so that it may "revive and draw breath," and stand-a living man before the Lord.

     At this time, there is night over Christian lands. There is even more of spiritual light with the Gentiles. These have not the Word, and know not the Lord, but they have truth concerning the life to come in their common thought. In many respects they live a better life more in accordance with their religion. Because of this, they are prejudiced against Christians, and offended by the name of Christ. Still their own lack is vital; they are "born blind." Without a knowledge of the Word, and of the Lord, a genuine spiritual church cannot be established. This knowledge is the ointment which must be spread upon their eyes before there can be an opening to the light of the new spiritual day.

     The man born blind stands for the Gentiles, and for the gentile state in every man, that is, the state of blindness, or ignorance, prior to the time when the Word is valued and the Lord known. We may in some measure appreciate the difference of state before and after the opening of the eyes by the Lord's hand; but it is only after we have undergone this experience that we fully understand the exulting answer of the man to the doubting Pharisees: "One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see." It is so with those who in mercy have their eyes opened to see the inner Word revealed. They know that they see.

     Many have asked: "What is truth!" even as Pilate. The inner revealing light, in which the harmony of all things is perceived-this is truth. It has always been apperceived by celestial minds because of their concordance; but is now revealed to the spiritual by an appearing of the Lord in the midst of His Word. The many voices of past revelations now speak as one-and this one with all authority. The speaking is not by sound, but by inner radiations of the Light of the Spiritual Sun, encompassing the Human Glorified.

397

It may no longer be asked: "What is truth?" Truth is known. "One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see." Thus to see, to know, sensitively to appreciate and be wise in the truth, is the "Yea, yea, and nay, nay" period of human development of which the Lord spoke. Nothing can be more convincing than this opening of the mind to the harmonies of truth, to the perception of the order of universal creation and the Divine Life immanent therein.

This perception is given as a result of high spiritual development with those who put away evil and love the truth,-the Divine Human series of Truth Revealed-made manifest in Scripture and in all creation. This superb perceptive faculty is denied those who know truth and by it serve themselves. Only from good affections leading away from self can this sensing perceptive be developed; but once it is given, the laws of the universe manifest themselves, because of their correspondence with the ordering of such a mind. Visions of the Divine and the Divine ends in creation are also given.

The mind is thus perceptive because it is molded into accordance by the inner fire of love. In this state of mind the Lord is seen in His Divine Human, wherever the look is fixed, whether upon the types and images of ancient Scripture, or upon the objects of the create world, or upon His natural Person as He appeared in the world, speaking to men words of infinite love and mercy,-words of redeeming power, sufficient to raise the dead,-or when He hung upon the cross, fulfilling the measure of all pain, or when, on the third day, He rose from the tomb in all the majesty and glory of a self-living, life-giving Body. The Lord is seen, and the inward ends and high purposes in creation are made known. It is a vision of the Almighty who came down and lived the life of a man on earth,-lived it through, and reascended with the redeemed bound unto Himself, even those who had known captivity for ages past. It was so done. Though men knew it not, it is now known, the fact is revealed, the reason given, the cause explained. It may never pass from human minds. It is known, and with it all truth and the harmony thereof; but known in the way of which we speak, and to those only whose eyes have been opened, and who can say, as did the man born blind: "One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see."

398

I see a Divine vision, revealing Him-His eternal purpose, His final accomplishment, His salvation, and the way of His Providence, leading through the valley of death unto life eternal. Amen.
SPIRIT AND STATE OF THE LEARNED WORLD 1920

SPIRIT AND STATE OF THE LEARNED WORLD Rev. HOMER SYNNESTVEDT 1920

     "The idea of God as Man is implanted from heaven in every nation in the whole world; but, what I lament, it has been destroyed in Christendom." (A. E. 1097.)

     "By means of sciences the learned among Christians have extinguished all the gift of perception; they cannot grasp that the Lord is the only God; and so they, least of all, can receive the heavenly doctrine." (Diary 4779.)

     SCIENCE VERSUS PERCEPTION.

     One great and striking difference in our thought,-which indeed runs through all our thinking,-is that we recognize that there is such a thing as Truth which is true in itself-infinitely, unalterably and Divinely true, and thus authoritative. That we also postulate the statement of this Divine Truth in Divinely provided forms of doctrine in Revelation, is but an added difference. For instance, we could agree with any religiosity,-whether Christian, Mohammedan, or others,-that there is a Divine Revelation, an authoritative source of wisdom from the Divine, which is thus a fountainhead of life and light to the soul. Our only difference would be as to where this Revelation is to be found, and what its genuine teachings are. In all religions there are some- fortunately, they are more plentiful outside of Christendom than inside of it, according to the Writings-who still possess the fundamental or axiomatic perceptions upon which religion rests; namely, that God is, and that He is One; also that He must somewhere, somehow, be accessible, and indicate His Will to mankind in Revelation of some sort. "But, what I lament," says Swedenborg, "this has been destroyed in Christendom." Here alone, among our leaders in the so-called Christian seats of learning, and in alarmingly growing numbers elsewhere, we are forced to meet the negative state of minds that question these fundamentals, or definitely deny them.

399

     Pilate said: "What is Truth?" Whether he meant which was true among all the contending systems-Oriental, Greek, or Jewish-that daily came before him, or had come to the completely vastated state of those who doubted whether there was any such thing as truth, it would be hard to determine. The form of his question would seem to involve the modern state of doubt as to whether there is such a thing. In this world, probably a majority are confirmed in neither the affirmative nor the negative of the truths of religion. But for the most part they dwell in doubt, because in obscurity arising from the undetected and unchecked spheres of the delights of the natural man. This is the veil that forms a covering over the face of the whole earth, as described in A. C. 44232. They dwell in such obscurity, whether here, or in the lower earth, or under the earth,-merely because it is to the best interests of all concerned that judgment be deferred, even as the tares are allowed to grow with the wheat until the harvest.

     Here is where our friends, the permeationists in the New Church, are so often deceived; for they suppose that the rejection of this or that old false doctrine involves or prepares the way for the reception of the heavenly truth itself. But, before accepting this conclusion, (a prejudiced one in many cases, the wish being father to the thought), we should examine these rejections to ascertain whether they do not carry away with them all ideas of Doctrine from any Divinely authoritative source. To lose the old, falsified persuasions, only to plunge into the deeper abyss of modern skepticism of every idea of the Divine Human and His power to lead and teach us, and of His love and ever-present desire to do so, is surely not a step toward the truths of religion, but away from them into the very night of spiritual extinction.

     I take it that the New Church has carried on its warfare, with frequent successes in the past, among those who have found themselves bound and in the mental prison-house of the old falsities, but who have at the same time desired freedom, and have been able to detect the genuine truths of Revelation when presented to them. But what can we hope to do with those who have lost all their affirmative remains of the perception that there is a God of love and truth, from whom we may expect to receive light, if only we seek faithfully?

400

     Is there such a thing as Divine Doctrine? Is there formulated and enunciated Truth that is true in itself-as true as the laws of the universe? Or are all Doctrines, whether inspired or not, but human interpretations of Truth itself, or of the fundamental laws of God as inscribed both upon Nature and upon the human heart? We know that the Word of God, as given to the Jews, was written in accommodation to their external, sensual, and corporeal states. So, in less measure, the Gospels themselves. There were many things that our Lord could not tell them then; "Without a parable spake He not unto them." But He promised that the Paraclete would fully reveal all things of the Divine to men at the time of the Second Coming. Have we such a Word now? Or is the Revelation of the Second Coming only another of these veiled and accommodated human expressions of truth, albeit inspired? Are the Doctrines only the way to the Lord, telling about Him and His eternal laws? Or are they His very Self, revealed in forms that are Divine and not Human! If we have such a doctrine, if our Heavenly Doctrines are really that,-then we have a treasure that is beyond all else in the world-a treasure which few in the world even claim to have. Indeed, the prevailing thought among the learned is that no such truth exists or can be given.

     What can we do with minds which affirm that the words, "Seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you," apply and can apply, only to matters of sense investigation? who assert positively that all so-called transcendent or spiritual matters belong to the realms of the unknowable? who thus close the door at the threshold, and will not even let their pupils try to enter into religious truth when yet religious or spiritual truth is the only truth that is really worth while, that can give direction, and teach the right use of all other knowledge, whether physical, civil, or moral?

     Now, right here is where I suspect that some of the "very elect" are deceived. They assert most emphatically that the latest trend among the learned is away from the bald materialism of the last generation, which followed the scientific revolution of Darwin and Spencer and the rest, and which reached its extreme in Germany, as exemplified by Haeckel.

401

These New Church apologists acknowledge, indeed, that this revolution did carry down with it the whole structure of ecclesiastical faith and Bible authority, upon which the Christian Church that survived the Protestant Revolution had rested up to that time. But they claim that religion has survived, and is all the stronger since being purged of its medieval enswathements. And they expect us to believe this, in spite of the fact that now more than ever those scientific men reject the Divine birth of Christ, the literal inspiration of Scripture, and the idea of an anthropomorphic God!

     But what, then, are we to do? We cannot follow these leaders; for in purely spiritual matters we see them to be but "blind leaders of the blind," not looking to the Lord for enlightenment, not even acknowledging Him clearly as God Man, our Savior and Guide, whose loving care is in everything, and who provides us with a sure guide somewhere. But, by reaction of their instinctive remains of an inarticulate craving for something spiritual, they yet hope to discover the truth from themselves and their senses, and insist upon subjecting the Revelation of all revelations to the reed and plumb line of strictly materialistic tests and proofs.

     Has man a soul, distinct from his bodily or animal life? Does it survive death? "Nonsense." cries Haeckel. Nothing but "superstitions" and "old wives tales,"-the "survival of the childish and barbaric ignorance of our evolutionary past,"-say many high priests of Science, who now occupy the seats of the mighty. But a new generation is arising, you say. Thinking men everywhere are now reacting against these extreme positions. The old Christian faith is indeed gone, never to return, but new grounds of faith are in survival, and thus some kind of a spiritual responsibility for our moral code must be found, they say. So they turn to psychic research, still trusting to sense, and fall into spiritualism. But where are they looking for the truth? In what direction are their faces turned?

     To the New Churchman it is clear that they are either trying to manufacture a religion out of the materials of their own human rationality, or else they are expecting to discover its existence by the use of the senses, unaided by the Lord, and without the light of a spiritual discernment that can only come from within, and only to him who humbles his own self-derived intelligence, and prayerfully turns his heart and his thought to the Sun of all spirit and life, whose radiance must come to man through the medium of some Divinely-provided Revelation.

402

     Nothing is more clear to the New Churchman, as it has been to the wise of all ages, than that man has two sources of light in the mind, the one from above or within,-which alone is able to detect ends, and to link us understandingly with the Divine plan of Creation, and the other from without, through the gate of the senses, giving us access to all the materials of our thought and action. It is indeed true, as Roger Bacon long ago asserted, that there can be nothing in the mind that was not first in the senses. For such is the interaction between the influx from within and the objective phenomena that enter from without, that we must have a plane of ultimate objects in order to see anything. But although we can see the things of this world in the light of the physical sun and the bodily senses, we do not really see those things in a human sense until we reflect upon them, compare them, and thus begin to understand what they are for and how to use them.

     PERCEPTION.

     Now the light that gives us this ability of perception, and thus distinguishes us unbridgeably from the beasts, is the light of heaven-the light of an interior rationality or intelligence, operating in and by a set of spiritual faculties or organs, and by no means discoverable or significant through the exercise of the merely natural faculties, depending as these do upon whatever impinges upon the outer senses. Here, I take it, is our basic ground of difference from the learned world outside of the Church, and outside of a very few truly religious men among them who, like the wise men of old, still wait for their Lord, and are ready to rise and follow, what time His star appears in the East.

     There is much talk of a reverse of attitude upon the part of "Science" toward the fact of the survival of human life, and with some even toward the value of the mission of Christ, and the moral importance of the reforms instituted by Him. For they see that, without an authority from God, there can be no hope of restoring a Christian morality upon any basis above mere expediency.

403

But, while all this sounds very well, and at first brings a sense of relief from the arrogant and blighting materialism of the previous generation, what does it amount to when examined in the light of interior spiritual truth? And, more important still, what does it promise for the New Church, in the direction of meeting the Lord in His Second Coming to re-establish His Kingdom?

     Some of our friends declare that they know professors at the colleges whose minds are open, and who at least do not deny the reality of the life after death, or that Christ was sent by God and was therefore Divinely inspired in what He taught and did. So far so good; for the Writings say that some will receive. But still we must inquire: Does this attitude prevail sufficiently to give quality to the sphere of the colleges and their teaching? An affirmative answer would modify our whole line of effort, and make it desirable for us to align ourselves with the permeationists. But is it warranted?

     Naturally we are glad to recognize in the world about us, and with gratitude to the Lord, any signs of an effort on the part of men to turn their eyes back to Christ, or to the Word of God. It is by such means that our Lord is preserving the remnant among them and postponing their final dissolution, as He promised, until such time as the New Church-now begun in the other world, and in course of incubation here-can be prepared to take the field in sufficient strength to inherit the earth, or in any way adequately to feed the vast number of the simple and children who are still getting their famine dole from the old sources. "Little by little will I drive them out from before thee," saith the Lord, lest the land be left uninhabited, and become desolate, when wild beasts multiply. Even the Old Church, dead as it is within, and devoid of rational truths when it comes to explaining and understanding their old traditional dogmas, is still a powerful factor in holding up certain moral and quasi-religious standards in the communities of Christendom. Wise statesmen recognize this, and not only tolerate but even encourage the various religions, in spite of all their shortcomings; for they see that to destroy the old faiths before some new cult has taken hold upon the consciences and lives of the people would leave them a prey to wild beasts of all sorts, even anarchy, rapine and murder.

     But does this fact, and the recurrence from time to time of reactions against the great tide of skepticism and materialism, justify the New Churchman in accepting the permeation theory, and expecting that the Old Church, without repentance and temptation combats, is to be the scene of the descent and growth of the new age, of the kingdom of God that is to endure for ages of ages?

404

Is the Academy movement a mistake, then, and our judgment as to the hopelessness of restoring Christianity, except outside of the Old Church, a hasty judgment, based upon the revealed statements as to conditions in Swedenborg's time, and also upon a supposedly temporary wave of scientific materialism that is now happily passed?

     INTERNAL STATE OF CHRISTENDOM.

     Let us now turn from our brief survey of the outer conditions, as they appear in the world about us, and recall the position taken by the early Academy, and the teachings of the Heavenly Doctrines which led to it. In the Words for the New Church, we read:

     "We cannot determine the interior states of men by the outward appearance. But if we would know the Truth, and thus form a true judgment of the state of the Christian world, we must resort to the Divine Revelations in the Writings of the New Church. The three essentials of the Church are: 1. The acknowledgment of the Divinity of the Lord. 2. The acknowledgment of the Holiness of the Word. 3. The life which is called Charity. (D. P. 259.) Is the Christian world coming into the acknowledgment of these principles? Are the great nations and churches in Christian lands, even in outward appearance, to say nothing of the inner life, any nearer the first and second of these essentials of the New Church now than they were a century ago? Do the churches, communities, or nations, of the present day, any more than did their ancestors, acknowledge the Divinity of the Lord or the Holiness of the Word?" (Vol. I, p. 82.)

     "The Church at this day is so vastated of faith and love that though men know and understand, they do not acknowledge, and still less believe, except a few who are in the life of good and are called the elect, who can now be instructed, and with whom a New Church is to be instituted. But where these are, the Lord alone knows; there will be few within the Church. . . . "(A. C. 3898.)

     "In a declining church the will becomes more prone to evils and falsities. But when the church is consummated and perishes, then the Lord always raises up a new one somewhere, though rarely, if ever, from the men of the former church, but from the gentiles who have been in ignorance." (A. C. 2910.)

     "The idea of the Divine Human of the Lord has been altogether destroyed in the Christian churches, especially with the learned there; only with the simple does anything of it remain. . . .

405

Few, in thinking of the Lord, think of His Divine, but they think of Him as a man like themselves. And yet, with this idea of the Divine, no one can enter heaven, but is repelled as soon as he touches the threshold of the way that leads thither." (A. E. 808.)

     "The idea of the Divine Human, concerning God, is in all the earths in the universe; and also with the gentiles of this earth, as with the Africans; this from the influx of heaven. But this idea has been destroyed with Christians, especially among the intelligent." (Ath. Cr. 189.)

     "They who are within the Church are so depraved in disposition and nature that they want to have an invisible God who does not come into their thought and of whom no idea can be formed. . . . Wherefore they do not acknowledge the Lord as God because He was a man. . . . But to worship God under the human form has been inscribed from heaven on the nature of the nations outside of Europe, also upon some within Europe." (Diary 4772.)

     "They who enter the other life from the Christian world are the worst of all, hating the neighbor, hating the faith, and denying the Lord; for in the other life hearts speak, not the mouth only. Besides, they are given to adultery more than others." (A. C. 1886, Preface.)

     This state is little realized because "by frequent use and habit things become immersed in the delights of life, and thus disappear from man's sight and reflection." (A. C. 4633.) "At this day there are few who are regenerated, and still fewer who reflect." (A. C. 4245)

     "Scarcely anyone knows how the case is with the rejection of an old church and the adoption of a new. He who does not know man's interiors, and the states thereof, and hence his states after death, can comprehend no otherwise than that those who are of the old church, with whom good and truth have been vastated, that is, no longer acknowledged in heart, are to perish, either like the antediluvians by a flood, or like the Jews by expulsion from their land, or in some other way. But when the church has been vastated, that is, when it is no longer in any good of faith, it perishes principally as to the states of its interiors, thus as to states in the other life. Heaven then removes itself from them, and consequently the Lord, and transfers itself to others, who are adopted in their place; for without a church somewhere on the earth there is no communication of heaven with man, since the church is like the heart and lungs of the Gorand Man on earth. They who are of the old church at that time, and who are thus removed from heaven, are in a kind of inundation as to their interiors. . . . Man himself, so long as he lives in the body, does not apperceive this inundation, but he comes into it after death, when it manifestly appears as a kind of foggy mist encompassing him, by which he is separated from heaven. The state of those who are in that foggy mist is that they cannot possibly see what the truth of faith is, and still less its good; for the light of heaven, in which there is intelligence and wisdom, cannot penetrate that cloud. This is the state of the vastated church." (A. C. 4423.)

406

     PERMEATION.

     But the permeationists think that because the salvable good are distributed everywhere among the rest in Christendom, and because only those are hopeless who have confirmed faith alone and the other enormities of the Old Church in their lives, that therefore the "New Age" or "New Dispensation," (they do not often call it the "New Church"), is descending and spreading everywhere by sheer force of the common sense of the people, and owing to the removal of the obstructing spheres in the world of spirits since the last judgment. That this expectation is vain, was amply shown in the Words for the New Church, from which we quote some of the conclusions there stated:

     "When the Christian world destroyed the Church of the Lord established among them, they passed into the ever-enduring night of evil; not mainly outward and apparent evil, but inward and often unconscious evil; evil covered and concealed by civil, moral, and religious habits and usages; and unconscious, because they did not hold it essential to examine themselves, and shun evils as sins. The Lord, being thus abandoned, departed to others, in gentile lands; and Christians thereafter, except the few, lived like pagans without religion. (A. R. 150; T. C. R. 961.) Inasmuch, then, as there is in the Church once consummated a continued growth of interior evils, these evils descending unabated to successive generations, (A. C. 4503; 10134), how can the disposition to acknowledge the Lord as God be engrafted in the posterity of the Christian world?

     "1. It cannot be done by the power of heaven, when the minds of men are so closed as to prevent or pervert the influx. . . .

     "2. Neither can the disposition to acknowledge God as Man, and the Lord as God, be restored by general religious instruction from the Word and books of piety. There is no internal acknowledgment, and without this, external instruction avails nothing, being like the seed that fell not on good ground. (Mark 4.)

     "3. Nor can this disposition be restored by Old Churchmen teaching their children the Decalogue. For the parents themselves, and also their children when they become adult, adopt the notion that they are not under the law, nor able to keep it on religious grounds, as stated in the Doctrine of Life, no. 64.

     "4. Nor, finally, can the disposition to acknowledge the Lord as God be effectually inserted by remains implanted in childhood; for these, in manhood, are first enfeebled, then vitiated, and at length consumed. This results from the overwhelming mass of inward and outward evils, falsities, and fallacies of sense, accumulated and confirmed, filling and tainting the whole atmosphere as with a fatal contagion, spreading secretly and openly, corrupting the fountains and currents of affection and thought, exciting, enticing, and powerfully bearing away the young, who yield a willing acquiescence, and who thus in heart and thought, if not in overt act, confirm inwardly in themselves the enormous perversity and wickedness of their hereditary nature.

407

Against such forces, leagued as they are with the hells, how can the remains of childhood stand and prevail?. . .
     "Still, the 'remnant' from the Christian world will ever be watching,-watching for the morning,-and in the time appointed in the Divine Providence will see the light, and be gathered into the New Church on earth, or in heaven!" (Vol. I, pp. 120-123.)

     THE REMNANT.

     On the extent and duality of remains with men at this day we have the following teaching:

     "The Lord alone knows the quality and quantity of man's remains; the man himself can never know this; for at the present day, man is such that he can feign good, while within there is nothing but evil; and a man may appear to be evil, when yet he has good within. Wherefore, it is never allowed a man to judge concerning the quality of the spiritual life of another; for, as we have said, the Lord alone knows this. But it is allowed everyone to judge of another in regard to the quality of his moral and civil life, for this is in the interests of society. It is very common for those who have taken up an opinion respecting some truth of faith, to judge of others that they cannot be saved unless they believe likewise, when yet the Lord prohibited this in Matthew 7:1, 2. ["Judge not, that ye be not judged."] It has been made known to me by much experience that men of every religion are saved, if only, by the life of charity, they have received remains of good and of apparent truth. This is what is meant by its being said that 'if ten were found, they would not be destroyed for ten's sake' (Genesis 18:32), by which was signified that they would be saved if there were remains." (A. C. 2284.)

     As concerns those who are outside of our specific Church, our attitude should be to "strengthen the things that remain" (Rev. 3:1-3), encouraging on all planes whatever is useful and wholesome in tendency, being as ready to show appreciation and thankfulness for wholesome elements, wherever we find them, as we are to criticize and oppose the doctrines and practices which we recognize as destructive or unwholesome. I cannot imagine a heart and lungs which is hostile both to the poisons of the body and to the whole mass of elements which, by reason of some remnant of good life from religion, are to be its body.

408

     OUR RESPONSIBILITY.

     In the Writings of Swedenborg are contained the Lord's own unfolding of His truths and laws of order, and only by these can the world be saved from the present alarming growth of skepticism and irreligion. Only in the Writings can rational ground be found upon which to stand against the growing materialism of the learned. Only the unfolding of the spiritual or internal sense of the Scriptures can restore a belief in their plenary inspiration. By the revelation of the realities of the spiritual world in detail, the rational explanation of its laws and their interaction with our natural world, the belief in the other world is to be restored, and with it the true spiritual quality of religious thought and motive. Thus we realize the full responsibility of all our doings here, as a preparation which conditions our life hereafter to eternity, changes our whole outlook upon life, and is the only means of restoring a truly religious attitude in all our affairs.

     This is the way, and the only way, to restore Christian civilization. And it must begin at the foundations. We must restore to the children, and preserve with them until they are able to defend themselves, the basic instinct which enables men to receive the idea of God as Man. This, chiefly, was the Temple that was destroyed with the former Church, according to the words: "There shall not be left one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down" (Matthew 24:1-3). That these foundations are what are lacking in Christendom today, the Writings abundantly testify.

     In Africa and Asia are those who will receive the New Church Doctrine gladly. For we read: After visiting those in certain parts of Africa and Asia who are receptive of the heavenly doctrine, "I was afterwards brought back to the region where they are in sciences, namely, such as those from which human learning at this day is imbibed; and I observed that they were all totally unable to grasp that the Lord can be the only God, merely for the reason that He was a Man . . . ; thus that these were the least able to receive the heavenly doctrine. . . . But in a region farther to the right were those who were in the faculty of receiving that doctrine, who had not extinguished by sciences the gift of perceiving that a thing is so." (Diary 4719)

409

Such an intense devotion to this kind of scientific thinking, admitting nothing except from the physical senses, closes the mind, and at length destroys the faculty of interior and truly rational thinking. That is why the angels have "slender hope" of Christians ever receiving the new evangel. (L. J. 74) The Africans have it "implanted in themselves more than others that the Lord must appear altogether as a Man, and that it can by no means happen otherwise. . . . (J. Post. 118.) How absolutely contrary this is to the present overwhelming trend among the learned of Christendom!

     But we must go down into Egypt. We must buy from the same granaries and at times eat out of the same trough as our learned contemporaries. How then are we to safeguard ourselves? I answer in general: By not asking the young to face the conditions until well-prepared to discriminate. What we have to do is to raise up a new generation with the right persuasions and remains. And this cannot be done without an environment which excludes other influences sufficiently to give the Christian remains a chance to survive "until the harvest."

     The future is known to no man, but probabilities can always be foreseen by examining the inward curve of the present trend, and by referring to the analogies of history. In such a view, it seems likely that the centers of thought in our so-called Christian world, having nothing definite to give in regard to spiritual matters, will first belittle such things, and gradually cease to teach them at all, for lack of pupils. Theology is already stopped; Philosophy is only historical, Psychology only physiological, and so on.

     It is of the utmost importance, therefore, that we maintain one or more centers of learning, to keep lighted the torch of interior wisdom, and to remain faithful in every thought and effort to the Word of our Revelation. If such a center, like Elisha, is able to stay with the Word (Elijah) until it sees him taken up into heaven in a chariot of fire, then will the prophetic mantle fall upon it.

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POET'S EVANGEL 1920

POET'S EVANGEL BEATRICE C. PENDLETON 1920

     Reviewers of The Supreme Adventure, however critical or adverse their opinions as to the form, have been compelled to admiration of that which everywhere breaks through and illumines the text,-the overpowering love of Divine Truth which infilled the Miter. The prayer she has put into the mouth of her hero is her prayer, and the whole work is the ultimation of her living desire to carry to those who sit in darkness the glad tidings of the Second Coming:-

"Alas! that loving followers of Christ
Should blindly grope to Him, thro teachings false!
Might I one special answer to my prayers
Receive, this humbly would I ask of God;
That He would with His Truth my soul prepare,
And in some way His Wisdom may devise
Appoint me to preach t' unawakened brethren
Of the earth, this gospel of His Kingdom!" (p.60.)

     W. C. Rodman, in the NEW CHURCH REVIEW for January, 1929, says: "In spite of its somewhat pedantic vocabulary, its too often inverted and sometimes stilted style, its unaccountably frequent substitution of the overworked apostrophe for the useful letter e, and its irritating derangement of lines,-triumphantly in spite of these, The Supreme Adventure is an extraordinary performance. . . . The work is pure poetry, conceived in sincerity, and executed with fidelity and unquestionable skill."

     A. A. S. J., in the NEW CHURCH MESSENGER for December 17th, 1919, is less kindly. He takes exception to Mr. Louis Pendleton's characterization of it as a "noble task, well done." "The innocent garrulous joy of its language forbids any idea of a task, and though it surely abounds in felicities, to call it literature is equally impossible. . . . It is perhaps poetry, but poetry written as if by one more accustomed to the speaking of it, the declaiming of it, than to the reading of it, or the writing. It leans not only in epic form, but apparently in meter, on the pentameter classics, but in its impatient failure to abide by their rhythmic laws, it seems to shudder away with equal reluctance from the pugnacious freedom of the new schools.

411

It would almost seem as if the pages were devised in their allotment of long and short lines and broken sentences, insets, extravagant elisions and capitals, to look like pages of blank verse. Even the newest school cannot account for their fantastic arrangement otherwise. And yet to condemn it as such rank and foolish imitation is impossible, because, if read without regard to the printed indentures, we come across grand passages of faultless pentameter, splendid in conception. Sometimes these passages occur as if accidentally in order:-

"Methinks, as mother-love smiles tender down
On babe that blindly smites with puny fist
The warm, full-flaggoned breast whereat it clings,
So God our self-assertive folly doth
Regard, ordaining in His Providence
That each presumptive battery of doubt
Shall ever fuller effluence evoke
From the unfailing well-spring of His holy
Love and truth." (p. 178.)

     "This is almost great poetry. . . . Throughout the book there runs an ecstatic fancy often bubbling into lovely lines, and near the end there is genuine interest."

     In conclusion, A. A. S. J. is of the opinion that "the doctrinal discussions are to a New Churchman harmless, [!] to an outsider, probably dull; the visions of spiritual landscape, houses and habits, delightful, not only because of their marvelous originals in the Writings, and the verity of the underlying thought saves the discrepancies of detail, and stamps the whole as unique. But it is not art. It is artless. Probably the writer would shrink from having it otherwise. Nor is it entirely amateurish, having too intimate a distinction. Where it fails as: literature is because of something in the writer above and beyond literature, a kind of other-world simplicity of purpose, scarcely intellectual at all." (The italics are mine-B. C. P.)

     Dr. J. B. S. King, in the LIFE for May, 1920, considers the book "an important addition to New Church literature. It is a grave, serious, dignified account in poetic form of the pregnant events that happen, or may happen, to the newly resuscitated human being. . . . The difficult task of telling the kernel of spiritual doctrines is done with surprising success, and without seriously checking the interest of the narrative."

412

     But he also finds fault with the form. The "too free use of adjectives; as it were, ornamentation or decoration piled on too thick, the adoption of stereotyped 'poetic' phrases, . . . the frequent employment of elisions, the unnecessary irregularities in the division of lines," irk him. Being Dr. King, he has his little joke, and concludes the review by magnanimously agreeing to find no more fault. "We enjoyed the poem," he admits editorially; "others will enjoy it. And it cannot fail to have an excellent effect upon those of its readers whose ears are open to Divine Truth."

     "Whose ears are open to Divine Truth." It is to these the author has addressed herself. Ever since she came into the knowledge and belief that the Lord had made His Second Coming in the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg, she has been filled with a burning zeal to share her spiritual blessings, to be among that company of disciples sent forth by the Lord "to preach the Gospel that the Lord Jesus Christ reigneth, whose kingdom shall endure for ever and ever."

"As thou from angels hast received, so teach
To blind and unbelieving earth.
'Write,' saith
The Lord, 'What in the spirit thou hast seen
And heard.'" (p. 236.)

     Admittedly, The Supreme Adventure is a valuable addition to New Church literature. But reviewers have, one and all, failed to point out what is perhaps its chief claim to such recognition, namely, the freshness of the appeal of the truth presented in such vividly picturesque forms, This is very grateful to the type of mind which is unpleasurably aware of the literary baldness in the translations from the original Latin of the Writings.

     Nothing has been said by the reviewers as to the possible missionary usefulness of the volume; yet the following letters fully attest it.

     As a case in point, a young man, who could not force himself to read the books of the Writings given him by New Church friends, found the poem highly delightful reading, the truth at last really "getting across" to him in this form.

     He writes: "I have read about two-thirds of The Supreme Adventure. It is so beautiful that I can't make myself hurry through it.

413

As a poetic conception, it is one of the loveliest things I have read. . . . As I read, it strikes me as odd that there is so much in it which is not new to me. It's as if I had known these things from long ago, and the reading resurrects the old ideas so that they become most vivid. I believe I get most things by feeling rather than study; and that is why the beauty of the poem appeals where Swedenborg's Writings seemed hard to stick to. But now I have the urge to tackle the books just as soon as I finish the poem, and I shall not be surprised to find myself absorbed in them."

Another interesting example is presented by the experience of a distinguished Southern editor who is credited by THE WOMAN PATRIOT (Washington) with having carried his State against woman suffrage. This man, a wide reader, as well as an able writer, but having no acquaintance with Swedenborg's works, read The Supreme Adventure before he died recently in the Johns Hopkins Hospital. Since then, his widow has written: "He marked many passages and you can never know what comfort it gave to him and to me. I was reading it when the end came, and it did so help me to bear the loss."

No doubt a man of his opinions would note and mark the following passage from the conversation in the lover's garden on the borders of heaven:-

"Oh! thou kaleidoscopic wonder! Scarce
A moment since, 'twas as sweet singing-bird
Thou didst the glen with raptured music fill;
Now subtly art thou turned philosopher!
But cold philosophy, man's bloodless steed,
Is at thy woman's magic touch transmute
Unto a flame-eyed Pegasus that feeds
On flowers grown in meads celestial!" . . . .

"Nay,"-laughing-"there are no woman sages.
Ruth-like we follow, gleaning at noon where
Boat in the morning passed. Men struggle
With nature, wresting from her with iron will
Truth's hoarded grain. Come we after, binding
With love the sheaves of knowledge won, winning
Thereby a heritage richer than all
Their harvest. Woman, true, hath climbed to fame;

414

But never, save where man with mail-ed hand
Hath hewn the path before her. 'Tis God's own
Plan; the matchless pattern of th' universe.
Thou 'rt our sun; we, thine inseparable
Moon, and in thine own reflected glory
Are we glorified." (p. 180.)

     The great truths, so familiar to the New Churchman in doctrinal form, must strike the spiritual minded outsider as convincing, as well as new and wonderful, in the following passages, clothed as they are in illuminating poet's imagery from nature itself:-

               "Man, ere his tenement
Of clay forsaking, chooseth, by the love
That molds and dominates his soul, for heaven
Or for hell. No awful bar, nor irate
Judge, with fateful record waits the trembling
Sinner, but writ on mem'ry's eternal
Tablets, his Book of Life, and faithful there,
In form of his affections mirrored, stands
To himself revealed. . . .
               Thus the soul's ruling
Love, its own tribunal; and by primal
Law magnetic, that atom weds to atom,
Orb to orbit, each its true affinity
And inmost kinship ever finds, sounding
Instinctive and unerring the keynote
Of responsive life. Beings there are,
     breed hate,
And glut voracious maw on human bane.
Nurtured as that ancient king on poisons,
They poisons still of life and breath require.
Lungs, long inured to dungeon damp, collapse
On mountain top, and hearts with lava-tides
Of lusts aflame beat sluggish in God's sun.
So, like to like, the law of spirit-life,
And hell, in light of truth revealed,
     showeth
Equally with heaven God's tender mercies
And his loving care. . . .
"A habitant of hell I once o'erheard
His Maker blasphemous arraign, claiming,
Foul-mouthed and insolent, entrance to heaven's

415

Gates. For his instruction, tho' urgent 'gainst
His violence and folly warned,
     a guide
Was for his conduct thither straight despatched;
But ere on distant verge billowed in light
God's holy mountains, the hapless spirit
Laboring respired, pains racked his failing
Joints, his limbs convulsive writhed,
     and reeling
With gasping outcry he to his own place
Headlong plunged." (pp. 43-45.)

     To the soul awaiting the final summons in the dread Valley of Shadow, what joy must such lines as these have conveyed:-

"Wasn't a dream, or did I hear them weeping
Say, that I was dying?"

"Nay, 'twas no dream! Thou heard'st aright.
To thee
In truth the night of pain and sorrow hath
Forever passed, and morn eternal come!"

I started with sudd'n shock.

"Surely, thou dost not mean I am of that
Pale band we call 'the Spirit Dead.'"

"No bloodless wraiths in this blest land abide,
But 'tis most true thou hast the mortal dropt
And put on immortality."

Visibly agitate, I 'gainst the light
Held forth my hands, warm, tinctured thro' with life's
Red-coursing tide. Possessed they ne'er before
This perfect, blue-veined symmetry. Yet, from
The truth my soul unreasoning recoiled.

"Looks spirit thus?"

"Aye."

"And can it be, I have th' awful portal
Passed? Hath the grim messenger his sickly
Victim claimed?"

416

A truant smile, hid in the fringed covert
Of her eyes, stole forth and dimpled about
Her mouth, as she replied:

"Woulds't thou behold this gruesome messenger,
This spirit dread, who thro' th' ages haith Earth's
Dreams affrighted? Come hither, Azrael!"

At her behest th' August presence, who from
Our converse had in part retired, drew near;
And o'er me with protective tenderness
Inclining, took in his own, my proffered
Hand, as thus he spake:
"She at thy side, and I, of thine own race
And brethren are who dwell on earth.
Thence passed
We e'en as thou, and as the countless hosts
Of all our planet's darkened children.
Thou seest
In us a vast angelic order, whose
Holy office, 'tis to loose th' immortal
Soul from carnal thrall, and here
     thro' peaceful
Slumber loving guard, till the blest moment
Of awakening to life and liberty
Eternal. To blinded Earth our dreaded
Name is 'Death,' but by th' angels we are known
As 'Life,' since in the vasty universe
From star to shore there is no death." (pp. 12-14.)

     And to those who all through their earth-life have been weighed down with bodily infirmity, imagine what these words would mean:-

Dropping his hand, I reached by long habit
For my crutches, dismayed at the moment
To find them not. Smiling, and half-ashamed,
I strove to rise, but thought still
     t' accustomed
Uses and conditions bound, restrained me.
Struggling now with smitt'n hope and faltering faith
I backward sank.

"I cannot rise. A helpless cripple from
My mother's womb was I, and such am still."

417

To my galled sense there seemed a hush
     of bird
And brook and all sweet sounds of woodland life,
As tho' my bitter words had dropt a blight
Upon the land. Gently th' angel spake:

"There are no cripple in our Father's House.
The crutch thou dost require is faith in Him.
Arise!" (pp. 14, 15.)

     Space is limited, but this quotation simply will not be omitted. The appeal is too strong:-

          I kneeling bowed my burdened
Heart in thanksgiving and penitential
Tears. In that veiled holiest, where 'neath the light
Of God's all searching truth the shrinking soul,
Naked as the first Adam, and ashamed,
Stands at his own judgment bar and inmost
Tribunal, self-accused and self-condemned,
I saw my blighted and abortive life,
The lowly vale, wherein
     Eternal Love
Its holy purpose patient wrought, and from
My hapless failures, scarred deep with bitter
Warfare 'twixt insurgent soul and its gyved
Impotence, aye, from my dead crucified,
A Temple Beautiful arose
     that 'nenth
The Master-Builder's Hand, reared stone by stone
Its heavenly symmetry, and kissed the stars!
Dashed I 'gainst this my mad rebellious will?
Strove my finite folly with Omniscient
Wisdom? Father, for give me! (pp. 16, 17.)

     It is not my purpose to follow the events of the story, but it may be well to give a brief outline of the four parts into which the poem is divided. Part One deals with the arrival of the novitiate spirit and his journey to his "fraternal order," where he is to be prepared for entrance into heaven. Throughout the poem occur the doctrinal discussions which, A. A. S. J. naively assures us, "are to a New Churchman harmless." It is perhaps unfortunate that in this first part there is not woven into them more of human interest.

418

The angel guide, greatly rejoicing in the spiritual acumen of the newcomer, instructs him freely on many subjects, as that the Lord is intimately present in every least thing of man's life:-

"Chance is earth's coinage, and hath no meaning
Here. Blot it from mem'ry and write instead,
Divine Providence." (p. 24.)

     Other subjects discussed are: the reality of the spiritual world; the angelo-centric theory; the trinal heavens; the absence of time and space; that night and day are but appearances due to changes of state; free will and equilibrium; the Incarnation and Glorification. Undoubtedly the "outsider," unless "his ears are open to Divine Truth," will find it "dull."

     Part Two initiates the spirit into the life of heaven. Through every sense the Divine Love and Wisdom penetrate; every art is infilled with the Holy Presence of the Lord, and every longing of the hungry soul is satisfied.

"What in sooth are we, from least
     to greatest,
But vessels for His infilling Spirit?
The only difference 'twixt hell and heaven
     is 'twixt
Rejecting and receiving." (p. 93.)

     He learns of government in heaven, of marriage there, of life upon the other planets, of the correspondence of heaven to the Gorand Man, of many other wonders too numerous to mention. With his appointed comrade, Israefel, he spends his days passing through wonderful experiences, which are preparing him for the yet more marvelous things to come.

     In Part Three, he is led where she, the counterpart of his souls highest and holiest,

"Awaited somewhere in God's
     Providence
The moment of magnetic unity,
As pole electric, its eternal mate." (p. 114.)
     * * * *

419

"Beloved, mine errand here is th' old errand
     of th' universe; of sun to earth, of sea
To shore, of soul to divine-created
Counterpart? Not twain are we but one! Thou,
My life's warm-beating heart; I, thy living
Breath." (pp. 163, 164.)
     * * * *
For answer I caught her to my glowing breast,
Raining down kisses on her brow, her eyes,
Her lips, her fragrant hair, with love's divine
Impassioned ardor, such as no
     moment
Of our earthly life e'er knew. Methinks some
Dark'ned soul exclaims: "What! passion there?"
Oh! thou
Profane! whose sin-dulled eyes distinguish not
Th' angels' shining pathway from the serpents'
Trail! Approach not unto that holy mount,
Oh! ye unsanctified! 'Tis not for souls
Uncleansed to know that passion
     purified
From carnal dress is heaven's hallowed fire, that
On love's holy altars doth descend thro'
Correspondence with divine creative
Glory. Upon our sin-marred planet reigns
It at best a fall'n Lucifer,
     wearing
On his shadowed brow the mark of exile!" (p. 166.)

     And in this new experience-as in every preceding one-the spirit is instructed, and led heavenward. There are so many beautiful quotations that might be given, did space permit-but this one must suffice:-

"Man, blinder and more helpless born than mole,
Never his highest doth attain; but e'er
Beyond the blessedness we know beckons
The vistaed glory of a higher. Thus,
Faithful as we follow Him, partaketh
Our finite of His infinite." (p. 178.)

     Part Four deals with the other side of the picture-the hells. It is the most dramatic portion of the work. In it the writer gives reign to her gift of imagery, and the result is beyond any pen but her own:-

420

"A gulch precipitous we presently
Descended, where haggard trees, like leprous
Mendicants, clutched at our garments,
     while perched
On bossed excrescence of rotting boles,
That awful semblance bore to human skulls,
The horn-ed owl all glassy staring whooped
Sardonic. Beyond, a range of sooty
Mountains belched volcanic. In one of these,
At base, a frightful cavern yawned, . . .
     kenneled
By double-headed hounds, that clam'rous frothed
Thro' lurid glare. Marveling, the meaning
I inquired.

"'Tis the mouth of hell! We enter there. Let
Not its seeming barriers thy soul dismay.
The monstrous forms thou seest are illusive
Films of fiendish hate and filthy lust, that
Thro' infernal correspondence threatening
Show."
"The fetor of hell," he said, "is ever
Correlate to such as in trespasses
And sins are dead; by whom they are
     perceived
As odors sweet. Inversely, the fragrance
Of heavenly spheres revolteth them." (pp. 191, 2.)
     * * * * *
Was this a vacuous interior approach
To lowest deep? Or voyaged we
     thro' pathless
Planetary space, hailed in the transit
By spirits orbital? E'en as my thought
The awful question pondered, my feet touched earth;
And now, with sharply indrawn breath, I stood
At portal of the dread profound.
The land-
If such the lifeless desert, stretching from
Rim to rim, of dusky-lined horizon-
Lay like a dead Titan, staring starkly.
Upward, in unbroken silence, 'neath the palled
Canopy of night and doom.

"Thou seest," said Gamaliel, "the vestibule
Of final Hell. There, beyond the sky-mark,

421

Lieth a mighty city, the fortressed
Stronghold of a direful realm,
     whose evil
Arts, and God-defying sorceries, would scale
The very heavens, but that th' Omnipotent
Hath limitations fixed, impassable." . . . (pp. 217, 218.)

No hint
Of feebly budded blade, nor mockery
Of leaf pricked here or there the hideous
Expanse; but nature, ever maternal,
Striving as 'twere with blind, forgotten
     impulse
Toward genesis of plant and tree produced
From her abortive womb a forestry
Of giant fungi, that in its bloated
Pallor sin's loathly leprosy proclaimed.
At roots of these lay prone, or coiled,
     or writhed,
What in the gloom prodigious serpents seemed;
But as they reared white-bellied from the mire,
I saw, O God I their heads, the' sharply drawn
To lines ophidian, were human! (pp. 232, 3.)

     But enough has been quoted to prove The Supreme Adventure a poem as well as a statement of eternal truth. Nor have I any quarrel with its form. Its metrical music is not like that of a simple melody, but rather of a symphony, with its calculated dissonances at more or less frequent intervals, thus bringing into bolder relief the designedly mellifluous, yet preventing the satiety consequent upon honeyed Sweetness too long drawn out.
     BEATRICE C. PENDLETON.
Mrs. Twiggs 1920

Mrs. Twiggs Editor 1920

As we go to press, we learn that Mrs. Twiggs has herself experienced "the supreme adventure," having recently passed into the spiritual world.-EDITOR.

422

Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA.
Editor                    Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager          Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager.

     TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION
One Year               $3.00 payable in advance
Single Copy               30 cents.
     INCENSE IN THE WORSHIP OF THE NEW CHURCH.

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:
     There has recently been a correspondence in the NEW CHURCH WEEKLY on the use of Incense in the Church. The Editor at first only inserted one letter, with the comment: "Our only justification for printing the above is the mention of incense by the writer, which he evidently favors. Are some of the extremists now eager for Romanism in the New Church?"

     It was represented to him, however, that he was somewhat high-handed in checking the discussion, so he gave way and inserted three additional letters on the subject. A remark by at least one of the correspondents would seem to suggest that incense may have been used in the recent Dedication at Bryn Athyn. I would venture to suggest that incense was the one thing lacking in that magnificent service to have made it full and complete.
     GEO. F. POOLE.
23 Cornhill, E. C., London,
     15th April, 1920.

     Incense was not used in the Dedication Service of the Bryn Athyn Cathedral.

423

The omission was not due to any objection on principle, but rather, we believe, to the fact that the subject in its practical aspect has not been fully studied as yet. Incense has been used occasionally in the Christmas services of the General Church. We need hardly state that this has not been an adaptation from "Romanism." If, in forming a ritual for the New Church, we were to eliminate everything that has been employed in the Roman Catholic Church, there would be very little left. We can quite understand the nonconformist point of view, as expressed by John Wesley, when he said: "I have no objection to instruments of music in our chapels, provided they are neither heard nor seen." If the sense of hearing is to be deprived of its harmonies in worship, it is logical to eliminate all other appeals to the senses, including fragrance for the nostrils.

     Without going more deeply into the subject at this time, we would simply observe that there are at least two reasons for all the externals of worship that appeal to the senses, namely, their practical use and their representative use. As a practical matter, something in the house of worship will enter the eyes, the ears, the nostrils. Why not loveliness of color, harmony, and fragrance? And if we have the fragrance of flowers in our temples, why not the sweet odors of incense, which has been in use from ancient times as a representative of internal things?

     The consideration of the subject in the WEEKLY, to which our correspondent has called attention, included the following editorial in the issue of March 27th, 1920: "We have received two or three letters on the question of 'incense' in the services of the Church. . . . We do not think a discussion of this matter would be of any interest to our readers, or to any members of the New Church in this or any other country. In fact, we believe it would be very objectionable. There is not a word in Swedenborg to sanction so Romish a practice. The spiritual meaning of incense in a representative Church which came to end at the time of our Lord is one thing; the use of it now is quite another." (p. 125.)

     Later, in the issue for April 10, the Editor publishes the letters referred to, as follows:

     "Dear Sir: The Romish Bogey has no terrors for me, and your remarks leave me quite cold.

424

Incense is not a monopoly of the Roman Church, and all students of the Writings (and I presume your readers are students thereof) know what is taught therein on incense. I could quote extensively, but refrain, from consideration for your space.

     "Rome is not condemned in the Writings for her ritual, incense, etc., but, as you know, for her false doctrines. Would a convert from that Church to the New Church be required to conform to the bare altars, low ritual, and (alas! too often) to the disorderly services of the organized New Church, in order to blossom forth into a full New Churchman?
     "GEORGE F. POOLE."

     "Dear Sir: I was not a little astonished at the footnote added by you, Sir, to a letter in the New-Church Weekly on the question of 'Incense in Worship. It is to me amazing how anyone can imagine that any secton of the New Church, be they of the General Church, the Conference, or the Convention, would allow themselves to be imitators of the Romish Church, which, as we all know, is the Babylon of the Word. Surely you are acquainted with the statement in A. C. 4748, where it is stated that the Ancients used incense in worship, and that the Odor is representative of perception.

     "I would suggest that such a practice, if adopted by the New Church Cathedral in Bryn Athyn, is not adopted as a copy of Romish worship, but purely for its signification.
     "PERCY DAWSON."

     The third letter is from Mr. Joseph Ashby, of Southport, who agrees that "there is no need to go in for Romanism in the New Church. At the same time, worshipers are allowed, without reproach, to adopt the forms of external worship which appeal and are of most use to them in the development of their Christian character." He then quotes one of the two following descriptions of Swedenborg's visits to Catholic cathedrals, which are taken from the diary of his travels in the years 1733-1736, and are of interest as showing; his view of the Catholic ritual at that time:

     "I was in the Roman Catholic Church at Carlsbad, where I witnessed their worship, or their celebration of the mass, and where I observed that all things were most delightful, or suited to all the senses. For the ear they had the very best instrumental harmony, having instead of the singing of the people the completest instrumental music. The eye beheld various sports: the gestures of boys, as well as of others, who were burning lamps and wax tapers; the magnificent vestments of the priests and of boys similarly arrayed; everything in the light of these lamps shone With gold and sliver. The sense of smell was regaled with the richest fragrance, with which the altar, or the Sanctuary, was perfumed. For the sense of touch there was the water which the priest, on entering, sprinkled upon the people.

425

The interior sense was struck with the priest's reverence for the Supreme Being, by his innumerable genuflections, and by those of the youths. The taste alone was left ungratified, except by what the priest, the participant in all these pleasures, could derive from the wine which he alone drinks. [Thus] the holy things of worship are formed for the pleasure of the external senses, and they are pleasing to the public generally, because with them the external senses are the channels through which the remembrance of the Supreme Being has first to enter." (Tafel's Documents, Vol. II., p. 67.)

"On the left side of the choir in the cathedral [at Brussels] I saw an altar and an altar-piece of silver; likewise many larger and smaller chandeliers and lamps of silver, together with other splendid ornaments. Mass was celebrated there. The only thing that needs to be noted in connection therewith, to serve as a subject for reflection, is this: That everything is so arranged as to captivate and occupy the senses, and to lead them above by an external way, or to exalt one's thoughts about religion, and direct them to the Highest; for all is instituted with so much devotion; the body inclines and bows; the knees bend; the eyes are engaged by everything magnificent and sublime that can be imagined; the ears are filled with beautiful music, instrumental as well as vocal; the nose enjoys aromatic fragrance. Besides this, many holy objects are exhibited, so that the senses are charmed, and by external means men are led to devotion; which with them seems to be the means of elevating their minds, since the external senses furnish them generally with subjects for meditation." (Documents, Vol. II., p. 89.)
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

THE YOUNG NEW CHURCH MAN (London) for April, 1920, contains an interesting symposium by a number of ministers and laymen on the subject of "Stopping the Leak," and dealing with the need of improved methods in the Sunday Schools if the young are to kept in the Church. We note especially the remarks of Mr. W. E. Vickers, who inveighs against the idea "that young people at the age of fourteen are qualified to become teachers in the Primary Department of the Sunday Schools." Continuing, he says:

"The younger the child, the more experienced the teacher needs to be. How is it possible for a young person, only just entering upon life, knowing very little what those affections are by which remains are insinuated, besides the many other things necessary to fill the position of teacher to the youngest children of our schools?

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And all for experimental purposes, i. e., to endeavor to keep young people in the Church.

     "Reflect! Is not such a practice as the one suggested a cause,-if not the main cause, of our young people wanting to leave, or to put it correctly, not having engendered, or built up within them, the desire for the Lord's Church. It is because there is lacking an orderly process, and a correctly graduated staff, that so many young people, when they arrived at the age of fourteen, know very little, if anything, of the Church, still less of the Lord's Second Advent, and perhaps even still less of the Writings We are afraid to instruct our children openly in the phenomena of the other world from the memorabilia; we fall short of our duty by not keeping constantly before the child the thought that the Lord has made His Second Advent, and that the Writings of the New Church are the evidence.

     "To all intents and purposes, except for the elucidations of the Catechism answers on the Doctrines, the child scarcely knows there is any difference between the Sunday School he attends and the Sunday Schools of the denominations in the district. Our schools, if they are to be of any use at all, must be so graduated and staffed, and so distinctive, that when a child has reached the age of junior membership, he has not only a knowledge of the literal sense of the Word, but also has been instructed in the nature of the spiritual world, as received in the Writings. The child should also know that there is a radical difference between the Church to which he is attached and other forms of Christianity, and this because the Lord has made His Second Advent. Most important of all, there should be engendered, as a result of careful and gradual instruction and development, the desire for the Church. Let us reflect upon our home training in the, things of the Church, and the above will stand out as the orderly process."

     There is more to the same purport, giving expression to a frank confession of defective conditions, and exhibiting a genuine spirit of reform which, if put into practice, would soon show results in "stopping the leak."

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TWELFTH ONTARIO ASSEMBLY 1920

TWELFTH ONTARIO ASSEMBLY HUGO LJ. ODHNER 1920

     Meeting for the first time since January, 1916, the Ontario District Assembly which gathered at Toronto on April the 16th, 1920, was significant of a renewal of the bonds which our common love for the New Church has welded together. The Assembly was characterized by an unusual degree of spiritual elevation, and by a sphere of strong mutual confidence between laymen and ministers; and in recording the general features of the meeting, we are conscious of the futility of attempting to convey that deep warmth of companionship which was the real essence of the gathering. But it was present,-"real and substantial," sure enough!

     A Banquet at the Humber Beach Inn,-a cosy lakeside hotel,-opened the Assembly. After a sumptuous course-dinner had quieted our "natural man," the local Pastor, the Rev. E. R. Cronlund, in the capacity of toastmaster, proposed the toast to the Church, and then introduced the series of speeches by quoting the teaching on the three loves, (T. C. R. 394-405), and elucidating the sentiment that love is the life of man and that a common love of the New Church had "brought us together tonight." The ruling love in a normal man must be the love of heaven, but when this is the inmost spiritual state of a man, the subordinate loves of the world and of self gradually become purified and thus serviceable for spiritual and natural uses.

     The Bishop of the General Church responded to a toast to "The Love of Heaven." He first expressed his pleasure at being present again among the Canadian friends, and congratulated the Toronto Society on its sudden and unprecedented growth! (Laughter.) We append a summary of his remarks, as gathered from longhand notes:

     In a certain passage in the Writings, the love of heaven is spoken of as being in everyone from creation and thus from nativity. Yet no connate love is a regenerate love, and we are led to ask what is meant by the love of heaven spoken of in T. C. R. 394. Love is said to be the essential of life. Yet love is hard to define.

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Phrases and terms often repeated are apt to lose their meaning, and while there is much need of constant repetition, the phrases must often be translated into living thought. So with the phrase, "love is life."

     Love leads. In the other world there are represented as many ways as there are affections. The spirit is led by his love, and can in no manner escape from the inevitable way of the love that holds him in its delight. Curiosity and temporary emotions may for a while turn him aside,-as with the evil, who may even visit heaven, yet nothing can alter the eventual destiny to which his love leads. A love of heaven, therefore, must rule inmostly in the spirit of man, and this in a practical way, if he is to be able to enter heaven. And this love produces certain externals whereby it is known and characterized. Five of these may here be referred to:

     1. The resistance to evil is a sine Qua non of spiritual virtues,-a thing necessary to all. Spiritual life is measured by the extent of such resistance shown here on earth. This resistance is not in itself negative, but springs from a positive love, the love of heaven. 2. Innocence is the soul of all good, the very human itself, which is introduced even before birth. It is the inmost of the celestial conjugial, whence all life comes, and is the only medium for the conjunction of good and truth. There must be a medium for all conjunction or communication; and this fact shows how needful it is that innocence be preserved. The Lord as to the Divine Human is therefore called the Lamb; since He is Innocence Itself, and is the means of conjunction between the infinite and the finite. Innocence is genuine when it dwells with wisdom. 3. Humility is the essence within all adoration and worship, and comes from the acknowledgment of the infernal nature of one's self or proprium; and it is through this acknowledgment that evil "ceases." After this state has come, man wants to cleanse others of evil,-to "wash their feet;" but this phrase must mean to us a turning away from their evils and a desire not to see them. Humility thus makes faith genuine and living. And hence we are told that the Lord desires our adoration, not because He Wishes to be exalted, but because man needs to humble himself in order to receive the love of heaven. 4. Compassion is the tenderest and inmost of human love. It reaches all. The Lord has compassion toward the human race, even when it rushes in its folly towards the depths of hell. It was the Divine Compassion which took unto itself the human form for the salvation of men. 5. The last sign of the love of heaven is Gratitude; and yet real gratitude to the Lord can belong only to the last stage of the regenerate life. It is described by "the feast of ingathering at the going out of the year," which signifies thanksgiving for salvation.

     Thus the love of heaven grows throughout life, from infancy to old age, ever nourished and protected by the Divine Providence. At first it is present only in the remains stored in the mind, but later it becomes the new will which vivifies all else in the man. Man after death is reduced to the last residual good for which he has contended with his spiritual foes while on earth. And this last residual good, with all Who are saved, is the love of heaven.

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     The Rev. Hugo L. Odhner, noticing the printed toast program, felt that an explanation was due, in that his name was printed under "The Love of the World," and Mr. Roschman's under "The Love of Self," while to the Bishop was attributed "The Love of Heaven!" (Laughter.) He also noted the care with which the subject of the "love of the world," which is closely identified with the love of riches, had been assigned to a clergyman! (Laughter.) He added that under ordinary circumstances he might have some scruples about drinking a toast to the "love of the world," but the fluid now in vogue makes this toast quite appropriate. (Prohibition sentiments were here demonstrated by prolonged applause.) The fact was that Swedenborg likens the love of the world to "the new must of unfermented wine, which tastes sweet but infests the stomach;" and he left the audience to draw its conclusion about the state of the Christian world. He continued:

     The love of the world, when unrestrained by a love of heaven, is today a special enemy of the Church. For, while the love of self is far worse in its effects, destroying the very fabric of human and angelic society, the love of the world is aimed more directly at the spiritual things of faith and the love of truth, which is the ground upon which the Church stands. As long as we are infested by the sphere of worldliness, and drawn into its mighty current of pleasure-hunting, money-grubbing, worldly attractions and sensualism, there is no time found for the study of the Writings and for devotion to the less alluring external uses of the Church. Nor can we find a hearing for our great spiritual message to the world, which can be aroused only by sensational methods.

     The love of the world is the foundation love of the civic held of uses, even as the love of self is that of the domestic. "No man of sound sense can condemn riches, for in the body of the community they are like the blood in man; nor can he condemn the honors annexed to offices or functions, for they are the hands of the king and the pillars of society. . . . " (T. C. R. 403) Yet, what we must require in the New Church is that men shall love and esteem the spirit of their neighbor; not merely his body, nor his wealth and worldly culture. We must love our neighbor spiritually, as a human soul.

     The speaker, in conclusion, noted that "God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son." . . . We may love the world, and its ultimate things, as a means to spiritual uses; and the Lord's love reaches down to the ground on whim we tread. Such as our love is, such are our treasures; for love returns as a circle to that from which it comes.

     Mr. Rudolph Roschman spoke on "The Love of Self:"

     The previous speaker had taken some wind out of his sails.

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The Word mostly refers to the love of self as an evil love, but it may also be orderly, since it looks to uses, viz., corporeal and domestic uses. If man permits the love of self to rule him, his spirit appears in the other life as if walking upside down. But that love is normal when its uses are performed for the sake of higher, spiritual ends. Perverted, the love of self looks towards domination over others; yet we should not judge; for the zeal of self-protection, and of administering the uses of one's office, may at times appear as love of dominion.

     The love of self guards against the violation of one's personal liberties, of body and family-life. It is our duty to be jealous of our freedom, and recent movements, such as vaccination, prohibition, and feminism, are aimed against those corporeal and domestic uses which the love of self is set to guard. Performing uses will strengthen and purify this love of self, and keep it in its place.

     When the tables had been cleared away, the orchestra started "jazzing," and all who felt young enough to lose a few hours' sleep stayed to dance, or to watch the glorious time that the young people had. Confetti streamers, pretty dresses, and the spirit of joy, came into their own; and at half past one the "special" car drew up to take us home.

     On Saturday morning, a Children's Service was held in the Olivet Church, the Bishop impressing upon the children the teachings of Deuteronomy 30:10-20.

     The first session of the Assembly was held in the afternoon, when Bishop Pendleton delivered an address on "Spiritual Substance." The Bishop stated that the subject was chosen with no reference to any recent discussion on the life-conditions after death; and remarked that the only authority for doctrinal views in the New Church was the light of truth as seen in the Writings. Doctrine cannot be fixed by mass opinion, by the majority voice of its councils, or by any ecclesiastical authority. The address was then read.

     Mr. R. B. Caldwell, in thanking the Bishop for the paper, recalled that nothing has been said recently on the subject, but that he had been assured that, when the time was ready, new light would be given. He hoped the ministers present would speak upon it.

     On motion, the Rev. Herbert C. Small and the Rev. Lewis Slight were invited to take part in the discussion. (The former gentleman is Pastor of the Convention Society in Toronto; and the latter is temporarily in charge of the First New Jerusalem Society in Kitchener, although a minister of the General Conference in England.)

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     The Rev. H. C. Small thanked the Bishop and expressed his agreement with the general conclusions of the address. He had recently met with the problems spoken of, in a Young People's class. In regard to appearances of time and space in the spiritual world, he stated:

     "The direction the Bishop's thought has taken is exactly that of mine, viz., that they are in some way related to matters of earthly experience. Since all man's thinking is really done in the natural plane, his mind, his whole rational faculty, which makes him a man, is the instrument of his thinking, and thus it carries with it all the appearances of the natural world. He never entirely removes them, and so when he comes into the spiritual world, they still remain with him, and are the origin of those appearances, either nearly or remotely."

     The Rev. Lewis Slight, after referring to the privilege of speaking to New Church friends, and especially new friends, said that two thoughts had been found useful to aid in seeing the relation of the two worlds:

     "A straight line exists only in the spiritual world. That is one of the facts that science is driving home to us, driving in more and more as the years go on. One of the most recent theories, which is associated with the name of Einstein, teaches that in the material universe there is no such thing as a straight line; yet in the mind of every properly trained man and woman it is an axiom. Everyone knows what a straight line is; or rather, everyone knows what a straight line ought to be. Everyone is aware, too, that right conduct is a straight line, and that the right course for everyone to take is to go forward, straight. This is a spiritual thing. We may have thought that a straight line was a material thing; but if we examine, we shall find that it does not exist in nature, and that we cannot produce it artificially. The world itself is round. If we run a straight line for any distance we find it is a circle; so every way we go. Man is the only spiritual being, and the only being who can have a conception of a straight line. That is one fact that has been useful to me in thinking about the relation between the spiritual and the natural. Another one is this,-that we move in the spiritual world now. If we ask ourselves,-What is the spiritual world?-we realize that the spiritual world consists in the relation of things. As soon as the mind receives impressions from the natural world, there is the relation between, and there is the spiritual idea, of course. That illustrates the way in which the two worlds are interdependent, and it is brought out very fully in the argument of Bishop Pendleton's essay.

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It is the relation of things that is spiritual, no matter how material they may be. . . . The real relation is use, service, ministry; and life is not too long to practice it. We find a vast number in the world having different views, and we have to accommodate ourselves to all. That reminds me of one passage in the Writings, which Mr. Odhner mentioned in a class which I attended, to the effect that man's regeneration is his initiation into societies and communities. He has got to learn to be useful to more and more, and to a great many more. This is the ideal relation, and a perfectly satisfactory one. Out of use comes a real happiness, and so out of service comes the acknowledgment of the Lord."

     The Rev. H. L. Odhner believed the subject of this profound paper to have occupied the minds of Newchurchmen since the rise of the Church. But, whatever differences of interpretation there may be, the reality of the spiritual world must be the ground of our thoughts. The agitation in our minds recently was due to our inability to see the reality of spiritual substance. In the end it matters not so much whether we have a simple or a highly philosophical idea of the substance of heaven, if we but have such an idea as can gather in the influx of truth from the Lord.

     "We have the same problem in our thought concerning the Lord. God is Man, but not material man. He is Man because He is the perfection of use, of love, of wisdom. Yet we are permitted to think of His Human in terms of material shape and appearance; and He indeed came down and clothed Himself with the material figure that our minds might be able to picture the Divine of Use, the only living substantial as something real and comprehensible, into which idea all higher perceptions of His Divine might be gathered. The Bishop has just impressed us with the vital need of thinking of the livingness of the spiritual. We have various ways to figure it out, but unless we think of the spiritual as the living primitive of creation, and as the substantial reality that underlies all phenomenal life, we have missed the purpose for which the Writings were given."

     The Rev. Alfred Acton had "listened with great interest to the paper which so very ably presented the subject of the spiritual world. . . . The Bishop had brought forward a great truth of our Church which ought to be impressed on all the Church does not offer any interpretation of doctrine. Each minister or member must be free to interpret the Writings as he sees right. If you do your best to see the subject in the light that is given you, you have the view that the Lord gives you, and that is better than to follow after the view of any minister, whoever he be.

     "There are several views concerning the spiritual world, and in general I think they may be summed up in three. First, the Christian theology of the Old Church has made a spirit-world, a natural super-world, where winged angels walk on golden streets, or a ghostly world, placed somewhere; yet, because reason does not confirm these, it has led to denial, except that the innocent believe in it. This view of the spirit-world seems to have influenced the one which has prevailed in the New Church, except that we have had before us Swedenborg's experiences in the other world, and know that it is not fantastic or hypothetical, but was actually seen by him.

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But when it comes to our understanding of its; nature, we have been influenced, perhaps more than we care to admit, by the Old Church view of a refined natural spirit-world. It has been said that it is not natural, but discretely higher; yet the words have not given any real understanding.

     "The second view is that of the learned, who claim that the ideas of spirit and of religion and of God came from nature and its forces, manufactured through dreams and fancies; and that the whole of our mental world comes 'from dust.'

     "Finally, there is the intermediate view, which the Bishop presented, that the spiritual world is the real and substantial world, and yet that nothing of that utmost reality can become apparent to man, or be investigated by man, until it is seen in a natural form; that is, that no man can exist unless he has been born on an earth. . . . It is that ultimate,-that vessel into which and by which his spiritual eyes can be opened, so that he can begin to see another world, which actually exists as the cause of this world. Take a moving picture show. You see the screen, the action of the people; waves of motion make the picture on the screen; you can draw the screen nearer, yet it is there, and the reality which makes it is between, invisible.

     "The Divine Proceeding of the Lord alone makes the real spiritual world. When we read the Writings, we are reading natural things; but by virtue of reading these things, we see spiritual things. I would like to emphasize one thought, as to what 'seeing the spiritual world' really is. If we had our spiritual eyes opened, as Swedenborg had, and could see the mountains, hills, etc., we would be no nearer seeing the real spiritual world than we are now. Abraham, Moses, and John the Revelator, all saw the spiritual world, and yet they saw only the external. If Swedenborg had not been prepared by the Lord, the opening of his spiritual eyes would have been merely an interesting phenomenon. It is the truths of the Writings that are given to open our spiritual eyes; that is, to form our mind so that we shall see the real things of the spiritual world. All men, when they die, will enter the spirit world; they will see the bodies of spirits, and they will see their clothing, and yet many will deny God, and will say: 'This is the material world,' because they have never seen the spiritual. The Writings are given to reveal the spiritual world,-what makes the spiritual, not what makes the appearance."

     The Rev. E. R. Cronlund: "This is a most important subject that has been placed before us today. In regard to the Divine Human of the Lord, we are told that no matter what idea we may have of the Human, it will be accepted as long as it has innocence in it. And so with regard to our ideas of the spiritual world. They may be very imperfect, but if there is innocence in them, they will be all right in the spiritual world. If there is innocence in a thing, there is a desire to be led by the Lord; and if we have that here, we will have it afterwards. All who really believe in a spiritual world naturally think about it. We are naturally interested in that world in which we know we are going to live forever.

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We are anxious to know. So we go to the Writings, the only source of information on the subject, and we find that it appears externally like this world. It simply could not be otherwise, because we are finite beings, and we cannot think except in a finite manner. And so the objects of the spiritual world clothe themselves in finite forms before us; and, as far as we are concerned, there must be that external clothing, or else we could not think of it at all. We cannot think of anything spiritual except in natural forms; but the important thing is to think from innocence, and to realize that the other world is the real world, the living world, and that this world is really in itself dead, and is only acted upon by the other world, and only appears living because it is continually acted upon by the Sun of heaven. The ultimates of the spiritual world are all finite; the interiors of the spiritual world are living,-the real world."

     At the second session, held Saturday evening, reports and greetings were given; and later the Rev. E. R. Cronlund read a paper on the "Principles of the Academy."

     The Rev. Alfred Acton found two points of alignment between the paper just read and the Bishop's address. First, that the Church does not teach anything but what the Lord alone teaches. The Divine Truth or Doctrine makes the universal of the Church. Now what has made the Church with us has been the "Academy doctrines." You might say it is the "Heavenly Doctrines." But what has made the peculiar quality of our General Church is that interpretation, that education, that application of the Heavenly Doctrine which we call to mind when we say "the Academy Doctrines."

     Mr. Acton then referred to wireless telegraphy, and to a statement by the Bishop that the Divine Truth was a real substance, and that this was seen by us just as far as we open our eyes to see it. The human mind is the only instrument that can detect the Divine Truth, The Academy was attuned to see certain things taught in the Writings,-the four great principles Mr. Cronlund had spoken of,-the Authority of the Writings, the Newness of the Church, Marriage in the Church, and Education. . . . You cannot strengthen the Academy by "boosting" it but by the acceptance of the Word of the Lord. . . .

     In regard to social life in the Church, we older people must lead to it by cultivating some affection for the New Church with our children in earlier years. . . . "There has been a great deal of marrying outside the Church lately; you may think I am treading on delicate ground. But marriage in the Church is a fundamental doctrine. By that is not meant that if you marry outside the Church you are going to hell, or that your life is to be a tragedy. The doctrine of the Church is, that if there is not conjunction in the minds of married partners as to the things of the Church, there is no true marriage.

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This is a very serious question for us to consider and bear in mind. It is an external that involves the very first principle with regard to the New Church; that the New Church exists for the salvation of the human race.

     The Rev. H. L. Odhner recommended that the paper be offered to New Church Life. He spoke of the logical connection between the different Academy teachings, grounded as they are on the premise that the New Church is a specific church. He concluded: "The Academy principles are not artificial rules or arbitrary regulations, but only the fruits of experience and the confirmations resultant from the point of view that there is a New Church. They are simply the rules of wisdom in regard to New Church life."

     Bishop Pendleton pointed to the evidences shown in the paper that Mr. Cronlund bestowed earnest thought upon his subject which thus came to represent the giving of something of the life's blood. "He brought our vanities home to us. We will go through life and not be quite able to get rid of them. Yet the Doctrines of the Church are 'boring in' all the time, if we have an affection for them; and, by their constant and continued action, they will in the end, uproot these vanities.

     "Now Mr. Acton has spoken very earnestly and eloquently in regard to marriage in the Church, and he has presented in a dear light just exactly what it is. Not all who are married in the Church represent, a true conjugial marriage. It may also be, in the case of one who is not of the Church joined to one in the Church, that the Lord may bless that marriage. The Lord exercises especial care. While conjugial marriage can only exist under certain conditions, yet in our Church we do not lay down a rule that a man must or must not do a certain thing. And, if our young people marry outside of the Church, let us remember that censorious criticism is going to do no good whatever. I should advise this: If one of our young people marries outside, let us extend a welcoming and enthusiastic hand, and let us make them feel that there is at least a spiritual home among us, if in the Lord's good pleasure their minds can be opened. The great majority of people have come into the Church through conversation with a friend; friendship was the medium of communication. If you want to give the Doctrines to another, you must do so as a friend, talking to him as one who has common sense. His religious convictions are to be treated with decency and consideration, for you must deal with him as a friend; and in your touch with him as a friend, the opportunity may arrive. It is a mistake to harp on the doctrines of the New Church when he does not want them, He must be in a state that is receptive when you present the doctrines of the New Church.

     "I refer to this matter of marriage in the Church because Mr. Acton has presented the Academy doctrine on that subject. But, don't let our understanding of that subject put us in the way of censorious criticism. Let this Society and every other Society of the General Church be an active spiritual organization. Unless you have a spiritual sphere of thought you are not New Church no matter how often you come together. If you come together, and the affections stir for spiritual things, then you become a medium capable of receiving once of Divine Truth.

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That is what we are here for; that every man may become such a spiritual medium. That is the genuine thing that makes the Church great, that has given the Academy a quality of its own, that gives it the right to be a universal spiritual trustee in the hands of the Lord.

     "Become such a society to join your minds in spiritual perfection, and all those in our midst by marriage or genius so disposed or prepared that they may be touched and moved by this thing, may become ambitious to appropriate some of it for themselves. If our young people cannot see this, then they are gone; for then they have begun separating from the spiritual part of the Church. The only way to keep them alive is to generate the spiritual sphere in the Church and to let them feel it, and to pray that they may take it."

     The Rev. Alfred Acton confirmed the Bishop's counsel, and said that one marrying outside the Church, in so doing did not depart from those external laws of the Ten Commandments or of the country whereby we judge a man. We ought to confine our external judgments, to external things. He can't be treated as if he were a bigamist or a robber! (Laughter.) Of his internal quality we cannot judge.

     Mr. Caldwell complimented Mr. Cronlund on the paper, especially because "it talked right to us? He thought that the afternoon meeting was an evidence of a sphere of spiritual thought, and hoped that the enthusiasm of the occasion might leave its lasting results. In touching on "mixed marriages," he recalled the teaching that "a man has passed temptation successfully if he regards his neighbor as more worthy than himself." We have not passed temptation successfully if we criticize others censoriously.

     Mr. Craigie was anxious lest we go to the other extreme and say that marriage outside of the Church is as good as that within. Of course, he did not accord with the parents who in a recent case of marriage outside of the Church would not even attend the wedding! (Laughter.)

     The Bishop: "The Academy does stand for, and teaches, Marriage in the Church."

     The Sunday Morning Service, April 18th, was attended by 147 persons. The Bishop preached on the subject of the Glorified Human of the Lord. The whole service was most impressive, everything leading up to and centering on the spiritual concept of the Lord; and the discourse flooded the mind with a very wonderful light. In a manner it seemed to be a further application of the view on "Spiritual Substance," given the day before; for the emphasis was placed on the substantiality of the Lord's infinite Love, incarnate and glorified. The Communion was administered in the afternoon, 82 persons partaking. The Rev. E. R. Cronlund assisted at both services.

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     A third session of the Assembly was held in the evening, when the Rev. Hugo Odhner read a paper on "The Church and Salvation."

     The Rev. Alfred Acton, noting the comprehensive character of the paper, regretted that discussion must be confined to one or two points. "It struck me from the beginning that the paper showed a very vigorous mode of approach, and I congratulate the writer. . . . One point especially impressed me, concerning the end of the Divine Providence. It seems shocking that the end of Divine Providence is not salvation. But it is easily seen that, whatever the end of Providence is, it is accomplished; and the end is not so much that every man shall go to heaven, but rather that in every man there be preserved the image of God, and that if he will, he can go to heaven (D. P. 66). . . . If he turns to hell, the inmost of Providence is that he shall be brought into the order of hell, and thus that something of the human and something of life be preserved."

     Another point which impressed the speaker was that salvation is a result of truth, i. e., that man is not saved, or brought into heaven, without truth. In regard to infants who die, the speaker noted that the great distinction between those who die as infants and those who die as adults is that the former have not a material idea, but only a spiritual idea. When adults see a palace in heaven, they may say, "That is Italian marble." Infants see only the spiritual idea of the palace, whether they come into one heaven or another; yet adults may also come into this spiritual idea by not sinking their thoughts in material things.

     As to the question whether those whom we ordinarily mean by "gentiles" can come into interior states, Mr. Acton observed that the Pre-adamites constitute the hairs of the Gorand Man; and, on the other hand, the New Christian Heaven is founded in the natural heaven. We would not be happy among the men of the Golden Age, but must live among our own. The three great "expanses" of heaven are formed respectively from the three ages, the Golden, the Silver, and the present age. The quality of the men of the first age was that they were not led by themselves, but by the Lord, as infants; of the men of the second age, that they were led by correspondences; and the great distinctive quality of the New Church is Divine Truth in the natural. Still, each society is a complete heaven, with the celestial, spiritual and natural degrees. . . .

     Another point, about the specific church as the heart and the lungs of the universal church. These two organs are on the same plane as the rest of the body. All its organs are made by the soul and the animal spirit, yet the heart and lungs are called the center of the rest. The fact is that the Lord uses two modes of reaching men: one is immediate, like the influx from the soul into the body; the other is mediate by other men, and is comparable to the action of heart and lungs upon the test of the body. Immediate influx without mediate influx has no value, and is of no avail. There must be mediate influx by means of lasts, and when the Lord came to earth Himself, He provided the mediate influx.

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He did this because the Church on earth had failed; and He uses the Church to instruct from lasts, and to bring the actual knowledge of Himself on earth. You may be surprised to know that the literature spread broadcast by the New Church is greater than that of any other Church. And this has had an incalculable effect, and no one knows the marvelous workings of the truth from the center,-the heart and the lungs,-which the New Church constitutes.". . . The same operation is going on in the spiritual world. The truth that the Lord God is God-Man, and that the Word is Divine, has come to other ears by means of the specific church. Think of the Hindoos and the Basutos. In every society of the General Church there are some who are most deeply interested, who uphold the hands their Pastor, and who thus are the real strength of the society. They, similarly, are the specific heart and lungs within their group; their affection is the affection of keeping the society most alive, and of stimulating others. And in so far as we, instead of criticizing them, admit that their affection and activity has largely served to keep the centre up, so far we admit the principle of the specific church as the heart and the lungs.

     Mr. Jacob Stroh confirmed the previous statement as to the extensive literature of the New Church. It stands third in the British Museum collection of religious works.

     The paper had brought home to us that the Church looks to the salvation of all our fellow-men,-even those who are not in as favorable a position for instruction as we ourselves,-and the Church wishes to make their surroundings, education, etc., as favorable to salvation as possible. There are many appearances of the failure on the part of the Divine Providence, in that some are rich and others are in want, and that only a few are within the church. Some are permitted to grow up and to become perverted, and thus to come into hell, when if they had died as infants, they would have been saved. Yet the mercy of the Lord is shown in the fact that an opportunity and a chance is given to every human being, if not here, then hereafter, and that everyone will eventually be put in the position of which he is capable. This little planet is not the gathering place for the last judgment, but the spiritual world is, where the Lord will make a provision for everyone, even for those who have been in evils and falsities....

     The speaker called attention to the teaching, in Heaven and Hell, that it is not so difficult to live the life that leads to heaven as some suppose. "Don't be mistaken"-it seems to say; "just try it, and see how easy it is."

     Mr. Craigie thought that the question involved in the teaching that every class of men corresponds to a certain part of the human body, and of the Gorand Man, would to a great extent be answered by the fact that the province of the skin, for instance, can be extended to include the skins of internal organs as well.

     Mr. Caldwell said that the "old people" (he was not sure whether that would include him) had reason to feel comfort in the fact that in the Academy we have an institution that supplies such material as the ministers of the district had shown themselves to be.

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     Mr. Wilson referred to the perfect Niagara of intellectual food provided during the Assembly. He hoped that, "even as the water rushes over the cataract, and reaches the smooth waters of the river, we shall be able to assimilate more of what we had heard, as we sit down quietly and think it over. After the Assembly sphere is gone, may we not lay to heart the teachings given, and try to carry some of the enthusiasm through into the life of the society?"

     The Rev. Alfred Acton made an application of the laws of Providence by remarking that in the Old Church the constant attempt is to make men "good;" in the New Church we leave man in freedom.

     The Rev. H. L. Odhner wished to add the thought that man is saved by being introduced into the Lord. This is the universal, and means that he is introduced into the Lord's love, which is toward the whole human race. If we can come to love something spiritual, outside of ourselves, there is some partial image of the Lord's love of all the human race; and this is a love that saves, because receptive of instruction, and thus of regeneration.

     On Monday afternoon, a Ladies' Meeting was held, Bishop Pendleton giving an informal address on the question: "Why can we be saved?" It is told us that this interesting question was answered in the light of the truth that the inmost of Divine Providence is "that man may be in this or that place in the Divine heavenly man" (D. P. 67), which shows that man can be saved because he can be of use: It is use which is salvable. In the evening the ladies gathered at the home of Mrs. Chas. Brown, where they had a jovial card-contest.

     The gentlemen met the same evening at the Olivet Church, when Mr. Jacob Stroh gave a delightful and inspiring address on "Conjugial love." Being a veteran nature-student, he used many interesting illustrations from the three kingdoms of nature, showing the distinctions between natural and spiritual love. He gave reminiscences from the early days of the New Church in Canada when the work on Conjugial Love first reached the German-speaking New Church people in the district. The discussion which followed was most interesting, and included a variety of topics, and the eloquence showed no signs of subsiding up to the adjournment at 12:30. Greetings were sent to certain old-time members who were absent: to Mr. Robert Carswell, who is still confined to his home as the result of an accident; and to the Rev. J. E. Bowers and the Rev. F. E. Waelchli, whose duties prevented them from attending.

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Various toasts were apologetically offered in ginger ale:-to the Bishop, to the Heroes of the Academy; and the final toast, to Conjugial Love, also conveyed the affection and gratitude of the men to the Ladies, who had borne most of the burden of the Assembly. Mr. Nathaniel Stroh thanked the Toronto Society, on behalf of the visitors, for the splendid hospitality enjoyed.

     The Secretary acknowledges the indispensable assistance of Mrs. Theodore Rothaermel, who made stenographic notes of the discussions.
     Respectfully submitted,
          HUGO LJ. ODHNER,
               Secretary.
TWO LETTERS FROM A ZULU 1920

TWO LETTERS FROM A ZULU Various 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:
     I am sending you herewith copies of two letters received from a Zulu, believing they will be of interest to the readers of the LIFE. Being unacquainted with the Sesuto language, he writes in English, I have not met him as yet.
     THEODORE PITCAIRN.

     FIRST LETTER.

To the Rev. S. M. Mofokeng,
     Basutoland.

Dear Sir:
     I herewith acknowledge the receipt of your letter of 26 Sept., in answer to the application for the books which treat of the New Church of Jerusalem. But this time my friend is not with me who could write in Sesuto, as being his language. And what I want to say is of my own self. I myself as being a member of the Wesleyan Church, I think it best first to explain to you how I came to know of the New Church. For the first time, I came across some one who was in possession of the first volume of the Arcana Coelestia. For the second, in a second-hand book store in Johannesburg, I came across a book called the True Christian Religion. When reading that book, I came across the truth that had never entered in my ear. Now, when spending my time in trying to get the truth that is in it, I cannot come to the clear understanding.

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For some matters are not treated in it, but in other books. If you can get me the other books I am asking for. I think you will understand me when I say, as I have experienced in many things when some one is in search of the truth, he can no longer remain in false... I would that I get all the volumes of the Arcana Coelestia, if not all that containing the books of Genesis. I have the True Christian Religion; I believe it is a complete one. Heaven and Hell-one of my friends, Joel Maduna, lent it to me. What I am anxious to get is as many volumes I can get of Arcana Coelestia, Apocalypse Revealed, Apocalypse Explained, Holy Scripture and Key to its internal sense, Miscellaneous Works.

     Now this time I am by myself, not knowing the idea of Michael Paeea. This is the anxiousness of one man. I am by nationality a Zulu of Natal.
     Yours truly,
          MOFFAT MCCANYANA.

     P. S.-I can be very much pleased if you can take me as a friend of the New Church, and send me what good about it you possess at present. That is to say, any book you think to be good which is in your possession now.

     SECOND LETTER.

Rev. Theodore Pitcairn,
     Basutoland.
Sir:
     I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the books you sent me, and with many thanks for your kindness. And I will wait with true hope of getting the others you have not at present. I hope you will not be discouraged, as I cannot come at present, having suffered a long time through sickness. I must take leave to Natal on the 8th inst., but I intend, when coming up again, to come to Basutoland first. I was very anxious to see you that my faith in those books may be made firm, and that I may hear more, and be able to tell others of the truth I have heard.

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I like to get a good understanding of this wonderful truth, and to be able to stand all the questions which may rise and will rise.
     Yours affectionately,
          MOFFAT MCCANYANA.

     P. S.-The language being not my own, I cannot express clearly my true feeling about this truth, but I hope you will be able to perceive that the fire has been lighted and it must burn, and will not be extinguished. No! Not till all the dry hay I had in my mind and sense is consumed.
ALLENTOWN AND SCRANTON 1920

ALLENTOWN AND SCRANTON 1920

     The Allentown, Pa., Daily Item of May 10, 1920, published the following:

     "The lecture by Karl R. Alden, B. A., on the discoveries of Sir Oliver Lodge regarding the life after death was attended by more than 200 persons in Hamilton Hall last evening. Mr. Alden's exposition of his subject was highly interesting and instructive. He opened with a discussion of Sir Oliver Lodge in other fields than spiritualism, asserting that there probably is no man more learned living today. His scientific achievements are world-renowned, and his opinions have become doctrines of fact. Mr. Alden then turned to the revelations made to Lodge by mediums in his seeking to communicate with his son, as expounded in his book "Raymond," and in conclusion pointed out three ways that thinking men and women have taken in their-beliefs. They may follow the university agnostics who deny that there can be a life after death, or they become devotees of Lodge. The final recourse, the speaker said, is to turn to the Bible and its messages in this regard, which have been revealed by Emanuel Swedenborg."

     The same lecture was delivered in Scranton, Pa., before an audience of 210 persons, all those being present who had become interested in the New Church during a previous missionary visit by Mr. Alden and Mr. Theodore Pitcairn.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     COLCHESTER, ENGLAND.-Since our last report some interesting socials have been held, one for the children on Easter Monday, according to our custom, at which there was a large attendance and a very successful effort on the part of the grown-ups to give the children a good time. As we are at low ebb in this priceless possession (four only), it will be understood that the general sphere and pressure upon them was considerable. However, they came up smiling at the finish, and all agreed to give it a premier position among occasions of this kind.

     On April 11th, by invitation, the Rev. G. C. Ottley conducted service for us, and we were glad to welcome him again after an interval of more than twenty years. The sermon was a clear and powerful exposition of Genesis 20:1-7, and was much enjoyed by the 39 persons present, including 7 visitors.

     The wedding of Mr. Sanfrid Appleton and Miss Winifred Potter was celebrated at the Hall of Worship on Priory Street on Saturday afternoon, April 17th, the Rev. G. C. Ottley officiating. The chancel was decorated with ferns, evergreens and flowers. The bride wore white cripe de Chine with a net veil surmounted by a spray of white roses, and carried a bouquet of white lilies. She was attended by her sister, Hilda; Mr. Alan Waters, of London, was best man. The Hall was filled to its utmost capacity by the many relatives and friends of the bride and bridegroom, and a powerful sphere was felt as the whole congregation sang the dosing hymn of the service. The happy pair left at once for their honeymoon trip to St. Leonard's-on-Sea.

     On Wednesday, April 28th, a reception for the newly married couple was held at the Hall, where flags covered the walls and the table was burdened with good things. We were pleased to have with us Mr. and Mrs. Boozer, of Maidstone, with their children. In all 34 were present. After a series of appropriate toasts, responded to by Messrs. Potter, Cooper, and Alwyne Appleton, the meeting entered lighter vein, with the singing of songs by several present and instrumental music-violin and piano-by Mr. and Mrs. Boozer. It was a gathering that breathed a strong sphere of affection for the Church and for one another, and we trust it cheered the hearts of the bride and bridegroom.

     Private Kesel Motum was recently demobilized; all of our young men have now returned from war service. Our building fund continues to make steady progress.
     F. R. COOPER.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-The spring visit to MIDDLEPORT, OHIO, was made May 8th to 19th. Two Sunday services were held, the attendance being seventeen and twenty, respectively. On the second Sunday the Holy Supper was celebrated, at which there were fourteen communicants. There were six doctrinal classes, a social, and two children's services. During the social the Pastor spoke of the importance of the use of the Weekly Sermons in family worship every Sunday. On the 15th, Mr. James Boggess passed away at a hospital in Huntingdon, W. Va. He was the oldest member of the Middleport Society, and had been active in its life and uses for nearly fifty years. The funeral service, including a sermon, was held in Middleport on the 18th, and was largely attended. Among those present were members of the Masonic Order, who took charge after our service at the house was completed.

     Two days, May 20th and 21st, were spent at GIVENS, OHIO, where our General Church member, Mr. S. A. Powell, lives.

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Two missionary lectures were given in the Christian Union church. The first evening, the subject was "The Nature of the Life after Death," and close attention was paid by an audience numbering 80 persons. We expected to have the usual experience of a much smaller attendance the second evening, but on the contrary it was larger. This time the subject was "The Lord's Transfiguration," which involves the doctrine of the sole Divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Many expressed their pleasure in what they heard, and we hope to continue the work in this locality.
     F. E. WAELCHLI.

     GLENVIEW.-Chicago now claims to be a "health resort." If any of our New Church brethren should be tempted to spend their vacations in that busy city, and do not find all the peace and rest and fresh air they were led to expect, we would remind them of the park at Glenview, which is within easy reach by train and a delightful spot in which to spend a Sunday. In addition to the three blessings above mentioned, the visitor can worship in a beautiful little temple, and meet New Church people who will be glad to welcome him. We hope all who read these news notes will accept this as a hearty invitation to visit the Immanuel Church.

     SERVICES AND CLASSES.

     At the Sunday services, our Pastor has continued his interesting series of sermons on the Apocalypse, in which he brings out the importance to the New Church of this Book of the Word. Our Sunday Evening Reading Class has concluded reading The Divine Love and Wisdom, and has taken up the little work on The Last Judgment. The several classes which follow the Friday Evening Supper are proving a successful experiment and seem to be promoting an increased interest in reading the Writings.

     LIBRARY.

     Our Library has recently received gifts of books from the Rev. David L. Klein, Mrs. Shannon, Mr. Harvey Brewer and Mr. Alec. McQueen, while our supply of books for the children in the School is being well taken care of by the proceeds of the Charles Francis Browne, Jr., Memorial Fund.

     STEINFEST.

     At the May Steinfest the subject of "Feminism" was discussed. Dr. King spoke on "Feminism, What it is" Mr. H. L. Burnham on "Woman Suffrage." Both subjects were so fully dealt with that little remained for the speakers who followed. The meeting seemed to be unanimous in the view that feminism is one of those lesser evils that come under the head of "permissions." It was brought out that in the main it is the men of today who are responsible for the conditions that favor feminism; that if women are to become recipients of the wisdom in the men, then the men must take the necessary steps to become wise. This was shown to be an essential thing in the New Church, if its members are ever to attain the heavenly state of conjugial love. Mr. Harold McQueen was toastmaster, and between the speeches he read quotations from the pamphlet issued by the feminist organization, following each with a quotation from the work on Conjugial Love-the latter, needless to add, being of an entirely opposite nature to the former.

     "LIFE" COFFEE MEETINGS.

     The New Church Life Coffee Meeting has now concluded its fourteenth session. It was begun as an experiment, has met in private houses, and has proved quite a success. Starting with seventeen at the first meeting, the average attendance has been twelve, and it has been the means of increasing the interest in the things of the Church which are so fully recorded in the pages of the Life in addition to the list of subjects already reported, special interest has been manifested in the stories written by Mr. Anshutz in early issues of the journal. The story of "Pentville" was recently read and much appreciated, telling, as it does, of experiences which have been all too common in the history of our Church, where societies have been started on the insecure basis of loose membership.

445

In the discussion of the stories, the idea was expressed that the young people of the Church at the present day should have an opportunity to obtain the benefit of these stories. The charge had been made that the stories are "old fashioned." In reply to this, one of the speakers remarked: "The descriptions of the ups and downs of courtship can hardly be called "old fashioned." When prohibition has ceased to be a live question, when the permeation theory has ceased to exist in the minds of Newchurchmen, when people no longer dabble in spiritism, when New Church people marry only those of their own faith, when we cease to yield to the pressure of Old Church spheres, when Newchurchmen view everything from the standpoint of revealed truth,-then the stories in the Life will have become "old fashioned."

     DECORATION DAY.

     On Sunday, May 10th, our Pastor preached a special sermon, taking as his text the words of our Lord: "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." He said that the great struggle for freedom and union had receded into the distance, and another conflict of far greater magnitude had passed into history. Because of this greatest conflict, Decoration Day would probably take on a much wider significance. It had already become a day for the commemoration of all the dead who have given their lives in defense of our Country, and a day to give a concomitant thought of gratitude to the Divine Providence of the Lord, who is the real and only defender of human society, as He directs and governs all things, and men are only instruments in His hands.

     On Monday, we had a flag-raising ceremony, with a patriotic address by Dr. J. B. S. King, who pointed out that we should be willing to make sacrifices for our country in times of peace as well as in time of war.

     WORK AND PLAY.

     For a long time our Manse has been sadly in need of a coat of paint, but offing to the high cost of labor and materials, it has had to wait. Recently, a number of our men and boys, under the leadership of Mr. Harvey Brewer, got together and did the work with an expedition that would have put to the blush the regular union experts. In place of the usual liquid refreshment, the workers were sustained in their efforts by ample supplies of coffee and sandwiches, handed around by the ladies.

     During the month the ball games have begun again. The last one played was between the married and the single, and resulted disastrously to the former. There has been a party for the children, a picnic in the park, and the young people have had a big dance and several little dances.
     GEORGE A. MCQUEEN.

     SOUTH AFRICA.-We learn from the New-Church Weekly (London) that the Rev. J. F. Buss was to leave for South Africa on April 30th last in the interests of the Conference South African Mission. The Weekly for May 1, 1920, contains the account of an enthusiastic Farewell Meeting tendered Mr. and Mrs. Buss at the place of worship of the Kensington Society on April 26th, which was attended by a large gathering of London New Church people. At the dose of remarks by a number of ministers and laymen, Mr. Buss "received quite an ovation on rising to speak, and said that he had been quite overwhelmed by the inspiring and encouraging speeches of his brother ministers and other friends. He regarded the call of the Dark Continent as a wonderful thing that had happened in the history of the Church, and hoped that the result of the meeting would be an awakened enthusiasm in the great cause in South Africa. . . . He spoke highly of the work of Mr. Keys in South Africa, who had formerly been a member of the Kensington Society. In conclusion, he asked for their prayers that he might be able to do the work for which he was about to set out."

446

     LONDON, BURTON ROAD. Sunday, May 16th, 1920, was a memorable occasion for all those privileged to take part in it. We had found it necessary to "anticipate states" to the extent of making it our "June 19th" celebration, as on that date our beloved Pastor, Rev. R.. J. Tilson, hopes to be in Bryn Athyn, this was his last Sunday before sailing.

     The Morning Service was the more impressive in that it included the unveiling of a beautiful brass tablet as a memorial to those of our brave boys who fell (or, rather, as we were reminded, rose) in the great war. Not all of them were actual members of Burton Road, but all were associated in some way with us, and all had expressed the desire to have their names included in our Roll of Honor.

     The tablet, some two feet by one and a half, is executed in a beautiful "warm" tone of the metal and is surmounted by a laurel wreath in green, immediately under which appear the following quotations from the Spirit and Letter of the Divine Word:

     "Who does not remember and love him who fights even unto death that his Country may be free." (T. C. R. 710.)

     "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." (John xv, 13.)

     Then with the simple headline, "Killed in the Great War, 1914-1919," come the following thirteen names:

Capt. Algernon G. Ottley
Lieut. Reginald T. Shaw.
"     Kendall C. G. Ottley.
2nd Lt. Reginald B. G. Ottley.
C. S. M. Richard Cooper
Pte. Osmond Acton
"     Clement W. Borer
"     Edgar Churcher
"     Harold W. Locke
"     George W. Manning
"     Walter Misson
"     Cedric Storry
"     Sydney H. Waller

     The whole is completed by a scroll-like border in black, of a light, delicate design, and the tablet is placed on the wall near the chancel in full view of the congregation. Such is our memorial, "lest we forget."

     As is his invariable custom, our Pastor struck the keynote of the Service in the opening words, which were from T. C. R. 414, and also Ps. cxii, 6: "The just shall be in everlasting remembrance," which was the text of the most impressive and appropriate address which followed in its place after the Humiliation and the Lessons from the Spirit and the Letter of the Word.

     For the actual unveiling, the Pastor descended from the chancel, and stood immediately beneath the Memorial; and when, at the touch of his hand, the Union Jack fell from the beautiful tablet, revealing the names of our heroes, the climax of a most powerful sphere seemed to have been reached. "Go and do thou likewise" was the exhortation, and all felt that nothing could have been more fitting.

     The administration of the Holy Supper to fifty-eight communicants followed, after which a hymn was sung, and the closing of the Word and the singing of the National Anthem completed a Service which had been indeed a "Feast."

     At 6 p. m. a Feast on the physical plane was held, which also provided plenty of mental sustenance, as it merged into our Annual Meeting. There was a full attendance. After calling upon the various officers of the Society to "render an account of their stewardship," the Pastor rose to give his review of the work of the past year. Very interesting is this always to listen to, showing, as it does, how wide is his "parish," how many and varied his activities. This year it had perforce to include the period of comparative quiescence (only comparative, for he kept in touch with us all the time!) immediately following his severe operation, from which, happily, he is making a good recovery, and of which we hope his ocean trip will complete the cure.

     The Rev. G. C. Ottley followed with a vigorous and interesting address, after which several laymen spoke, all voicing their good wishes to our Pastor and his colleague, and a suggestion from the former that he should take a message of good will from us to our brethren across the water was received with enthusiasm.

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     The singing of a hymn and the Benediction brought the Feast to a close. All felt that it had been a day of "meat indeed" for which we were supremely thankful. For the next two months, we shall be in danger of merely "vegetating!"
K. M. D.

     PHILADELPHIA.-Our Local Assembly left a great deal of enthusiasm and interest in its pathway. The meetings were exceptionally spiritual in character. The fine address and sermon by our Bishop, not to mention his banquet speech, were most deeply appreciated and productive of good results.

     The monthly meeting of the Advent Club was unusually inspiring, due to the speaker of the evening, Mr. Randolph W. Childs, who gave us an address on "Socialism." He has studied this subject with great care, and his presentation was especially pleasing, in that he did not take a biased or partisan view, but pointed out both the disastrous effects and the virtues of different forms of socialism. The paper was followed by a heated discussion of economic theories, as advanced by various members of the Club.

     About the middle of the month a recital was given by Mr. and Mrs. D. F. Edmonds, vocal; Miss Creda Glenn, cello; and Mr. and Mrs. K. R. Alden, violin and piano. Only a small number of persons attended, but we hear that they enjoyed themselves very much.

     A week later the ladies stepped into the limelight by imitating their sisters in Glenview and giving a little one-act play, entitled "Sewing for the Heathen." They put a great deal of work into it, and the production made a great hit. They introduced a number of local hits that were welcomed with shouts of laughter. The musicale and the play together netted about $30.00 for the carpet fund.

     A movement which we trust will prove itself very important was instituted by the Pastor during the month,-a self-governing Young Folks' Club, the initial officers of which are: President, Oswald Soderberg; Secretary, Miss Vera Fitzpatrick; Treasurer, Miss Edith Smith. On Decoration Day the Club made its maiden appearance by giving a picnic for the Society at Willow Grove which we understand was a great success.

     The Scouts have been working hard on their camping fund. According to latest advices, about ten boys will go with the Pastor to the summer camp, at Delaware Water Gap. During the month the Pastor made a brief missionary tour to Allentown and Scranton. Invitations had been received for some time from friends in both towns, and at last he found it possible to make the trip. The great interest that has been shown in the lectures given by Sir Oliver Lodge in this country suggested the title of our address, "The Discoveries of Sir Oliver Lodge regarding the Spiritual World." For the purpose of advertizing the lecture, we sought the advice of our New Church friend, Mr. Samuel Fred. Haxton, and he outlined a campaign which resulted in phenomenal audiences. In Allentown, through the efficiency of Mr. S. Dan Zeppenfeld, generous press notices appeared beforehand, and the; result was a friendly and understanding audience of 183 persons. In Scranton, an audience of 210 included in its number some of the most intelligent in the city. Owing to the limited size of the hall, about ten persons were obliged to stand, the first time in the experience of the lecturer that such an accident has occurred! The lectures seemed to accomplish the desired end of arousing interest in a lecture on Swedenborg to be given later, and for which a number of persons asked.
     K. R. A.

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TEACHER WANTED 1920

     Announcements.

     A Teacher is wanted for the Local School of the Carmel Church, Kitchener, Ontario. Ten pupils, divided into several grades. Apply to Mr. J. E. Hill, 75 Mount Hope Street, Kitchener, Ont., Canada.

449

PRINCIPLES OF THE ACADEMY 1920

PRINCIPLES OF THE ACADEMY Rev. E. R. CRONLUND 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL          AUGUST, 1920          No. 8
     (A paper read at the Ontario District Assembly, April 17, 1920.)

     The church, in itself regarded, is Divine. As it is the Divine of the Lord that makes heaven, so also it is His Divine that makes the church. A heaven from the human race is the end of the Divine Providence, and it is according to the mercy and good pleasure of the Lord that there should be a church on earth to prepare men for a life in heaven.

     The church, as a teaching body, is such as is its doctrine. There can be no church without doctrine. A church that teaches false doctrine is a false church, and a church that teaches true doctrine is a true or genuine church. Our Church,-the General Church of the New Jerusalem,-stands for the doctrines or principles known as the "Principles of the Academy." Chief among these, or these principles in a summary form, are the following: That the theological Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg are the Word of the Lord to the New Church, consequently that they are of Divine authority; that the former Christian Church is consummated and dead, with no hope of a resurrection; that the New Church must be distinct and separate from the old; that the marriage of conjugial love is between those who are of one mind, in the true faith and in the true religion; that there must be education in the church, by the church, and for the church.

     These principles were drawn from the Writings by the Fathers of the Academy movement; and because they are derived from that source, they are principles that are taught in the Writings themselves. The principles of the Academy have been handed down as a doctrinal heritage to the present generation, and on the acceptance or rejection of them our Church will stand or fall.

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It is quite certain that the New Church cannot be established except along the lines of these principles, since it cannot be built up except by means of genuine doctrine drawn from the Writings. For it must be evident that nothing but the doctrine of the New Church will establish the New Church. It must be borne in mind, however, that each one ought to see for himself that the doctrine of the Church is true. Each one ought to see the doctrine of the Church in the Writings, and each one should apply that doctrine to his own life in the greatest freedom. No one should be forced either to believe or to live the doctrine of the Church.

     It is possible that in the early days of the Church there was not a sufficiency of freedom. It is probable, also, that extreme positions were taken with regard to the application of certain doctrines. Mistakes have been made; splits and internal disruptions have occurred. But let us remember in this connection that the Church as an external organization consists of fallible human beings, and that therefore we must not expect it to be perfect.

     The Church, as it has come down from the Lord out of heaven, is Divinely perfect and infallible; but the finite receptacles of the Church are fallible, and liable to err. We must not look for perfection in any structure built by the hand of man. But, although errors and flaws have been found in the Church, let us beware of committing the grievous mistake of judging the Church and its uses by the errors committed. Would such a judgment be charitable? Would it be a just judgment? How would we like to be judged by our mistakes? Let us rather consider the great uses that the Church is endeavoring to perform; and let us judge the Church by those uses, and by those endeavors.

     And let us remember that the doctrine of the Church as revealed out of heaven will stand in spite of all errors of interpretation, and that its uses will survive, no matter how weak and faulty the hands and the minds through whom they are performed. Let us remember, also, that the Church itself does not consist of a body of errors; for it consists of a body of truths that are coherent and harmonious after a heavenly manner, that are similar to themselves in greatests and in leasts.

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For "Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together; whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord. For there are set thrones of judgment, the thrones of the house of David." (Psalm 122:3-5.)

     The great strength and power in the Academy movement lies in the fact that we hold that the Lord is manifested in the Writings. For the Writings are a revelation of the Divine Human of the Lord. The gospel which the New Church proclaims is that the Lord has come in Divine power and glory. The Lord has actually come; for He has come as to His Divine Mind. And as the mind of a man is the man himself, so also the Divine Mind of the Lord is the Lord Himself. Unless this is seen, it cannot be seen that the Lord has made His Second Coming in accordance with His promise. He who does not see that the Writings are Divine does not see what the New Church is. He has not caught the spirit of the Church. That it may be realized that the New Church is a living thing, that it is the Lard's Church, truly the Bride and Wife of the Lamb, the Lord must be seen in the Writings.

     It is because the Writings are Divine that we must humble ourselves before them as before the Lord. For the acknowledgment of the Divine authority of the Writings should not be an intellectual acknowledgment only, but also an actual acknowledgment. We should permit them to govern us and lead us in all the affairs of life. The heavenly doctrine revealed by the Lord should be to man his instructor, his delight, his very breath of life. All his thoughts should be in harmony with it. We must admit that our natural tendency is to think from the world. The opinion of the world around us is apt to be our opinion. It is indeed true that we may learn many things from the world. But the theories and opinions of the world must be tested by the doctrine of the Church before they are accepted. The light of Divine Doctrine must be shed upon every such theory or opinion, that its true quality may be seen. As the apostle says: "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world." (1 John 4:1.)

     The Writings are the supreme court of inquiry, the law above all laws, the holy of holies. Everyone may go to this supreme court of inquiry, everyone may interrogate the Lord there, and receive answers from Him.

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And by constantly going to the Lord, the spirit is kept in a state of enlightenment. By reading something in the Divine Revelation each day, We are kept in the sphere of truth, we have light from above, and are able to think from the truth. If we do not read the Writings, the natural consequence will be that we will live in the light of the world; and we think from the light in which we live. If we would have spiritual strength and enlightenment, we must read the Writings, and meditate on what we read; for the unchangeable Divine law is: "In Thy light shall we see light."

In this connection, it is also well for us to bear in mind that the Church in each one stands in need of protection, since it is subject to continual attacks from within and from without. We know what our depraved inheritance is, and that the proprium of each one is nothing but evil. We know also that a sphere of Utter indifference toward things truly Spiritual reigns in the world. This sphere infests the Church, and our natural tendency is to enter it and be carried away by it. Hence the necessity of a guard. It is said in the Apocalypse that the Holy City "had a wall great and high." By a "wall" is signified protection, and the wall that protects the Church is the doctrine that has been given out of heaven. If we know this doctrine, and take delight in it, then we are within the wall of the city, and are safe. But he who is indifferent toward the doctrine of the Church, and lives a life of merely natural good, has no protection. He is led by the evil as easily as by the good. He is carried hither and thither by every wind like a ship without a rudder.

He who takes delight in the doctrine of the Church is naturally drawn toward and loves those who are in a similar delight; and so a spiritual brotherhood is formed. Such a brotherhood existed in the early Christian Church. All who were of the Church regarded themselves as brethren in the Lord. But when charity began to grow cold, a marked change took place. They then began to be indignant at the idea of calling one who was of a lower station in life a brother, for then their idea of brotherhood was based, not on any spiritual similarity and relationship, but on purely natural and external similarity and relationship. In the New Church there should be, and there will be, a spiritual brotherhood; for we should regard those as brethren who, as far as we can see, love the doctrines of the Church and are in the sincere effort to live according to them.

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In heaven there are no other than spiritual relationships, and they who are spiritually alike live together, without regard to what their state and condition had been in this world.

     Let us bear in mind that, when we leave this world, we cannot take with us either titles or wealth, or any other earthly possession. The only thing we have here that will be of any value to us after death is our love,-our love of the Lord and of the neighbor, and the things that are stored up in these loves. When we enter the other world, and seek admission to heaven, we will not be asked if our parents were aristocrats or what standing we had in the social world, or how much money we possessed, or what university we are graduates of. Such questions will not be asked by the examining angels. An illustration of what we will be asked is given in the Writings in the following account of an interview between an angel and a novitiate spirit. The angel said to the newcomer: "What is your doctrine, and the religion from it?" He answered: "Faith and charity." "These are two things," said the angel. He replied: "They cannot be separated." The angel asked: "What is faith?" He replied: "To believe what the Word teaches. "And what is charity?" He answered: "To do what the Word teaches." The angel said: "Have you only believed those things, or have you also done them?" He replied: "I have also done them." The angel of heaven then looked at him, and said: "My friend, come with me, and dwell with us." (F. 43)

     Honors, wealth, and a store of knowledge are indeed Divine blessings to those who are spiritual, but they are not the things that cause men to be admitted into heaven, nor is it from such things that an angel regards a man as a brother. The love of use, the spiritual love of truth or in other words love to the Lord and charity towards the neighbor,-these are the Divine of the Lord that makes heaven. These are the things that admit man into heaven, and these are the things that cause a man to be regarded as a brother by the angels.

     In order that we may be able to enter that great spiritual brotherhood on earth which we call the Church, or, in other words, that we may actually be of the Church, it is necessary for us to make certain sacrifices. No one can serve God and Mammon.

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If the Church dose not conquer the world in us, the world will certainly conquer and drive out the Church. That we may be of the Church, we must therefore be willing to forsake the world, that is, the evils of the world, and the indifference toward spiritual truth that reigns in the world. The Lord says: "Whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:33.) The things of the proprium, the things that hinder and prevent us from receiving the Lord, are the things that must be forsaken. The way must be prepared, so that the Church may reign supreme within man. It must reign, not only in the understanding as an intellectual light, but also in the heart as an ever-burning fire. When this is the case, it does not matter to us if the world does regard us as queer and as bigoted and narrow-minded. If the love of the Church is the living fire and the vital force in the heart, nothing will prevail against it.

A man is willing to give his life for whatever he loves supremely. Men are giving their lives every day for the things they love. The man who is in the love of eating or drinking, and does not curb his desires, knows that his excesses will kill him some day; but still he persists. There are those who lead a life of immorality, and who know that such a life will cause disease and finally death, but who still do not repent. There are multitudes of men at the present day who are giving their lives for utterly unworthy causes, and who are thus going directly against the commandment of the Lord, who tells us to give our lives for His kingdom, for His Church. We should be willing, therefore, to give our whole-hearted devotion to the Church, to make sacrifices for the sake of the Church and even to give our lives for it, if necessary.

They who have no knowledge of the Church can be saved without it; but we who have a knowledge of the heavenly doctrines cannot be saved without them. Our welfare in the life to come depends upon our being faithful to these doctrines, It is well for us to realize this, for our tendency is to stray into crooked paths, to forsake the straight road that leads to happiness. We are annoyed at the senseless things our children do sometimes, and yet the things we do ourselves are often far more senseless and inexcusable.

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     We must remain faithful to the truth, or we will be scattered among the nations; we will be driven out of the promised land,-driven out by our own unworthiness, by our evils. If we are unfaithful and unworthy, the Church will be given to others, for the New Church will of a certainty be established on the earth. It is written: "The Lord of Hosts hath purposed, and who shall disannul it? And His hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it back?" (Isa. 14:27.)

     And, in this connection, let us listen to these wonderful words by Swedenborg the philosopher: "It is foretold that the kingdom of God shall come; that at last the guests shall be assembled to the marriage supper; that the wolf shall lie down with the lamb, the leopard with-the kid, the lion with the ox; that the young child shall play with the asp; that the mountain of God shall rise above all other mountains, and that the Gentile and the stranger shall come to it, to pay their worship." (E. A. K. 366.)

     The Writings declare that the who knows anything of the Lord's coming, and of the New Heaven and the New Church, and thus of the Lord's Kingdom, should pray that it may come." (A. R. 956.) Each one who has any knowledge of the Church should pray that the Church may come to him, that it may enter into his heart; for if the Church does not exist in the heart of man it has no place in him.

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ABRAM'S JOURNEYINGS 1920

ABRAM'S JOURNEYINGS Rev. HUGO LJ. ODHNER 1920

     "And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother's son, and all their substance that they had gotten, and the soul that they had gained in Haran; and they went forth to go into the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan they came. And Abram passed through the land, even unto the place Shechem, even unto the oakgrove Moreh; and the Canaanite was then in the land." (Genesis 12:5, 6.)

     The Word of the Lord, or the Revealed Scripture, treats of the Lord. It came forth from the Lord, and His spirit fills it. Outwardly the Word seems to treat only of temporal things of certain historical events among certain Semitic peoples. But all who acknowledge the Word to be inspired must also accede, in their thought, to the simple conviction that the principal thing to be studied and looked for in the Word is the Providence of the Lord,-the guiding Divine hand which mercifully leads, and chastises, and rewards. For even in its Letter the Word is manifestly the record of the providential intercessions of the Divine hand in human affairs, with a people which was to be accounted as a peculiar treasure unto the Lord,-a people chosen for this peculiar office that they might for all times represent all mankind; so that men of all future ages might see their own characters mirrored in the character of the Jews, and realize in their own lives the promises of the Old Covenant,-realize them by a life of humble obedience to the voice of the Lord, as they perceive its call in the providential shaping of their lives.

     The Word, then, is a record of Divine actions, or of the continual Divine efforts to approach and lift up the human race. And in every Divine providential operation infinite things are involved; in every Divine operation whereby the Lord's finger points and leads toward salvation, innumerable finite agencies are employed. Angels, high and lowly; spirits, good and evil; men, willing and unwilling; all are the instruments of His actions. Unfathomable spiritual and natural forces obey the Divine laws which are put into operation. And if we wish to understand the meaning and the value of the acts recorded in Scripture, we must consider and learn all the agencies, all the instrumental planes, by which these acts are effected.

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     First of all, however, we must know something of the Divine Lord Himself, who sways that transcendental category of spiritual and natural powers. Only by a knowledge and a perception of the quality of the Lord, Who alone is true Man, can we hope to understand the ideal quality of finite man. This was one of the supreme reasons why the Lord was born as a man on earth to be glorified and revealed as Divinely Human. For the knowledge of the Lord as the Divine Human is the beginning of all wisdom.

     The Lord came on earth for this simple reason-the necessity of His revelation as Divine Man. And since the knowledge of Him is the source of all wisdom, it was provided that His revealing Himself should partly precede the Advent or Incarnation. For in those ages of darkness during which men in the world were evil, and grew more and more evil and false in their hearts, there were yet angels in heaven whose whole soul and life continually craved the wisdom flowing from the knowledge of that One Divine Man. For their sake, as well as for the sake of the whole human race on this earth, it was provided that the Lord should be revealed before the Advent by Prophecy,-a prophecy continuously enacted, sometimes willingly, sometimes unwillingly, by the people set apart for this miraculous function; a prophecy enacted by living representatives for many centuries previous to the Advent.

     It is the beginning of that work which our text records; for it tells how Abram, with Sarai his wife and Lot his nephew, took all their substance and removed from Haran, in Syria, to the land of Canaan, by the command of the Lord; and how he passed from one place to another, from Shechem to Moreh. And the Canaanite, it adds, was still in the land.

     The chapter wherein this is told also relates some further journeyings that Abram undertook; and special stress is laid upon a journey to Egypt which famine prompted him to make. For fear that he might be killed, and Sarai, his wife, who was very beautiful, be made a wife to Pharaoh, Abram uses the strategy of letting Sarai call herself his sister. Pharaoh treated Abram well and enriched him because of Sarai's comeliness. But finally she is taken into Pharaoh's house, and Pharaoh is smitten with plagues, until he understands who Sarai really is. Then he returns Sarai and admonishes Abram for the deception. And Abram and Sarai return to Canaan.

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     But in reading this record, the man of the church may be instructed concerning the Lord; even as the angels are when man reads the story reverently. The angels of the ancient churches, long before the Advent, saw in the story of Abram the mysteries of the great work of the incarnate God, who glorified His Human and conquered the hells. And when the story was read by men on earth, the prophecy of the Advent was fulfilled, to all intents and purposes, in the sight of the angels, who thus caught glimpses of the glory of the Divine revealed as Man-revealed as the source of the true wisdom of life.

     Abram, and Sarai, and Lot; the rising hills of Canaan and the fertile Nile-valley; far-off, gentile Haran; and the barren deserts between, crossed by occasional caravans; the lowing herds of cattle, with the shepherds watching them; all these,-yea, even Pharaoh and his princes, even the Canaanites dwelling in Canaan,-all, had their prophetic correspondences in the life of the future Lord who was to assume a body of flesh and a human hereditary, and thus, by conquests over hell, reveal His Divinity before human eyes. All these things of Abram's world represented elements that made their alliances, or carried on their warfare, within the human of the incarnate Lord. And all together, in their mutual relation, these things presented a picture of the life of the Lord in the process of its Glorification.

     Entirely apart from any personal merit of his own, Abram, chief among the men here spoken of, represented the Lord as to His Human Essence; i. e., the Lord in regard to His manifestation to men, or the Lord in ultimates as a Man, the incarnate Jehovah, who assumed a body from Mary,-a body of human nature. And hence it is said of Abram that he departed from Ur of the Chaldees, and from Haran, departed from his ancestral house and followed the call of Jehovah into a new land, which was to be given to his seed forever. The voice of Jehovah to Abram is supremely significant of the Divine perceptive call to the Human Essence of the Incarnate Savior,-the Divine perception inflowing from the soul of our Lord as He was being prepared: even in infancy, to enter upon the work of redemption.

     For the soul of our Lord Jesus Christ was the Father, Jehovah, the Divine Esse, Life itself.

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And yet this soul was obscured and hidden with the Lord by the finite human, the maternal hereditary flesh, which was pregnant with the slumbering desires of the pervert race of men. The things of hereditary life must be put off, entirely destroyed, annihilated from the Lord's Human, in order that the Divine and the Human might meet in glorified and eternal unity.

Let us reflect as to how this was done. The Divine soul, "Jehovah," could not in an instant remove the evil tendencies of His hereditary human; but this hereditary plane, although pervert, must first develop according to the order of its nature. It must grow up in the manner of human bodies. And, as it began to unfold each new potentiality, each new tendency, each new tempting preference to its own merely corporeal life, so far could each new tendency be overcome and be put away forever by the proper Divine power of the Lord. So through all the states of a human life, the hereditary unfolded itself; and yet none of its evils were ever made actual with the Lord. The resistance to evil by the Divine was continual. Every new temptation was a new victory over evil, and over the very hells from which that evil came. At the same time it was a glorification of a new state in the holy mind which was being built up within the Lord's Human. And so, at last, by that glorified mind, the Soul-the Divine Life itself, Jehovah-found perfect expression, until, the victory complete, the risen Lord was the Divine Father Himself, even unto flesh and bones, even unto ultimates,-the First and the Last, the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the Source and the Destiny of all life.

But how many and sublime were the stages of this evolution from its ultimates! How profound are the arcane celestial laws of this glorification,-the laws whereby the whole power of the infinite God was centered into one brief span of life. And yet the greater marvel is that these laws of Divine order may in a measure be apprehended by men, because they are reflected in the life of One who, although Divine and infinite, chose to appear under a finite form. These laws and interior truths, in their essence and entirety, may not be grasped. And still they are reflected in what seem like finite states in the Lord's life on earth, For He was the Divine Law incarnate; and, as we may observe from the changing features of His life, when He was brought into contact with all human states, that He might pronounce them clean or condemn them as unclean, and thus that He might judge them, it becomes evident how in the Gospels the Divine Law is applied for us, applied to every day conditions, intelligible alike to minds broad and narrow, shallow or profound; and this, in order to enable our unperceptive understandings to judge ourselves, enable us to cleanse the inside of the cups of our existence, and to offer ourselves as pure vessels which defile not the living waters flowing from the eternal fountain.

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     The Lord came to show men by a supreme example how to journey the path of life, from state to state, from problem to problem, from temptation to temptation; and how to journey that path without faltering or turning aside. In the internal sense of the Word that journey is described even as to its most particular states. The process of the Lord's glorification is there recorded; the reaction of affections and thoughts in their succession are there told in fullness.

     Abram's journeyings from Haran, in Canaan, and in Egypt, inmostly mean nothing else than the succession of states in the Lord's Human about to be glorified, and particularly the succession of His states while in His infancy. Abram's departure from Haran and from his father's house, and from his land and from his kindred, means the Lord's withdrawal and recession from the things of His inherited human, His withdrawal from the earthly and worldly things of heredity, and His approach to the Divine celestial things which are represented by the land of Canaan. But when Abram had entered Canaan, he found that "the Canaanite"-a Hamitic people of evil character-"was then in the land." By this people, who were called by the name of their accursed ancestor, Canaan, the son of Ham, are represented hereditary evils. For when the Lord, in His infancy, began to grow up in accordance with the Divinely Human laws of development, it became evident to Him by a Divine, though at first obscure, perception, that hereditary tendencies in His external man would obstruct the union of His Human Essence with His Divine; wherefore, it is remarked that Abram noticed that the Canaanite was then in the land.

     This hereditary evil was to be removed. And it could be removed only by the cultivation and education of a mind which could serve the Divine Soul as an instrument in this purifying process, or in this glorification. The celestial things of love with the Lord were the beginnings of this mind. And there was also some truth.

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Abram here represents the Lord's Human Essence as to good, or as to celestial things of love; Sarai represents truth which is to be adjoined to that good; and by Lot is signified something which is called sensual truth in the external or corporeal man. The latter, or sensual truth, is the first truth which is insinuated in childhood; and it consists of the realization and acknowledgment that all things seen and felt by the senses, all things earthly or worldly, are created by God, each for a purpose, and that in each there is a certain image of the Lord's Kingdom. None but the celestial have such truth. And none but the Lord is truly a celestial man.

The mind of man is the link between the soul and the body. And it was so with the Lord. Moreover, the mind of man is built up by reactions with the sensual things of the body, or by reactions with the scientifics of the corporeal memory, and thus with the senses. And it was so with the Lord. Such a reaction, as it took place in the Lord's infancy, is signified by Abram's journey down into Egypt. There was lack of food-a grievous famine in Canaan. For the formation of the mind, knowledge or scientifics of sense-experience were needed. And the Lord, as it were, "descended into Egypt," to receive such infantile sense-experience as was necessary for the descent and confirmation of those celestial things of love which, from Jehovah, were being instilled into His incipient mind.

At this point in the sacred narrative, we may discern the first evident struggle within the Lord's human,-the first struggle and the first victory. For the Lord, otherwise than any man, conquered in all temptation. The Lord lived His Divine life according to His perception of the Divine order, from earliest infancy to His final victory over death. Even as an infant, He obeyed the Divine voice. From His Divine celestial perception, He knew the uses of the knowledges or scientifics which He must acquire. He perceived the true condition of His external mind, through which such knowledges enter. He perceived the danger that the mind might easily be captivated with the delights of knowing scientifics, and be carried away with those external delights to the detriment of the celestial things of love, which would then be obscured. Even in His infancy He saw the danger that lay in the lure of externals, a danger which men do not see plainly in adult age. And this was the internal reason why Sarai was so safe from harm in Egypt, though she was fair in the eyes of Pharaoh, and was not known as Abram's wife.

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The Lord saw the dangers of the merely natural mind, just as Abram saw the dangers besetting him in Egypt, and avoided them by Jehovah's help.

     The particulars of this story involve interior truths of most important practical value, though not easily drawn out and set forth at this time in a comprehensible manner. But it is easily seen that the general lesson in Abram's sojourn in Egypt and Sarai's deliverance from Pharaoh regards the nature and quality of the natural mind signified by Pharaoh; namely, that this mind readily appropriates what belongs to the celestial, and claims it as its own, thereby perverting the celestial things of love and violating their sanctity, if this tendency be not discovered and checked.

     Many of the grave problems of human life would be solved if men could perceive the discrete difference between "the things which are of Caesar and the things which are of God." But the life-power which inflows into the natural mind and gives to that mind the ability to think and generalize and reason, which causes in it the appearance of self-life and proper independence of any higher plane or any source of life, frequently is not acknowledged to be a celestial power inflowing from God.

     And even though, in the journeyings of a man's life, the truth be finally opened to him; though he at last comes to see that the life and the organic force, which joins each thing of sense, each harmony of reason, each thought and each imagery from the unmeasured treasury of the memory, into one vast whole,-into one conscious rational individual; though he at length domes to realize that this master force and organizing power within the mind is not his, but a celestial endowment of a superior order; even when he acknowledges these things, he is filled with sadness and disappointment. He harbors the emotions which Pharaoh felt when he found that the beautiful Sarai was Abram's wife. For Pharaoh felt a certain resentment that he had not before known this fact, that he had been misled to lay eyes on Sarai whom-he could not now hope to gain as his own.

     In a similar way, the regenerating man ofttimes feels resentful and dissatisfied with Providence over the fact that the life of the natural mind should seem as his own when in reality it is the celestial sojourning in the natural mind. And yet, how could this celestial power work in the natural mind otherwise than as a "sister?"

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     Let us remember that the power of thinking, of willing, of doing aright, is the celestial working in the natural for its own ends. And the celestial degree in man is his soul-the abode of the Lord with man, the creative and formative power of his being. The ends for which the soul works in the mind, and even in his body, are the ends of salvation and regeneration. When the soul operates in the mind, it is disguised and masked, and, like Sarai in Egypt, it is called by a name not its own. But, while it is thus disguised, it reaps a rich harvest, enriching the soul with the means of salvation. The soul gathers knowledges, and teaches the mind to think and to perceive. Finally, if man be willing, and can bear it, its identity of the soul is disclosed; its heavenly ends, and the universal object of its labor and its sojourn, is revealed.

     Then let man not delay in returning from Egypt! Let him seek the heavenly Canaan, which alone is goodly to dwell in and to worship in. Let him depart from the apparent life of natural ambitions and temporal, selfish advantage, and from the deceiving thoughts of self-flattery and conceit. This life of pleasing appearances will not be suppressed without a struggle. Pharaoh cries out against Abram; there is dissatisfaction and impure longing; there is all the stubborn hatred, all the spitefulness of the love of self to smother. But man must not attend, must not listen to the threats or fears or objections raised in the natural mind at the prospect of each sacrifice of its satisfactions and pleasures. He must depart, must lift his eyes and elevate his mind towards the heavenly goal, and leave Egypt behind.

     The Lord alone was a truly celestial man. He alone never acted contrary to His perception. He alone laid down His life, and sacrificed the last vestige, the last appearance, of the self-life of His finite human, for the sake of the salvation of the whole human race. He fulfilled the prophecies involved in the journeyings of Abram, to the end that all men who will may take up their cross and follow Him into the heavenly country where they shall rest from their labors. Amen.

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RITUAL 1920

RITUAL Rev. T. S. HARRIS 1920

     (An address delivered at the Banquet of the Sixth Philadelphia Local Assembly, April 11, 1920.)

     Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: I am pleased to have the opportunity of addressing you on the subject of Ritual, because it is one in which I am deeply interested.

     Ritual is defined as "a prescribed form or method for the performance of a religious ceremony." But, in a broader sense, ritual includes every sign, word, or act designed to express or excite a corresponding internal religious feeling; it embraces everything pertaining to external worship.

     All religions are ritualistic, since a religious ceremony cannot be performed without the use of ritual of some kind. It may be simple or elaborate in form, uncouth or artistic in quality, weird or rational in style; but, whatever the character of the signs, words, and actions associated with the ceremony, it is designed to express or excite religious thought and affections. The quietude of the Quaker meeting and the noise of the Negro revival; the shivers of the Shaker and the shouts of the Salvationist; the absurd actions of a Billy Sunday addressing his audience, and the dignified deportment of a Bishop in his Cathedral; these, and others like them, must be classified as ritual, whatever be the feelings, means or manner of arousing the religious feelings.

     Religious feelings! Think of what it implied by this term,-love to God, humility before the Lord, reverence for all that is holy, peace of mind and joy in the heart, good will towards men, and an infinity of other affections which these generals contain. The best form of ritual, then, is that which is most effectual in awakening these affections, and which most fully expresses them.

     In the ritual of the Most Ancient Church, the signs, words, acts, and objects used in the performance of religious ceremonies declared with utmost distinctness the emotions of the worshipers. That Church possessed a perfect ritual, because the infallible cognition of the relation between things spiritual and natural prevented the introduction of externals which did not correspond with internals.

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When men lost this infallible cognition, true ritual perished, and the idolatrous worship of externals ensued. There can be no deliverance from this idolatry except through a knowledge of the correspondence of externals with internals, or of natural things with spiritual. Because of the lack of this knowledge, the development of ritualism in the Christian Church has led those who are zealously devoted to it into greater degrees of idolatrous worship. This is why many Christians do not favor ritual, not that they can give any reason for opposing it, but they have a kind of intuition that something is wrong. They feel that the externals of elaborate ritualistic worship are empty, and so they swing to the opposite extreme, and try to worship with as few externals as possible. But they do not get away from externals, for this is impossible, and the consequence is that the few externals which are retained are used all the more intensely. The externals retained are as empty as those rejected.

The ritualism of the Old Christian Church is unchristian, and therefore idolatrous. The externals of worship, because their spiritual correspondences are not known, do not express and excite emotions which are truly Christian. For merely natural feelings are awakened by externals that do not reveal the spiritual internals to which they correspond. External worship without internal affects the natural mind only. Such is the duality of the ritual of that Church which is "Christian in name only."

The Roman Catholic Church, in its use and explanation of ritual, illustrates and confirms what has been stated. It is evident that the end is to excite natural emotions. That such an effect is produced by the figures and pictures presented to the sight, no one can deny. Who can look upon the figure of a man upon a cross, where physical agony is depicted by artistic skill, without feeling emotions of sympathy and sorrow? Or who can devoutly make "the stations of the cross," where every conceivable posture of humiliation and degradation is portrayed, and not be moved with compassion for the sufferer? In the sacrifice of the Mass, the Catholic sees what is identical with the sacrifice that He made upon the cross. The only difference consists in the manner of the oblation. Christ was offered up on the cross in a bloody manner; in the Mass, He is offered up in an unbloody manner.

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Everything points to the Passion of the Cross. Even the particular parts of the priest's vestments are intended to remind the worshipers of this event. Hear what the Rev. Bertrand L. Conway, of the Paulist Fathers, has to say on the subject of vestments:

     "Why do Catholic priests wear such peculiar clothes during services? The vestments worn by Priests at Mass mark them as men apart from the world, as in the Old Law (Exod. xxviii:4). Symbolically, they call to mind some detail of the Lord's Passion, for the daily Mass shows forth the death of the Lord until He comes. The amice, a linen covering of the priest's head and shoulders, is symbolic of the linen scarf placed over our Lord's eyes (Luke xxiii:64); the alb, the long linen garment of the priest, of the white garment wherewith Herod in mockery clothed Him (Luke xxiii:11); the cincture and stole, of the cords with which He was bound (John xviii:12, 24); the chasuble, of the purple garment the soldiers gave Him (Mark xv:17). The different colors of the vestments worn at different seasons of the year and on different feast days are also symbolic-white of innocence, red of martyrdom, purple of penance, green of hope, and black of mourning." (Question Box, page 190.)

     To the devout Catholic this explanation of ritualistic symbolism seems sufficient; but to those who are in the effort to see spiritual things through their natural representations, such an explanation is most unsatisfactory, to say the least. There is no attempt to explain the significance of the ritual of the Jewish Church, which is taken as historical authority, nor how a stole, for instance, is a symbol of a cord.

     The Protestant Churches, in their protest against Catholicism, have rejected much of the ritual of the Mother Church, and in doing so have eliminated almost everything of a symbolic nature. It is true that in the High Church of England, and in the Protestant Episcopal Church of America, there are many things of ritual which resemble that of the Roman Catholic Church; but there is no symbolic meaning ascribed to them. Ritualism among Protestants, instead of being a development from within, seems to be but a mild imitation of that which they unite in denouncing. Hence the constant state of agitation among them relative to this subject. The clergy of the Catholic Church are watching with much interest this attempt to imitate the ritual of their religion.

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Let me quote from The Faith of our Fathers, by Cardinal Gibbons, of Baltimore:

     "Only a few years ago, the whole Protestant world was united in denouncing the use of floral decorations on our altars, incense, sacred vestments, and even the altar itself, as abominations of Popery. But of late a better spirit has taken possession of a respectable portion of the Protestant Episcopal Church. After having exhausted their wrath against our vestments, and vilifying them as the rags of the wicked woman of Babylon, the members of the Ritualistic Church have, with remarkable dexterity, passed from one extreme to the other. They don our vestments, they swing our censer, erect altars in their churches, and adorn them with flowers and candlesticks." Continuing, he says: "These Ritualists are, however, easily discerned from the true priest. Should some of them ever appear before the Father of the faithful in these ill-fitting robes, the venerable Pontiff would exclaim, with the Patriarch of old, 'The voice indeed is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau. I feel the garments of the Priest, but I hear the voice of the Parson.'" Then the Cardinal offers this petition: "God grant that, as our misguided brothers have assumed our sacerdotal garments, they may adopt our faith, that their speech may conform to their dress. Then, having laid aside their earthly stoles, may they deserve, like all faithful Priests, to be seen standing before the throne, and in the sight of the Lamb, with white stoles, and palms in their hands . . . saying, 'Salvation to our God who sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb.'"

     The above sentiments show the mental attitude of Catholicism towards ritual as practiced by Protestants. "They don our vestments, they swing our censer," etc., and the hope is entertained that by imitating the ritual, the faith of the Church may be adopted.

     Now it is the fear of being "too much like the Catholics" that prevents some of our people from being in full sympathy with the development of ritual in the New Church. But as soon as it is seen that we are not imitating the Catholic Church, and that our endeavor is to return to the ritual of the Most Ancient Church, then all opposition will cease. Let us repudiate the insinuation that we are imitating the ritual of the Old Christian Church; let us emphatically deny the accusation that we have assumed the sacerdotal garments which are but symbols of the cruel falsities which assailed the Lord while on His way to final victory.

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     The ritual of the Old Christian Church makes the crucified human the center, while the ritual of the New Church points to the Lord in His glorified Human. The one sees Him as He hung upon the cross; the other beholds Him exalted as the only God of heaven and earth. Those who worship according to the old ritual witness the Lord being continually offered upon the altar as a vicarious sacrifice to propitiate the wrath of an offended God; but to those who worship according to the new, the Lord appears as the Living one, with "feet like unto fine brass," standing upon the open Word, as it lies in the Repository. With the Catholics, the "Real Presence" is the bread and wine which are said to be changed into the flesh and blood of the Lord, and if these elements were not upon the altar, the Lord would be absent; but with us, His presence is in and through the Word. This is what differentiates our ritual from that of Catholicism and its imitators.

     The New Church, from its inception, has given the same significance and reverence to the opening of the Word as the Catholic Church gives to the elevation of the Host. This simple act of opening the Word, which is a new thing in Christian worship, was the beginning of New Church ritual. And as this is a new thing, so all things in our ritual are distinctly new. The objects presented, the signs made, the actions performed, and the words spoken, have a different signification. To us, the white robes of the priest signify the reception of Divine Truth and protection against falsities, not the white garment wherewith Herod in mockery clothed the Lord. In the colors red and blue, we see the love of good and the love of truth, not martyrdom and penance. Lights in the chancel represent to us Divine Wisdom, truth, and faith, descending by correspondence in sun-light, electric-light and candle-light, which have their source in the three kinds of natural fire. In short, all things of ritual in the New Church are intended to represent that which is spiritual, not to signify things which in themselves are merely representatives.

     Those who are initiated into the mysteries of correspondences cannot be furnished with a ritual too elaborate. "The whole earth is full of His glory."

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All we have to do is to arrange in order the things which rightly represent and truly correspond, and thus develop a ritual similar to that which existed with the Ancient Churches. Such a ritual will not lead to Catholicism, but will take us farther and farther away from it. The ritual that is being developed in the New Church is a necessity, and not merely a luxury. We need it to excite our effections and express our emotions, and he who is able to interpret aright the significance of the things contained therein shall find the supply sufficient to the demand.
"THY KINGDOM COME." 1920

"THY KINGDOM COME." Rev. GUSTAF BAECKSTROM 1920

     (At the closing exercises of the Bryn Athyn Elementary School, June 14th, 1920.)

     It often happens that we do not realize the value of a thing until we have lost it, or until a long time after it is given us. You have received much good from your parents, and you do not see so well now what they have done for you, but you will see it when you are children no more, and when you have little ones of your own to take care of. Then, in your love for your own children, you will understand how your parents have loved you. And when you are grown up, you will also see what school has been, what your teachers have done for you. You will see then, better than now, the use of all this work, and you will perceive something of the love for you that has inspired them.

     Now you may often think: "Why must I learn all these things? What is the user of it? I will soon forget most of it anyhow." And yet it is all of use, because everything you learn forms your minds in a certain way; and when you learn what is good, your minds are formed in a good way, fitted to become images of heaven. Your father's and mother's love, your teachers' love for you, will do that. And your father and mother and teachers know that it is the Lord who does it through them.

     If your minds are formed in an image of heaven, then heaven will be your real home,-the home which your Heavenly Father opens to you, and where He bids you welcome: "Suffer little children to come unto me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven."

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There you will be happy, happier than you could ever be on earth, happy in your eternal home. This is the reason why you go to school, and why you learn about heaven and its glory, that it may not be a foreign country to you when you die, but a land which you have learned to love, where you wish to be, and where you will be happy forever.

     You also learn many other things in school which do not teach you directly about heaven. You learn these in order that your understanding may be developed, and that you may be better able to see the ways of the Lord, and that you may be of greater use to your fellowmen, which is just the way to be happy.

     Is it not much, then, that you get in your homes and in school? Indeed, it is the best of all you get. Not all children get what you get. Other children have homes and go to school, but there are few who have such homes as you have, and very few, if any, who have such a school as you have. There are homes where there is no love of the Lord. There are schools where there is no worship of God; yea, schools where falsities are taught as if they were truths. And if you knew what that means,-what difficulties, trials, and sorrows they undergo who have been brought up in such schools, before their eyes were opened to see what truth is,-you would praise the Lord for His goodness towards you.

     What is truth? You need not ask that question. Your parents and teachers have told you what truth is. But Pilate, who delivered the Lord to be crucified, asked the question: "What is truth?" Thousands of people who have imbibed false ideas of God and heaven now ask the same thing: "What is truth?" Some ask it in doubt, some in despair of every receiving an answer that will fill their hearts with trust and their minds with hope. I have been one of them myself. I know how it is.

     You have heard about the fearful battles in horror-stricken Europe; perhaps you had fathers or brothers or friends there, standing face to face with death. But there is a death worse than the death on the battlefield to stand face-to-face with. If you had stood upon the field of battle, you would never forget it. But the war in Europe is finished, as far as your country is concerned. There is another war which I am thinking of, which is by no means finished, the war against evils and falsities, in the world and in ourselves.

     Your nation, your fathers and your elder brothers, wanted to help Europe in its death-struggle.

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They wanted to fight for freedom. But you, boys and girls, and even the little children, can help us in that other struggle I speak of. You have been born in the New Church; you have been born in freedom; you have been born in love and light. There are others-many hundreds of thousands-who were born in spiritual slavery, in utter darkness. I believe that only the New Church can make them free and happy. Therefore, you boys and girls in the New Church, pray for them, that they may receive the religion of life, and live the life of religion.

     You have been taught the usefulness of prayer. Because it is useful, it ought to be used. To pray to the Lord is to speak to Him, and you know that even a silent prayer from a sincere heart is heard as a great cry in heaven. And no cry is there heard in vain.

     May all of you, therefore,-all you boys and girls,-pray to the Lord for these unhappy ones who have not been fortunate enough to receive what you have received. Yea, every morning and every evening, all of you, no one excepted, pray: "Thy kingdom come!" And you may be sure that every prayer will bring something of heaven nearer to the earth. We who work in the missionary field, to build up the New Church there, know very well from our own experience the truth of the words, "Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain who build it." And the Lord builds the house by the descent of heaven.

     The Lord our God permits us to speak with Him as children to their father, and He wants us to say to Him: "Come!" And to pray, "Thy kingdom come." But you can do more than this; you can do something more than pray for others with your mouths. You can pray with your hearts. In everything that you do, you can pray in your hearts that you may do it right, in order that you may be good and true and useful, and so be able to help those who have not what you have, help them that the unhappy may become happy, yea, help them to find heaven. And then you will keep what you might otherwise lose.

     "Remember how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast." Ever remember these words you have so often heard and spoken: "Thou shalt not." You are not to do what is evil, and then you will be able to do good, to be honest and just and right, to do the will of your Heavenly Father, and thus honor Him. And so His kingdom will come.

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May we, therefore,-all of us,-thank the Lord for His goodness, for His endless love and mercy towards us, for all the good things He has given us. And let us pray that heaven may descend upon earth more and more, that its light may be seen, that its truths may be loved and lived, by you and me and all. "The Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come."

Yea, may you all,-boys and girls and little children in the New Church,-say. "Thy kingdom come." The secret of life is to forget oneself for others. If you forget yourselves for the Lord, forget your own wishes for the Lord's will, His kingdom will come. Amen.
CHARLES FRANCIS BROWNE 1920

CHARLES FRANCIS BROWNE ENOCH S. PRICE 1920

     BORN, MAY 21, 1860-DIED, MARCH 29, 1920.

     Another of the old boys has crossed the Great Divide. Why regret the passing? Non mortuus est; emigravit. What pleasant memories he has left with those of us who knew him best! Of him it can well be said that those who knew him best loved him most. There were five of us, in those old days of the early 80's, who formed a sort of close corporation of friendship-"quinque sunt in amicitia;" Charles Francis Browne was not the least of those five. We first became acquainted with Charlie at 1719 Green St., Philadelphia,-the Mecca of all Academy boarders at that time. Four of us were students in the Theological School of the Academy of the New Church; Browne was a student in the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. He was not a New Churchman when first we knew him, but called himself a Unitarian. He became a New Churchman through endless discussion and argument with the above-mentioned students, especially with our beloved departed, Carl Theophilus Odhner, and N. Dandridge Pendleton, our present Bishop. There came a time in the course of those arguments when Charlie said: "I see that what you say must be true, but I wish it were not so."

     However, that state of forced belief did not last. Browne became one of the most steadfast New Churchmen it has been the writer's good fortune to know. Although a busy student in the Academy of the Fine Arts, he found time to attend all the religious and social meetings of the Cherry Street Society, and took an active interest in all the church uses.

473

He read and studied the Doctrines privately, and was in the constant endeavor to apply their teachings to his chosen profession. He had not been many years in the Church when he began to lecture on Art to the students of the Academy and the members of the Cherry Street Society. After one of his lectures on Egyptian architecture, some one of the "five" said to him: "Browne, that sounded a good deal like the Encyclopedia Britannica." "Well," he replied, "you have to get your information somewhere."

     His good nature was imperturbable. Not once in all our acquaintance with him did we ever see him angry, although I know of more than one trap set for him just to see what the reaction would be. The nearest we ever got to an expression of anger was a sort of Indian grunt, usually followed by a most infectious chuckle. Charles Francis Browne was born at Natick, Mass., on May 21, 1860, of old Pilgrim stock, being the son of Mr. and Mrs. George Warren Browne, his mother's maiden name having been Emmeline Wetherbee. He was obliged to give up school in the second or third year of High School, owing to an illness which continued for the greater part of two years. He started in designing at the Forbes Lithographing Company, and attended the Boston Museum Art School at night, until he moved to Philadelphia about 1883.

     Early in life he had conceived the desire to be an artist, but was afraid to broach the subject to his father, who was a practical builder and contractor. So, using a little of the wisdom of the serpent, he asked his father to apprentice him in the School of Design. That being a practical business, his father made not the slightest objection. Perhaps he would not have objected in any case; but Charlie got where he wanted to be, namely, where he could learn color and drawing. He had no intention of becoming a designer, but went through the course in the School, specializing in stained glass, which afterwards stood him in good stead, as will be sees.

     While a student in the Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, he was receiving an allowance from home, but this was not nearly enough for such a life as the art students almost necessarily lived. So he would work away in the Art School until his last cent was gone and he had borrowed from every art student who had any money left, and then he would quit, (there were no attendance requirements in the Art School then, perhaps not now), and go to a stained glass establishment in the city and ask for a job.

474

He always got a commission, and charged his own prices. In this way he would, in a few days, have money enough to pay all his debts and resume his work in the Art School. Here let me say in passing that if he had so desired, and had continued to work at designing, he could easily have gained a competence, if not wealth. But he
had complete disregard for money for its own sake.

In the fall of 1887, I think it was, he took the prize in the students' exhibition. He was, of course, greatly and justly elated; but we: in our pious anxiety that he should not become conceited, praised the beauty of the frame he had selected for his exhibit. The writer of this little sketch is not an artist, but he thought at the time, though he did not say so, that the picture,-a seascape,-was beautiful, and he would dearly love to own it at this moment. In the winter of 1887-8, or the spring of 1888, Browne went to Paris and entered L'Ecole des Beaux Arts, where he studied under some of the great French masters for several years. There the writer met him in July, 1888, and, together with him, did the city of Paris in two days! We sat on the banks of the Seine and watched Frenchmen fish. Browne said that there was a tradition that some one had some time or other caught a fish in the Seine, but he had never heard the date.

When he had finished his course at L'Ecole des Beaux Arts, he returned to America, and in 1890 took up his residence in Chicago, where he soon became identified with the art interests. He continued painting, but especially loved to talk of art, and his talk was always illuminating. He lectured at the University of Chicago and the Chicago Art Institute, also conducting classes in the latter, besides being identified in other ways with its remarkable progress in recent years. He was the founder and editor of BRUSH AND PENCIL, president of the Chicago Society of Artists, member and director of the Western Society of Artists, and the American Federation of Arts, and was associated with many undertakings of national and international importance in the art world. His landscapes found a place nearly every year in the Chicago Art Institute and other exhibitions, and received numerous awards. He made several summer trips to France, and also painted in the Scottish hills.

475

Many of his subjects were chosen from scenes along the beautiful Rock River, in Illinois, where he had a studio among others of the art colony located there during the summer months. The high esteem in which he was held, and the personal affection felt for him by his brother artists and wide circle of friends in Chicago, was manifested in a notable manner during his illness last winter when they arranged a special exhibition of his paintings, and realized the sum of $12,000.

     Despite this great popularity, and the social demands of the most exclusive circles of art and culture, Browne retained a remarkable simplicity and modesty of demeanor, and never lost a favorable opportunity to "talk New Church" to those he met. Readers of the LIFE will recall the sentiments he expressed in his account of "A New Church Social Experiment," which appeared in these pages last March, (p. 160), where he said: "I spent last winter in one of the most attractive places anywhere for the beauty of landscape, climate, wealth, exclusiveness, and-lack of happiness. I came back to Glenview, and here I rejoice in the intimacy of the New Church life, and find happiness the coin of general exchange."

     Poor Browne's marriage turned out unhappily, but of that we will say no more. He had one son,-the very apple of his eye,-who was killed, or so injured that he died, in a swimming accident a few years ago. Young Charlie is remembered with affection in the Academy Schools. The boy had much of his father's sunny disposition, to whom his death was a sad blow, though he accepted it bravely and humbly as in the Divine Providence. We trust they are united before this in the fields of heavenly art, where they may paint landscapes such as they could not find in this world, and such as mortal eye hath never seen.

     More, much more, could be written of Charlie Browne, but time and space will not permit.

     Last year, while in California, he suffered an apoplectic stroke, from which he never fully recovered. He became well enough to travel, however, and got back to Glenview, where he resided for some time with his dear friends, Mr. and Mrs. Seymour Nelson. When somewhat further recovered, he went to his mother's home in Waltham, Mass., but there suffered another stroke, which caused his death on March 29, 1920.

476

     He was a man, an artist, a beloved companion, and, best of all, a New Churchman. Requiescat in pace.
     Unus quinorum,
          ENOCH S. PRICE.
Bryn Athyn, June 2, 1920.
MEMORIAL SERVICE ADDRESS 1920

MEMORIAL SERVICE ADDRESS GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

     IMMANUEL CHURCH, GLENVIEW, ILL.

     When a person dies, and goes into the spiritual world, we know it is of Divine Providence. Not only the fact, but the time when he passes into the other life is the one best appointed for his going. There is nothing to be regretted in a thing that is so evidently in the Lord's hands.

     When one whom we especially love is removed from this life by the Lord, it touches and affects us. We cannot help that. There is no reason why it should not touch us, for it is one of the manifest acts of the Lord Himself. His presence-His will-is felt in it. The dependence of man upon Him is felt. This by itself is affecting, aside from the fact that an object of our affection has been removed from our sight. The very removal of one we love from our natural sight and sense tends to open within us a keener internal sight of him, especially when there is the acknowledgment of the Lord's Providence in it.

     The quickening of this spiritual vision of our dear friend, Charles Francis Browne, brings before us a character sincere and lovable,-lovable to us in particular because we recognized his strong love of the Church, and of the Doctrine of the Church,-that is, a receptivity toward the Lord in His Second Advent. This was our chief bond of love far him, from which we delighted in the charming things of his person; for he had many charming traits of personality. He was affectionate, and believed in giving expression to good affections,-a man of strong feelings, as an artist should be,-a man, too, who gave every evidence of being in the love of his use. When one is in the love of his use, not from desire for gain or eminence, it is a sign that he is in the love of his fellowmen, and is a spiritual man.

     We see Mr. Browne not only as a character of affectionate quality, but also as one of high intellectual attainment, adorned also by a breadth of view, the result of culture and travel.

477

He always dated his intellectual birthday from the time he was brought by Providence into the companionship of those young and eager students at the Academy's School in Philadelphia, where he made his first acquaintance with the New Church doctrine and life, which furnished remains useful to him in his subsequent life, and in his art. He seemed always to grasp and hold to the essentials of a thing in the greatest possible simplicity; and he grasped the essential principles of the New Church life and education. We all know that he deemed it the most fortunate and gratifying thing he had ever done for his son when he had arranged for his bringing up in the knowledge and sphere of the Church.

     Although a man of wide professional and social connections, he always held the little circle of the Church as his center of deepest fellowship, especially of late years,-even enthusiastically at the end. He had his spiritual battles, his natural disappointments and sorrows, as it is of Providence that all should have. He was free to speak of his mistakes, but right-minded and cheerful, being alive to the limitations of the human kind, and, on the other hand, sympathetic and finely appreciative of the good in others.

     I think one of his leading characteristics was sympathy. And although sympathetic, and readily approached in friendship, he was firm enough to let it be known if his own convictions were not the same as yours; but this with tact, and without animus.

     We think of him as a man of strong affections turned in the right direction. We will think of him coming now into the freer exercise of these affections,-into a widening sphere of activity, better than anything life on earth affords. And we will always love him as being spiritually our brother.
     GILBERT H. SMITH.

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
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BRYN ATHYN, PA.
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     OCCASIONAL SPIRIT VOICES.

     Here and there in the Writings we find mention of the fact that men occasionally hear spirits speaking to them without the danger that usually attends such communication. The conditions and circumstances under which this may occur will be seen from the passages quoted below. The burden of the teaching in the Writings and in the Scriptures is to warn men hot to seek communication with the departed, not to "betake themselves to familiar spirits," not to depend upon visions and speech with the dead for a faith in immortality; in short, not to desire and ask instruction from spirits and angels, but to go to the Lord alone in His written Revelation, which was given by Him through angels and spirits in an orderly manner, and which is sufficient unto every need of the man of the Church.

     That this warning is the uppermost truth on the subject to be observed by the man of the New Church, is the rational conclusion resulting when all the teachings of the Writings are brought together and compared. The organized New Church in all its branches is agreed upon this view, and it has been set forth frequently in our pages during the past year. The general law is that conversation with spirits and angels is contrary to order at this day, on which account there is a Divine prohibition and prevention of it.

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Like all laws, however, it may be broken. Both spirits and men try to break it, and to some extent succeed. "Mediums," and those who follow after them, co-operate with evil spirits in breaking this law, in violating this order; and for causes that belong to the Divine wisdom it is not altogether prevented. The man of the Church, however, will not cast himself into the sphere of the Divine permissions by a deliberate "breaking of the commandments, and teaching men so," but will heed the warnings of Revelation.

But we wish here to call attention to the fact that there are occasional deviations, which may be described as incidental or accidental and which are not to be classed as deliberate violations of the law. Just where these occurrences belong in a rational view of the whole subject, and what importance is to be attached to them, will become evident from a careful reading of the passages in the Writings which describe how men may occasionally hear the voice of spirits without the injury that attends a deliberate seeking for such communication. The chief statements known to us are as follows:

"To speak with spirits is rarely granted at this day, since it is perilous; for then spirits know that they are with man, which otherwise they do not know; and evil spirits are such that they hold man in deadly hatred, and desire nothing more than to destroy him soul and body, which also happens to those who have so much indulged in phantasies that they have removed from themselves the delights proper to the natural man. Certain also who lead solitary lives sometimes hear spirits speaking with them, and without danger; but the spirits with them are removed at intervals by the Lord, lest they should know that they are with man; for most spirits are not aware that there is any other world than the one in which they live, or that there are men elsewhere; on which account it is not allowed man to speak with them in return; for if he did speak, they would know. Again, those who think much about religious matters, and dwell upon them even until they see them as it were inwardly in themselves, begin to hear spirits speaking with them; for religious persuasions, whatever they are, when a man dwells upon them by himself, uninterrupted by various things of use in the world, penetrate to the interiors and rest there and occupy the whole spirit of the man, and even enter the spiritual world and move the spirits there.

480

But such persons are visionaries and enthusiasts; and whatever spirit they hear, they believe to be the Holy Spirit, when yet it is enthusiastic spirits." (H.H. 249; see 438.)

     "Something will now be said about the speech of spirits with man. It is believed by many that man can be taught by the Lord by means of spirits speaking with him; but they who believe and wish this do not know that it is conjoined with peril to their souls. (Fully explained.) . . . These things show the danger in which a man is who speaks with spirits, or who manifestly feels their operation. . . It is otherwise with those whom the Lord leads; and He leads those who love truths and will them from Him; these are enlightened when they read the Word; for the Lord is there, and speaks with everyone according to his grasp. If such hear speech from spirits, which also happens at times, they are not taught but led, and this so providently that the man is still left to himself...." (A. E. 1182, 1183.)

     Treating of the doctrine that "no one is reformed by visions or by speech with the dead, because they compel," it is added: "Nevertheless speech with spirits is given, but rarely with the angels of heaven, and it has been granted to many for ages back; but when it is granted, they speak with man in his vernacular, and only a few words; and they who speak by the Lord's permission never say anything that takes away the freedom of reason, nor do they teach; for the Lord alone teaches man, but mediately by the Word in a state of illustration. . . . " (D. P. 135.)

     From these statements we learn (1) that "those who lead solitary lives sometimes hear spirits speaking with them, and without danger," though the spirits are removed at intervals, for their own sake and the man's; (2) that those who abstract themselves from a normal life of use in the world, and think too long on religious matters, begin to hear the voice of spirits, and not without danger; (3) that those who read the Word devoutly may sometimes hear spirits speaking, though never instructing them; lastly, that when spirits speak with the Lord's permission, they speak in the man's vernacular, and only a few words; they never take away freedom, nor do they teach.

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Accordingly, we have this further important teaching that "they who wait for influx do not receive any, except a few who from the heart desire it, who sometimes receive a kind of response by vivid perception in their thought, or by a tacit speech therein, and rarely by open speech; and it is to the effect that they should think and act as they will and as they can, and that he who acts wisely is wise, and he who acts foolishly is foolish; but they are never instructed what to believe and what to do, lest their human rationality and liberty should perish. . . . They who are instructed by influx what to believe and what to do are not instructed by the Lord, nor by any angel of heaven, but by some Enthusiastic, Quaker, or Moravian spirit, who leads them astray." (D. P. 3213.)

The numbers quoted all treat of the disorderly forms of communication with spirits, yet mention the fact of man's occasionally hearing the voice of spirits,-a casual occurrence which plainly is not to be classed among the deliberate violations of order, because it comes to man unsought and the spirit does not instruct. That such an incidental hearing of voices from the spirit-world has not been uncommon during the Christian era, the testimonies of history assure us. Luther was warned by an angel not to establish faith alone. (D. P. 258e.) We know of more than one person who was brought to the New Church by hearing a voice say: "Read Swedenborg!" In such cases we perhaps view the direct hand of Providence. Many instances of a lighter order might be cited. Without the information now given us in the Writings, we would doubtless place too great emphasis upon their importance. And, in allowing for such exceptional occurrences, we do but emphasize the general law that men are not to be instructed by spirits, which "rarely takes place at this day, lest men be compelled to believe by such means; for a compelled faith which enters by miracles does not remain; and it would be injurious to those with whom faith can be implanted by the Word in a state not compelled." (A. C. 10751e.)

The information now revealed concerning "occasional spirit voices" should be a protection to every New Churchman. The tendency with those who "hear voices" is to magnify the importance of the incident, regarding themselves as especially favored from on high, allowing their minds to dwell upon the matter with the desire for a return of the experience, and thus encouraging the presence and speech of unholy spirits.

482

When Swedenborg found that he was placing too great value upon his own discoveries in the field of science, losing a sense of their proper relation to other facts, he gave up experimenting, and relied thenceforth upon the findings of other men in forming his philosophical deductions. The application to our present subject is evident. The New Churchman who hears a spirit voice, as he sometimes may, will recall the admonitions of the Writings and not magnify this passing experience. He will rather scent danger, and avoid giving encouragement to those denizens of the spirit-world who are only too willing to overstep the boundary line and pass the veil which the Lord Himself has placed between the two worlds for the safety of both spirits and men.

That Swedenborg himself was not really instructed by spirits and angels, but by the Lord alone, is according to his own declaration:

"That the things which I have learned in representations, visions, and from speech with spirits and angels, are solely from the Lord. Whenever there has been any representation, vision, or speech, I have been held interiorly, and inmostly in reflection upon it, as to what was successful and good from it, thus as to what I should learn; which reflection was not so much attended to by those who presented the representations and visions, and who spoke; yea, sometimes they were indignant when they perceived that I was reflecting. Thus have I been instructed, consequently by no spirit, nor angel, but by the Lord alone, from whom is everything true and good. Yea, when they wanted to instruct me about various things, there was scarcely anything but what was false; and therefore I was forbidden to believe anything they said; nor was I permitted to introduce anything which belonged to them. Moreover, when they wanted to persuade me, I perceived an interior or more interior persuasion that it is not as they wanted, at which also they wondered. The perception was a manifest one, but cannot easily be described to the apprehension of men." (Spiritual Diary 1647.)

483

FAIRIES 1920

FAIRIES E. E. IUNGERICH 1920

     It is perilous for the inhabitants of this planet to converse with angels and spirits. The Old Testament, addressing an era of mentally stunted beings, therefore fulminated the death penalty against those who courted familiar spirits. For rebellious children-and adults who have never progressed beyond this state-cannot make discriminations in applying the teaching set before them. They cannot distinguish between the mild or grievous dangers involved, nor can they understand how Providence may permit apparent infractions for the sake of an end that cannot otherwise be accomplished.

     Those to whom the New Testament was addressed had a dawning mentality. It was not necessary to treat them as slaves who require to be cowed under the lash of prohibitions; but they could be led as friends well-disposed to follow the example and heed the exhortations of their beloved Master. For they who obey chiefly under the fear of punishment and the dread of danger open only the degree of civil good in their minds; while they who do good as the result of following an example or heeding an exhortation may have a higher or moral good formed in them. With such it is sufficient that the Lord taught men to consult the Scriptures, and not to seek intercourse with the dead, and that He showed a relentless disapproval of spiritism by casting out the spirits who obsessed so many poor wretches. But to those who hearken to the words of His crowning Testament, revealed to Emanuel Swedenborg, it is allowed to enter intellectually into a knowledge of the spiritual causes and influences involved in this and other teachings. Seeing rationally within themselves the spiritual value or harm of any course of action that is proposed, the good they do by living according to their eagle-eyed conscience, formed from the Writings of Swedenborg, is not merely civil and moral, but pre-eminently and at times purely spiritual.

     In the light of many teachings, the New Churchman can see the triviality and futility of spiritism and the actual dangers that may at any time supervene.

484

Swedenborg asseverates that he was specially protected by the Lord against the attacks of evil spirits who might otherwise have destroyed him. (E. U. 92; A. C. 5863.) He states that only those who are in a true faith, and who are led by the Lord, can be immune from harm (H. H. 249, footnote); yet he significantly warns men against a conceited presumption that they have this protection:-"A man does not know what his affection is, whether it be good or evil, or with what others it is conjoined; if he have the pride of his own intelligence, the spirit favors every thought which is thence; it is similar with one who, being enkindled by some fire, favors certain principles, as is the case with those who are not in truths from a genuine affection; when the spirit, from a like affection, favors the thoughts or principles of the man, then one leads the other as the blind leads the blind, until both fall into the pit." (A. E. 1182".)

If anyone should declare, in a superconceit, that he talks, not with spirits, but with angels themselves, he is met by the teaching that "in this earth, where corporeal and terrestrial things are so much loved, . . . it would be dangerous to speak with angels" (E. U. 155; A. C. 10384); since it is "as perilous to come into the angelic heaven as into a flame" (S. D. 3061), especially for the learned (S. D. 3060a). Rationally, it can be seen that speech with the dead, or visions thence, would compel faith, effecting a miraculous faith which is not deeply implanted, and which may prevent the reception of a genuine faith; and also, if there is subsequently a recession from such a
miraculous faith, the man may be brought into something of profanation. On these points, read A. C. 10751; H. H. 456.

In the case of Swedenborg and other prophets, who had the mission to give a Divine Revelation to the earth, the perils just enumerated were obviated by a special protection. On nearly all other planets, both of our own and other solar systems, whose inhabitants are not so fond of "corporeal and terrestrial things," fruitful intercourse with spirits and angels is the law, inasmuch as they have no written Word to serve as an infallible standard of truth. Yet, notice that it is said of "the more adult men" on the planet Jupiter that "they do not suffer themselves to be led by "spirits and angels, who therefore rarely approach them" (E. U. 84), obviously because their rational mind has become maturely settled, enabling them to see the truth of a matter within themselves. (Compare A. C. 5121.)

485

     We may note, also, that in the case of those who have not access to the Writings, and to whom the Words of former dispensations have become sealed books, occasional intercourse with the other world may be permitted, either as a means of directing them to the Writings, or of giving them salutary admonitions of impending dangers, as happened to Socrates, for instance, who had the warning voice of his mentor. Even upon some within the sphere of the New Church, whether they be young or old, who are predominantly of a poetic and imaginative temperament, within which their rational plane is so enmeshed as rarely to come nakedly to view; even upon these, fleeting glimpses of spirit phenomena may fall without apparent harm to their faith, and convey, rather, a quickening sense of the aliveness of their environment from the joyous presence of the Lord's love. To such there may appear banshees, trolls, elves, gnomes, nymphs, or fairies. The learned Aristotle was not so mustily and crabbedly remote from the thrilling aliveness of Homeric infancy as to be without his fair spiritistic Pallas, who stroked his cheek when he had written some especially true and beautiful thought. (A. C. 4658; S. D. 3952.)

     With the consent of Mr. A. W. Manning, a staunch New Churchman and an assiduous reader of the Writings, and one who has now passed his eightieth birthday, I may present the following charming account of an experience he had some forty years ago:

     LETTER.

     Riverside, California,
April 28, 1920.
Rev. and Mrs. E. E. Iungerich
Dear Friends:
     I trust I may not put you out in writing to you upon the subject of Fairies, which must at least seem strange to you, as it would to millions of others. But, seeing in the NEW-CHURCH REVIEW of recent date an article by a New Church lady who wrote of it as a historical myth, not knowing any other side than is generally accepted by the world at large, or at least by the well-informed world in which I counted myself until some forty years ago; I feel prompted to set forth the following experience which, notwithstanding my set prejudice, forced me to change my former views or opinions.

486

     It happened in the following way: A Mrs. Lubeck, the wife of a Swede, (she being English), kept a boarding school for children at Locust Grove, Sonoma Co., Cal., about forty miles from San Francisco. I sent my two oldest boys, about eight and ten years of age. It was in a lovely spot, a kind of paradise, full of lovely trees, bearing fruit and flowers. The lady, who was about sixty summers, and full of kindness and love, had seven children whom she had adopted. These were the children of my old friend, Mr. Clayton, who had made them over to Mrs. Lubeck on the death of his wife. At the time of my first visit, these children were all grown up, six girls and one boy, and, with Mrs. Lubeck; did all the teaching and numerous other uses concerned in the care of 35 or 40 children, girls and boys.

     On my arrival, Mrs. Lubeck gave me a very warm welcome, and just before bedtime, 8:30 p. m., they were all put through their exercises for my pleasure and benefit. I enjoyed it very much; for they had their little games and dances, in which all the teachers joined. So at 9 p. m. all retired for the night. She put me in a bedroom adjoining the one in which all the frolic had gone on.

     After she had bidden me good-night, I looked around the room, and I made up my mind it was the room of one of the young lady teachers. Not being in the least sleepy-for my business, [i. e., a restaurant] kept open until 2 a. m., and I never went to bed much earlier than 3 a. m., since I usually read the Writings for an hour or so before retiring-I yet, having nothing else to do, got to bed and read for some time. Finally, I lowered my lamp a little, and, not feeling the least bit sleepy, I got into a thinking spell. I was lying on my back, with my eyes half-closed, when I happened to look at the foot-rail of the old mahogany bedstead. The rail was about three inches in diameter, and about six feet long, and to my great amazement it was completely covered, the whole length, with the dear little creatures of frolic; that is the only way I could think of them, for they were full of fun, pulling and hauling, and pointing at me with their cunning little hands. I saw at once it would not do to move, or to open my eyes any wider. So I just watched and watched their pranks, and was feasting myself on them. As my light was clear, I could see all over the room-10 by 17 feet in size-and I was saying to myself, "Well, what do you think of that! I never did believe in fairies, save only as a myth, but what can I say now? There they are, right before me, within five feet of my face!"

487

     It was hard to keep from laughing at them. None was over sixteen inches in height, I should think, and there may have been fifteen or twenty of them-each having a little suit on, and a cap, and pointed shoes, their hands and face being bare. Well, it got to be rather hard to keep in such a tension, not daring to move, for fear of frightening them away, it being truly lovely to see them, and I being unusually awake, though they thought this great giant was asleep. So I moved just a wee bit, and like a flash they were gone; but where, I did not at that moment know. The door had not opened, and the screens were on the windows. I leaped out of bed, and looked Under the bed and all over the room. Finally I got into bed again and lay quiet, pretending I was asleep, though how long I lay there I know not, for I soon fell asleep.

     At breakfast I told Mrs. Lubeck and her family about the strange visit I had had from the fairies before I had gone to sleep. She was greatly delighted, and so was I, and I shall never forget it. I have seen others twice since, but they were of a different type and taller than those dear little ones in their cunning little Suits that were mostly reds, yellows, and blues, and seemed to be of wool or cloth. . . .

     They are most likely spirits of frolic, who come from some part of the Gorand Man. There may be very many species of them, and they perform a wonderful use, which is to bring and put activity and delight before infants, under a most merciful Providence. So, for hundreds of years, and from every nation and dime, fairies of various names have been reported; but an absence of the knowledge of how and what the opening of the spiritual sight is, and an ignorance of the spiritual world, have made people suppose they were all of this world. And not being able, in all these years, to find out what they were, they have classed them as myths. . . .

     I will merely say before dosing that I am fully convinced that the many fairies under many names were real substantial beings, and that those who saw them did not see them with their natural sight any more than I did, although it seemed so, but with their spiritual sight. . . . I could tell you some more wonderful things about them, and if I ever go east I will, but I am now past eighty, and may be called any time. . . . Love to you both, and you may do whatever you like with this article.

488

You might prepare it for the LIFE, if they would think it worthy, for I feel that the Church ought to know of it, since it is only by her spiritual laws that fairy lore can ever be explained.

     Let me hear from you both. As ever your brother, A. W. MANNING.

     Pursuant to Mr. Manning's instructions, I have condensed his article to about half its length, omitting what seemed to be least vital to his purpose, and occasionally recasting some of his sentences by way of emendation. But the account is virtually as he wrote it. I agree with Mr. Manning that there are fairies, and that they have a real substantial basis, and yet can only be seen by a partial opening of the spiritual sight. I do not hold with him, however, that they are spirits of the dead who, prior to their demise, lived on some planet in the universe. There is teaching to the effect that animated beings who never had lived as human beings on any earth may yet appear to those in the spiritual world. This may perhaps be the truth involved in the fable that there were angels who had been immediately created such.

     Besides the teaching that the Pallas who appeared to Aristotle was "not a spirit, but was the representation of a female" (S. D. 3952), we are told that spirits can "produce infants by phantasies" (S. D. 3923, 3869), and also, by means of one so produced, counterfeit innocence (S. D. Minor 4772). But though these are instances of animated beings who never had a prior existence on any earth, it is not so much the way these were produced as what is said about an
atmosphere of little babies that seems to explain the causes underlying the appearing of fairies. On this we read: "There are atmospheres presented to view which, in their smallest and invisible forms, consist as it were of little children playing together, but only perceptible to an inmost idea, and from which little children get the idea that all things around them are alive, and that they are in the Lord's life, which affects their inmosts with happiness. There are other kinds besides, for the varieties are innumerable, and are also in; expressible." (A. C. 1621) Doubtless there are many little children, and even grownups who have not lost their childlike states, who have been allowed to see such little cherubs; or, instead, have seen some other of the innumerable varieties of elfin sprites.

489

     And if they have seen the fairies,-Mr. Manning's dear little spirits of frolic,-how can I say that they should bitterly repent of such an experience under a searing conscience, as possibly betokening some blemish that had attracted evil spirits to them? Nay, they need make no sacrifice for it as a sin or guilt offering, but rather render thanks for it as a peace offering, since its use, as stated by Mr. Manning, was "to bring and put activity and delight before infants, under a most merciful Providence, or, to quote the inspired words of the Arcana, "so that little children get the idea that all things around them are alive, and that they are in the Lord's life."
     E. E. IUNGERICH.

     The foregoing communication raises the interesting question of the origin and nature of fairies, and of the beings known by kindred names in different ages and lands. The charm of the subject is undeniable; for what child has not delighted to believe in the existence of "really truly" fairies? And who can deny the usefulness of that period of the awakening mind? The childhood of the race was rich in its store of "fairy lore," the remnants of which are left to us in the myths and fables of pre-Christian times. That many of these had their origin in the visions and dreams of the men of the Ancient Churches, the Writings leave us in no doubt. But what of modern fairy lore? Shall we assign to it an origin in the vivid imagination of an Andersen, a Grimm, and a Defoe, or in a real appearing of substantial beings before the partially opened spiritual sight, as suggested by Mr. Manning and Mr. Iungerich? Additional light would be thrown upon a rational consideration of the matter by what the Writings say of visions in their classes and degrees, and we hope Mr. Iungerich will favor us with an article on this phase of the subject.-EDITOR.

490

COUNCIL OF THE CLERGY 1920

COUNCIL OF THE CLERGY W. B. CALDWELL 1920

     GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM.

     Bryn Athyn, Pa., June 22-26, 1920.

     The twelve sessions of the Council of the Clergy-7 private and 5 public-were attended by 27 ministers and 3 theological students. Owing to the presence of five ministers from Europe, the meetings this year emphasized the international aspect of the uses of the General Church. Both by their public addresses, and their active participation in all of the discussions, our friends from abroad contributed in an inspiring manner to the success of what must be regarded as a notable gathering in the history of the Church, and one that promises lasting benefits to the future of our cause. We shall not attempt to convey a full sense of the animated interest that characterized the sessions throughout. A measure of this will reach the members of the Church through the publication of the addresses and discussions in subsequent issues of the LIFE. These will include: The Bishop's Address to the Council of the Clergy; "Additional Notes on Ritual," by Bishop W. F. Pendleton; "Academy Fundamentals," by the Rev. R. J. Tilson; "Missionary Work Viewed Spiritually," by the Rev. Ernst Deltenre; "The Mission Field in Sweden," by the Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom; "Government of the Church according to Doctrine," by the Rev. G C. Ottley; and "Christian Art and Architecture for the New Church," by Mr. Raymond Pitcairn.
     W. B. CALDWELL,
          Secretary.

491

JOURNAL OF THE TWENTY-SIXTH MEETING OF THE JOINT COUNCIL OF THEGENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM 1920

JOURNAL OF THE TWENTY-SIXTH MEETING OF THE JOINT COUNCIL OF THEGENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM Various 1920

     Bryn Athyn, Pa., June 24-26, 1920.

     First Session-June 24th, 3 p. m.

     1. The meeting was opened with worship, conducted by the Bishop.

     2. There were present:

     OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CLERGY:
Bishop N. D. Pendleton, Presiding
Bishop Emeritus W. F. Pendleton
Rev. Alfred Acton
Rev. K. R. Alden
Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom
Rev. J. E. Bowers
Rev. W. B. Caldwell
Rev. E. R. Cronlund
Rev. L. W. T. David
Rev. George de Charms
Rev. Richard de Charms
Rev. Ernst Deltenre
Rev. C. E. Doering
Rev. T. S. Harris
Rev. Fernand Hussenet
Rev. E. E. Iungerich
Rev. D. H. Klein
Rev. H. L. Odhner
Rev. G. C. Ottley
Rev. Ernest Pfeiffer
Rev. Enoch S. Price
Rev. J. E. Rosenqvist
Rev. G. H. Smith
Rev. Homer Synnestvedt
Rev. R. T. Tilson
Rev. F. E. Waelchli
Theological Students: Messrs F. H. Rose, Harold Pitcairn, and George Mokoena.

     OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Dr. Felix A. Boericke, President
Mr. Raymond Pitcairn, Vice-President
Mr. Paul Carpenter, Secretary
Mr. Edwin T. Asplundh
Mr. Edward C. Bostock
Mr. Randolph W. Childs
Mr. Walter C. Childs
Mr. Harvey L. Lechner
Mr. Seymour G. Nelson
Mr. Rudolph Roschman
Mr. Jacob Schoenberger
Mr. Anton Sellner
Mr. Paul Synnestvedt

OF BOTH BODIES:
Rev. W. H. Alden

492

     3. The Secretary read the Minutes of the 23rd, 24th, and 25th Meetings of the Joint Council, which, on motion, were approved as read.

     4. The Rev. W. H. Alden read the following:

     REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE GENERAL CHURCH.

     On June 1st, 1920; the General Church of the New Jerusalem numbered 1,135 members, a net increase of 84 over the membership reported to the General Assembly in October last. This increase is greater than what we then reported for the preceding three years. 101 new members have been received since October 1st, 1919; 17 have died. Of the new members, 29 were from the Old Church, 45 were previously of the New Church faith, and 23 were of New Church parentage. Of the 45; previously of the New Church faith, It are members of the Burton Road Society, London, England, of which the Rev. R. J. Tilson is Pastor.

     The duties of the Secretary of the General Church include the keeping of a record of the vital statistics of its members and their children. Baptisms and marriages are reported by the ministers of the Church upon specially prepared cards, which are kept on file, and constitute legal certificates. The names of all the members of the General Church are entered upon cards, with all obtainable information as to date of birth, baptism, parentage, marriage. In the event of marriage, the card of the wife is attached to the card of the husband, and a cross-reference card inserted where her name had previously been. On the death or resignation of a member, that member's card is removed and a special card inserted recording the name and date of death. This card catalogue, therefore, constitutes a complete record of all members of the General Church, past and present, and is readily accessible for reference. The Secretary also has a manuscript list of the members with their addresses. Four copies of this are made, one each for the Secretary of the General Church, the Bishop's Secretary, the Editor of New Church Life, and the Assistant Pastor of the Bryn Athyn Society. This list is kept corrected to date, as far as possible. Full accuracy cannot be attained, inasmuch as few advise the Secretary of a change of address, unless there is something they wish to receive from him.

     The Secretary has also prepared upon cards a list of those baptized into the New Church, as reported by the ministers of the General Church. Most of the names are children of the General Church. Upwards of a thousand names are recorded on these cards, and they have also been arranged on a manuscript list in chronological order of their birth, thus affording a valuable indication of the growth of the Church through its children. Incidentally, this list tells how many of the children of the Church become members on reaching their majority.

493

     NEW MEMBERS.

     A. IN THE UNITED STATES.
Denver, Colo.
Miss Sarah Elizabeth Dibb

     Chicago, Ill.
Miss Bertha Farrington
Mrs. Franc Webber Lord

     Glenview, Ill.
Mr. Geoffrey Eugene Blackman
Miss Emily Barbara Gartner
Mr. Alan George Synnestvedt
Mr. John Ralph Synnestvedt

     Halethoupe, Md.
Miss Eva Harris

     Detroit, Mich.
Miss Grace Graham

     North Jay, Maine.
Mr. Charles Sifferlen

     New York, N. Y.
Mr. Harold Edgar Sellner

     Allentown, Pa.
Miss Rhoda Althea Ebert
Miss Frances I. Weirbach

     Altoona, Pa.
Mrs. Anna Adams Spangler

     Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Miss Dorothy Eva Ashley
Mr. Harold Thorpe Carswell
Mr. Joseph Wainwright Coley
Mrs. Joseph Wainwright Coley
Mr. Frank Lyons Doering
Miss Jennie May Gaskill
Mr. Addison Franklin Lyman
Miss Rhoda Price
Miss Lenore Smith

     Erie, Pa.
Mr. Myron Fowler Near
Miss Alma Marie Johnson
Mr. Carl Edwin Johnson
Mr. Clarence William Urban

     Germantown, Pa.
Miss Vera Fitzpatrick
Miss Edith Gertrude Smith

     Philadelphia, Pa.
Mr. John H. Goldhorn
Mrs. Sara Elizabeth Maddock
Mr. William O'Brien
Mr. John Walter
Mrs. John Walter

     Pittsburgh, Pa.
Miss Grace Cornelia Horigan
Miss Madeline Horigan
Mrs. Walter Denny Uptergraff

     Wycombe, Pa.
Mrs. Charles D. Watson

     Virginia.
Mr. Richard Levi Johnson

     B. IN CANADA.

     Kitchener, Ont.
Mrs. Eugene L. Roschman

     New Toronto, Ont.
Miss Norah Ellen Fountain

     St. Catharines, Ont.
Miss Lucile Isabella Scott

     Toronto, Ont.
Mr. Theodore Percival Bellinger

     Waterloo, Ont.
Miss Anita Linda Doering
Mr. John Rupert Kuhl
Miss Beatrice Kuhl
Mrs. Frederick E. Stroh

     Windsor, Ont.
Miss Ina Elizabeth Bellinger

     C. IN ENGLAND.

     Bath, Eng.
Rev. Carl Albert Bjorck
Mrs. Carl Albert Bjorck
Mr. Samuel Robert Lewin
Mrs. Samuel Robert Lewin

     Colchester, Eng.
Mr. John Felix Cooper

     London, Eng.
Mr. James S. Pryke
Mrs. James S. Pryke

     Enfield, Eng.
Miss Beryl Gwendoline Briscoe

     Enfield Wash, Eng.
Mr. Frederick George Shepherd
Mrs. Frederick George Shepherd

494

Mr. Frederick George Shepherd, Jr.
Miss Ruby Shepherd

     London, Eng.
Mr. R. W. Anderson
Mrs. R. W. Anderson
Mr. Frederick D. Balls
Mrs. Frederick D. Balls
Miss Theresa Balls
Mrs. Clement W. Borer
Mr. Ezekiel William Misson
Mr. Edward Bachlor Morris
Mrs. Edward Bachlor Morris
Mr. Albert Ernest Orme
Mrs. Albert Ernest Orme
Miss Agnes J. A. Orme
Miss Dorothy Irene Orme
Rev. Glendower C. Ottley
Mr. George Frederick Poole
Rev. Robert James Tilson
Mrs. Robert James Tilson
Miss Minnie Gertrude Turner
Mr. Alan Noel Waters
Miss Dorothy Waters
Miss Frances Ruth White

     Redland, Eng.
Miss Marie Ida Hauser

     Sutton, Eng.
Mr. Charles Tarelli

     Street, Eng.
Mr. V. S. Summerhayes

     D. IN FRANCE.

     St. Cloud.
Miss Henriette Pepersack

     Rousies.
Mr. Nestor Strebelle
Mrs. Nestor Strebelle

     E. IN SWEDEN.

     Stockholm.
Miss Theresia Liljegren
Mr. Nils Loven
Mr. Torsten Isedor Sigstedt

     F. IN BELGIUM.
Mr. Raymond Francois Marguerite Claes

     G. IN SOUTH AFRICA.

     Durban, Natal.
Miss E. M. Champion
Mr. James Johnson Forfar
Mrs. James Johnson Forfar
Mr. Charles Rowland Ridgway
Mr. Charles Stedman Ridgway
Mrs. Charles Stedman Ridgway
Miss Kathleen Mary Ridgway
Mrs. George S. Venton
Miss Violet Wood-Bush

     Maseu, Bosutoland.
Mr. George Mokoena

     DEATHS.

Mr. J. Bonscheur, Killed during Spanish War
Mrs. Arthur H. Motum, Colchester, England, June 30, 1919
Mrs. Mary W. Clark, Chicago, Ill., October 1, 1919
Mrs. Annie M. Walker, Philadelphia, Pa., October 24, 1919
Mr. Jacob Renkenberger, Columbiana, O., October 26, 1919
Mr. Walter E. Bellinger, Waterloo, Ont., November 11, 1919
Mrs. Eliza W. Izzard, Tuckersmith, Ont., November 21, 1919
Mrs. Myron F. Near, Erie, Pa., December 31, 1919
Mrs. R. M. L. Frost, Cambridge, Mass., January 10, 1920
Mr. George W. Evans, Erie, Pa., February 1, 1920
Mr. John S. Kessler, Allentown, Pa., March 18, 1920
Mrs. W. Therese Schwenk, Yalesville, Conn., March 26, 1920
Mr. Charles Francis Browne, Waltham, Mass., March 29, 1920
Mr. James S. Boggess, Middleport, O., May 15, 1920
Miss Clarice A. Howard, London, England, May 20, 1920

495

Dr. Edward Cranch, Erie, Pa., May 21, 1920
Mrs. Fanny A. Gilmore, Pittsburgh, Pa., May 21, 1920

     WM. H. ALDEN, Secretary.

     5. The Rev. W. B. Caldwell read the following:

     REPORT OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CLERGY.

     The 24th annual meeting of the Council convened on June 22nd, with an attendance of 27 ministers and 3 theological students, including five representatives of our ministry from Europe, viz., the Rev. Messrs. Tilson, Ottley, Deltenre, Hussenet, and Baeckstrom.

     The reports presented at the meeting show that during the year ending June 1, 1920, the ministers of the General Church officiated at 140 baptisms (to of these in Basutoland), 27 confessions of faith, 6 betrothals, 24 marriages, 32 funerals, and 130 administrations of the Holy Supper. The uses of the various societies have been regularly maintained. The London and Colchester societies have been without a resident Pastor since the death of the Rev. Andrew Czerny on July 8, 1919, but services have been held regularly in both societies under the leadership of lay members. The smaller societies, circles, and isolated members of the General Church have received the ministrations of the visiting pastors.

     We glean from the reports the following matters of special interest: Bishop N. D. Pendleton, as Bishop of the General Church, and Pastor ex-officio of the Bryn Athyn Church, reported that he had preached to times, 15 of these being in Bryn Athyn, two in London, England, one in Toronto, one in Kitchener, and one in Philadelphia on October 12, 1919, he ordained four ministers into the second degree of the priesthood, namely, Messrs. Richard Morse, Reginald W. Brown, Karl R. Alden, and Theodore Pitcairn. He presided at a Local Assembly in Philadelphia in April, and later in the same month at the Ontario District Assembly in Toronto, after which he visited the Carmel Church in Kitchener. He states that in the near future he will ordain the Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom into the second degree and Mr. Ernest Pfeiffer into the first degree of the priesthood. He has recently received the Rev. Albert Bjorck, of Bath, England, as a member of the Clergy of the General Church. He had continued to administer the affairs of the Academy of the New Church as President, and had taught in the Theological School.

     Bishop Emeritus W. F. Pendleton reported that, in the absence of Bishop N. D. Pendleton and the illness by the Rev. George de Charms, he had preached 7 times in Bryn Athyn during the summer, securing the services of other ministers on the other Sundays. During the rest of the year he preached 9 times, 5 of these being at evening services. In the summer months he had also completed the arrangements for the dedication of the church, with the assistance of the Rev. W. B. Caldwell. He had continued his teaching in the Theological School.

496

     The Rev. Alfred Acton, as Pastor of the New York Society and the Washington Circle, had preached 36 times in New York and g times in Washington; he had also preached once in Bryn Athyn and once in Toronto. During July and August he took charge of the Kitchener Society in the absence of the Rev. Hugo Lj. Odhner. In the New York Society an effort had been made to institute social life, and one general social was held in September; but, owing to the severe winter, sickness and removals, no other socials were held. The doctrinal class held in Brooklyn continued the study of the Earths in the Universe, though severe winter weather interfered with the regularity of the meetings. He had continued his duties as Dean of the Theological School, and had given instruction in Religion and Hebrew in other departments of the Academy Schools.

     The Rev. Karl R. Alden, Philadelphia, Preached 50 times during the year, including 5 times to the men at the Car Barns, once at Bryn Athyn, and once at New York. He reports an increased average attendance of 5 at the doctrinal classes, special interest being shown in the lessons from the Arcana Coelestia treating of Genesis, chapters 12 to 26. He made 251 pastoral calls, 70 per cent. upon members of the society, the rest being missionary prospects. He made one missionary trip, preaching to 181 persons in Allentown, Pa., and to 210 in Scranton, Pa. The Scout work and Sunday School in the Advent Society have been maintained, with the idea of quality rather than quantity, no efforts being made for new children, but some being dropped, the result showing a decidedly increased sphere and excellence of the work. The teachers' training course was continued from October to March. A revision of the roll of the Society showed a membership of 40, of which 4 joined during the year, including 3 converts to the New Church. 20 members have moved to other centers; yet the average at services had only slightly decreased. 9 persons from the Old Church had been baptized during the year.

     The Rev. W. H. Alden preached twice at Bryn Athyn and once each at New York and Philadelphia. In addition to his duties as Secretary and Treasurer of the General Church and Manager of the Academy Book Room, he had taught a special Latin class in the Academy Schools.

     The Rev. Walter E. Brickman preached three times for the Pittsburgh Society, acted as Superintendent of the Sunday School, and taught a class of boys and girls of the ages of 11 to 14. Upon invitation, he had written two articles for the newspapers. "As a non active," he states, "I feel that I am not altogether a passive either, just a filler, a sort of helper-out now and then; but I am glad to do the little I may, and hope that little is acceptable in His sight."

     The Rev. R. W. Brown, writing from Basutoland, describes a service he conducted at Qhuqhu, which was attended by 215 persons, including children and a large percentage of men, while at former services the average attendance had been 50; mostly women. There were tot be 10 or 11 baptisms at this service, and the Rev. Mr. Mofokeng had advertized the feature extensively. Only five were baptized, however, as the others were unable to attend, and will be baptized later. Further he writes: "I had translated the whole of the baptismal service, as well as the remainder of the service, into Sesuto, and there was a very impressive sphere about it all.

497

My Sesuto went much better than I had expected, and I was very glad that I had put the work on it. We will soon have enough translated to print a short Liturgy in Sesuto, which will be a very great help in the work here. I translated the Holy Supper service several weeks ago, and have used it three or four times. Theodore preached his first sermon in Sesuto yesterday in Maseru, and some of the natives told me that they understood it."

     The Rev. John E. Bowers made two trips during the year, visiting 32 places in Ontario and in six States; 18 twice, 14 once. One adult and 5 children were baptized, I marriage was solemnized, and the Holy Supper was administered 9 times.

     The Rev. W. B. Caldwell continued his duties as Editor of New Church Life, member of the Bishop's Consistory, and Secretary of the Council of the Clergy. Since March he had assisted in the work of sending out the Weekly Sermons, his share being to edit and see them through the press. He had preached once each at Baltimore, New York and Philadelphia, and twice at Bryn Athyn, besides assisting at other services. His duties in the Academy included the teaching of theology, religion and Hebrew in four departments of the Schools.

     The Rev. E. R. Cronlnnd reported that services and classes in the Olivet Church, Toronto, were held regularly. In the classes, the subject of "The Rational" was taught, and four evenings were devoted to the subject of "Vastation." A very successful young people's class met at the homes, and was attended by one person not of the N,, Church. At the ladies' class, held every alternate week, the series of articles on the "Conflict of the Ages" in the Words for the New Church was read. The Sunday School was attended by 30 pupils, of which 5 were not children of the members of the Society. In the month of May he tendered the Bishop his resignation as Pastor of the Olivet Church.

     The Rev. L. W. T. David, in addition to his duties as Pastor of the Denver Society, had visited Colorado Springs once, baptizing three persons and administering the Holy Supper. During his absence on five Sundays, the Rev. J. S. David had officiated. He reports further that he has resigned the pastorate of the Denver Society, effective July 1,1920, and that his father, the Rev. J. S. David, is now Acting Pastor by appointment of the Bishop.

     The Rev. George de Charms assisted the Bishop in the pastoral work of the Bryn Athyn Society, preaching 11 times, and also once in New York. With the able assistance of Miss Constance Pendleton, and the affectionate interest and co-operation of all its members, the Chancel Guild has been improved in organization, and has been functioning with marked efficiency. He conducted 18 doctrinal classes, treating the internal historical sense of the Prophets. Several Friday suppers were followed by an open forum for the discussion of questions of live interest to the society. He had conducted children's services throughout the year; for the past six months these were held on a week day in connection with the school, special Sunday services being held from time to time, as on Christmas Eve and Memorial Day, when services were held in the cathedral.

498

The ushers had been organized and instructed, and he had given doctrinal instruction at meetings field for those who were interested in the missionary work connected with the cathedral.

     The Rev. Richard de Charms continued as teacher of the Letter of the Historic Word in the 4th, 5th, and 6th grades of the Bryn Athyn Elementary School, and had preached once in Philadelphia.

     The Rev. C. E. Doering preached once in New York and once in Bryn Athyn, and has continued his duties as Secretary of the Bishop's Consistory, Principal of the Boys' Academy and Dean of Faculties in the Academy Schools, also giving instruction in religion and mathematics.

     The Rev. W. L. Gladish, although engaged as teacher in the public schools of Chicago, assisted in the Sunday School of Sharon Church, and preached occasionally during the year Since March, when Mr. Klein was taken ill, he has preached every Sunday, and is now Acting Pastor by appointment of the Bishop.

     The Rev. T. S. Harris has continued his work as Pastor of the Baltimore Society and Visiting Pastor of the Abington, Meriden and North Chelmsford, Mass., Circles. In the latter places, there are 16 members of the General Church. These he visits quarterly, and also spends July and August in New England, where he preaches every Sunday for the Abington Circle and conducts doctrinal classes in the homes. During his absence on these trips, the Baltimore Society is without services. There are 32 persons (including children) in the Baltimore Congregation, half of them living at Arbutus, the others in the city, and most of these are fifteen miles from the Arbutus place of worship. Bad weather and transportation reduce the average attendance to 17. As the conditions are unsatisfactory for social life and Sunday School, owing to the difficulty of bringing the young people and children together regularly, he has formed of each family a "Home Circle," the head of which is the father, and it holds a meeting every evening. A uniform course of reading and instruction is followed, and the Pastor visits each Circle fortnightly. "We have not been able to make any impression upon the people outside of the Arbutus community. Half of the homes in our New Church settlement are now owned and occupied by people not of our religion. Thus the community idea has proved to be a failure with us. The young people, as soon as they marry, will move to the city, and so there is little hope of an increase of homes in the community from this source. Notwithstanding these circumstances, the members of the Baltimore Society are making a heroic effort to carry on the uses of worship in the chapel and religious instruction in their homes. Although the community is defunct, the church is not dead. There are strong indications that a good work is going on in the hearts of all, and that they are growing in a knowledge and clearer understanding of the Doctrines of the New Church."

     The Rev. E. E. Iungerich preached 3 times in Bryn Athyn, 3 times in New York, and once each in Philadelphia, Arbutus, Md., and Frankford, Pa., besides assisting in other services.

499

He has attended the weekly meetings of the Bishop's Consistory, and fulfilled the duties of Dean of the College and Professor of Theology in the Academy of the New Church.

     The Rev D, H. Klein, as Acting Pastor of Sharon Church, Chicago, reports that Sunday services and monthly Friday suppers have been held regularly. In the Sunday School he had the valued assistance d the Rev. W. L. Gladish and Miss Bertha Farrington, which has made it possible to adapt the work with greater advantage to the children of varying ages. A special effort was made to provide New Church social life for the scattered children, and owing to hearty co-operation, the initial results have been gratifying. The society has enjoyed a peaceful and happy year. At the beginning of May, because of failing health, he was obliged to give up his work in Sharon Church, and to leave Chicago.

     The Rev. Hugo Lj. Odhner resumed his duties in the Carmel Church, Kitchener, on September 1st, 1919, restored to health after several months' absence. He preached 35 times at Kitchener and once in Bryn Athyn, and conducted to general doctrinal classes, besides those for the ladies, young people, etc. The Sunday School has an enrollment of 20, with an, average attendance of 15, not counting special services. Realizing the need of a more thorough Bible knowledge in the society, a series of classes was devoted to the correspondences of the lands and peoples of the Bible, and to the general contexture,-natural and spiritual of the Bible stories. To provide material for instructed Sunday School teachers, a special class for the study of the Bible was commenced. On the 11th of June, 1920, he tendered the Bishop his resignation as Pastor of the Carmel Church, to take effect on September 10th, 1920, and has accepted a call from the Durban, Natal, Society.

     The Rev. Glendower C. Ottley had preached at the Burton Road Church, London, England, during the absence of the Pastor, had officiated at Colchester for betrothal and marriage, and had preached a few times at Kensington in the absence of the Rev. J. F. Buss.

     The Rev. Theodore Pitcairn, writing from Basutoland, says: "Mr. Brown and I both preached in Sesuto today. Next week we start our school at Qhuqhu. Next Sunday we are going to give a talk on the New Church for the benefit of the white people of Maseru, the meeting being arranged by a Scotchman who is somewhat interested in the New Church. According to the report of the natives, the other Churches here are saying that the New Church is the Church of Satan.'"

     The Rev. Enoch S. Price, Pastor of the Allentown Circle, where monthly services are held, has also preached twice in New York and once in Bryn Athyn. As heretofore, he is engaged as Professor of Ancient Languages in the Schools of the Academy of the New Church.

     The Rev. Gilbert H. Smith, in addition to his pastoral duties, has taught religion to three classes in the Immanuel Church School and conducted weekly children's services,

     The Rev. Homer Synnestvedt reports a prosperous year of uninterrupted activities, during which he conducted public worship every Sunday but 3.

500

He preached once at Bryn Athyn and once at Erie, Pa., the Rev. Walter E. Brickman officiating in his place at Pittsburgh. He visited Youngstown, O., twice, Leetonia and Salem, Ohio, each once, and conducted funerals at Greenford, O., and Erie, Pa. On New Year's Eve he gave an address at the Olivet Church, Toronto. Upon invitation, he wrote two articles for the newspapers, and has lectured to the Pittsburgh Woman's Club, the Press Club, and the Men's Club of the North Side. The Sunday School is regularly maintained by the Superintendent, the Rev. Walter E. Brickman, assisted by the regular teachers and two young ladies of the Society. The High School Class and supper on Sunday evening is very successful, and the mid-week meetings have steadily gained in regularity of attendance and in interest shown. Best of all has been the progress of the Day School, for which Miss Elise Junge and Miss Amy Doering are responsible, their work being most thoroughly appreciated.

     The Rev. Robert James Tilson, Pastor of the Burton Road Society, London, England, and Head Master of the local School there, has also visited the Circle at Kilburn, near York, and administered the Holy Supper to 6 persons there. While crossing the Atlantic in May, he conducted worship on two Sunday mornings on board the S. S. "Kroonland."

     The Rev. F. E. Waelchli, as Pastor of the Cincinnati Circle, conducted services and Sunday School 24 times; on 5 other Sundays they were conducted by members of the Circle. The general doctrinal class met 20 times. A men's class, reading the work on The Infinite, met occasionally, and week-day religious instruction was given a number of times to the three children of one of the families. As Visiting Pastor, he ministered in 17 localities. Some of these were visited once, some twice, some three times. The length of the visits varied from a few days to several weeks.
     W. B. CALDWELL,
          Secretary.

     6. The Rev. W. H. Alden read a letter from Mr. Robert Carswell expressing approval of the recent action of the Executive Committee with reference to the London and Durban pastorates.

     7. The Rev. W. H. Alden read a letter from Mr. Walter C. Childs requesting that the following subject be placed upon the docket of the Joint Council, and asking the privilege of reading a short paper upon it: "Should ministers of the New Church consecrate marriages between members of the New Church and those who profess other religions or no religion?"

     8. On motion, the Secretary read three communications which the Bishop had received from Lausanne, Switzerland; two of these, dated April 17 and May 15, 1920, being signed by the Rev. Gustave Regamey, and one, dated April to, 1920, being signed by the members of a Committee of Six having in charge the plans for the formation of a Confederation of French-speaking New Church people in Europe.

501

     9. The subject presented by the communications from Lausanne was discussed at length, involving the question of the relation of the General Church to the proposed Confederation.

     Second Session-June 25th, 3 p. m.

     10. The meeting was opened with worship, conducted by the Bishop.

     11. Mr. Walter C. Childs read the following:

     REPORT OF THE ORPHANAGE FUND.

     Statement from July 11, 1919, to June 7, 1920.

     RECEIPTS.
Cash Balance, June 10, 1919                         $311.13
Mrs. Stella C. Arrington, Refund                     7.50
Henderson Bequest, Interest                          120.18
Manning Donation, Interest                          4.76
Norris Bequest, Interest                          75.00
Mr. J. Goldhorn, for children's board                135.00
                                        $653.57

     CONTRIBUTIONS.
Mr. William Evens                          $2.00
Mr. C. Pryke                              16.76
Rev. Enoch S. Price                          1.81
Rev. Alfred Acton, Contributions at
     Family Worship                     13.88
Dr. F. A. Boericke                          25.00
Miss Winifred Boericke                     5.00
Mr. Philip C. Pendleton                     1.00
Mrs. Raymond Pitcairn                     25.00
Mrs. Regina Iungerich                     6.00
Mrs. Wilfred Howard                     5.00
Miss Laura K. Vickroy                     2.00
Mr. Roland Trimble                          2.00
Mr. Jacob Schoenberger                     10.00
Colchester Christmas Offering                5.64
Bryn Athyn Children's Services-Offering           58.13
Bryn Athyn Children's Christmas Offering          37.93
Pittsburgh Society, Christmas Offering           27.57
Cincinnati Circle, Christmas Offering           20.00
Toronto Society, New Year Contributions           13.50

502

New York Society; Christmas Offering           47.10
Denver Society, Children's Christmas Offering      5.00
                                                                 330.32
                                                                 $983.89

     DISBURSEMENTS.
Assistance to Sundry persons                          $762.50
Balance in Bank, June 7, 1920                          $221.39

     WALTER C. CHILDS, Treasurer.

     12. The discussion of the communications from Lausanne was resumed, at the conclusion of which the matter of replying to the same was left with the Bishop.

     13. On motion, the question of the financial needs of the French-speaking members of the General Church in Europe was referred to the Executive Committee for consideration.

     14. On motion, the subject placed upon the docket by Mr. Walter C. Childs was presented by him, and discussed at length.

     Third Session, June 26th, 2:30 p. m.

     15. The meeting opened with worship, conducted by the Bishop.

     16. The Rev. W. H. Alden read the following:

     REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.

     For the year ending May 31, 1920.
Five meetings have been held since our last report:-October 2, 1919; January 22, February 22 and 29, May 18, 1920. In addition, two joint meetings with the Bishop's Consistory were held, on February 21 and March 31, 1920.

     In view of the increased cost of publishing New Church Life, the subscription price, beginning with 1920, was raised to $3.00, with an additional charge of 25 cents outside of the United States, to provide in part for the extra postage. The salary of the Editor has also been increased.

     The Editor of the Life has presented a careful statement of the expenditures from the Editorial Assistance Fund, originally provided by Mr. John Pitcairn, and continued from year to year thus far by Mr. Raymond Pitcairn. These expenditures seem legitimate, and I would recommend that the Fund, which is now exhausted, be replenished, so that the Editor may have essential clerical assistance and the means of paying for special articles which this Fund has hitherto supplied:

     The salary of the Missionary of the General Church has also been increased, in recognition of the higher cost of living which has persisted since the war.

503

     The subject of "Weekly Sermons for the Isolated," which was discussed at the last General Assembly, has been actively taken up since then, and a decision reached to undertake such publication, in the full belief in the great use such sermons will perform, and in confidence that the Church will provide the means for their publication. An appropriation of $500.00 was made, and the publication has been going on for 14 weeks. Between four and five hundred copies are sent out fortnightly, each issue containing two sermons selected from among those prepared for use in the General Church. They are sent to all the isolated members of the General Church, and to anyone else who expresses a desire to receive them. No subscription price is placed upon them, as it is believed they should be supplied in the same way that Sabbath worship in our societies is supplied,-freely,-the costs to be met by the voluntary contributions of those who benefit by them, or who recognize and desire to assist in this use. Several earnest expressions of appreciation have been received, and a number of contributions. While the latter have not been sufficient to cover the entire cost of publication, it is believed that there will be increased contributions as the use becomes more familiar, It will be necessary for the Executive Committee to renew at this time the authority to continue the publication of the these Weekly Sermons, which is strongly recommended.

     Arrangements have been made for the visit to this country of five ministers of the General Church in Europe; namely, the Rev. Messrs. R. J. Tilson and G. C. Ottley, of England; the Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrm, of Sweden; the Rev. Fernand Hussenet, of Paris, and the Rev. Ernst Deltenre, of Brussels. These gentlemen have now arrived, and are present at the Council, their attendance making our meetings this year a truly International Council of the New Church.

     Such an International Council is of especial importance at the present time, in view of the situation created in England by the death of the Rev. Andrew Czerny, and the conditions on the Continent, where an effort is being made, under the leadership of the Rev. Gustave Regamey, of Lausanne, to unite in one organization all the French-speaking New Churchmen in Europe.

     A substantial contribution has been made by Messrs. Raymond, Theodore, and Harold Pitcairn, with the promise of its renewal for a period of three years, to enable the General Church to assure the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal of a sufficient income to warrant his taking charge of the London and Colchester Societies. He has accepted the call, and will go to England in August, his place in Durban being taken by the Rev. Hugo Lj. Odhner, who has accepted a call from that Society.

     With the increased expenses of the General Church, a serious deficit was threatened at the end of the fiscal year, but an urgent circular sent to the members of the Church has met with encouraging response. Not only have additional contributions been made by those already contributors, but quite a number of new contributors have been added, which we may regard as even more encouraging than increased subscriptions.

504

     The adverse rate of exchange between the United States and England and Canada has been a serious inconvenience to our correspondents in those countries. Our agents in Kitchener, Toronto, and in England, are holding considerable sums in bank, hoping for a favorable turn in the rate of exchange. In the case of contributions to the General Church, I would suggest that we
instruct our agents to remit, the Church Treasury bearing the cost of exchange. In the case of subscriptions to New Church Life, I would wait a while longer. The increase in the subscription price, together with the adverse rate of exchange, would make the Life cost about double its old rate if the full amount were remitted at the present time. To insist upon full payment might seriously reduce the number of foreign subscriptions, or prove a hardship to our foreign subscribers. W. H. ALDEN, Acting Secretary.

     16a. The Rev. W. H. Alden read the following:

     REPORT OF THE TREASURER.

     For the Year ending May 31, 1920.
Balance on hand June 1, 1919                         $585.35

     RECEIPTS.
Interest on Investments                    504.25
Interest on Bank Account                     22.53
Exchange                              2.00
Rent of Addressograph                     8.00
Contributions to Orphanage                     20.35
                                                                 $557.13

     CONTRIBUTIONS.
Yearly Offering                          $74.00
California                               1.00
Colorado                               62.00
District of Columbia                         18.00
Georgia                              190.50
Illinois                               32.00
Chicago                               28.00
Glenview                               231.25
Indiana                               11.00
Maryland                              9.00
Massachusetts                          1.00
Michigan                               7.75
New Jersey                               29.00
New York                               107.50
Ohio                                    454.75
Pennsylvania                               241.92

505

Bryn Athyn                               4,275.80
Philadelphia                               44.00
Pittsburgh                               328.50
Texas                                   20.00
Washington                               21.70
West Virginia                          33.00
Canada                              108.00
Kitchener and Waterloo                     62.00
Toronto                               219.70
Australia                               33.30
Great Britain                               16.47
South Africa                              2.87
Sweden                               4.75
                                                             $6,668.76

     NEW CHURCH LIFE.
Subscriptions                               $1,617.25
Contributions                          30.00
Redeemed Envelopes                     10.70
Paper sold to Swedenborg Scientific Association     26.00
                                             $1,68305
Total Receipts                                    $9,495.19

     EXPENDITURES.
Salaries of Bishop's Office                     $2,700.00
Missionary                              584.92
Treasurer's Office                          720.00
Traveling Expenses-Missionary                99.55
Bishop                               51.00
Ministerial                               50.00
Secretarial Expense-Assembly                80.00
Ecclesiastical Vestments                     62.62
Academy Book Room-1st Edition Liturgy Plates-on
     account                          300.00
Printing Quarterly Report                     50.25
Interest on Investments paid to Treas. of Orphanage     195.18
Contributions to Orphanage paid to Treas.           46.82
Typewriter                               59.10
Membership Certificates                     47.00
Addressograph Expense                     19.27
Stationery and Postage                     269.60
Sundries                              82.81
Life subscriptions paid by General Church           227.75
                                                                 $5,645.87

506

     NEW CHURCH LIFE.
Salary of Editor                         $666.67
Printing issues of Dec., 1918; Jan., Feb., May,
     1919, to March, 1920                    1,712.03
Refund Subscriptions                     4.00
Paper for 1920                          339.87
Stationery                               72.80
Sundries                               25.54
                                             $2,820.91
Total Expenditures                                   $8,466.78
Balance on hand, May 31, 1920                         1,028.41

     SPECIAL EDITORIAL ASSISTANCE FUND.
Balance on hand, June 1, 1919                         $163.20
Expenditures during June 1, 1919, to May 31, 1920               $162.60
Balance on hand, May 31, 1920                         $0.60

     The following sums have been paid to our agents, but owing to adverse conditions of exchange, they have not yet been turned over to the Treasurer:

     CONTRIBUTIONS.
Kitchener and Waterloo                              $106.20
England                              3 Pounds, 7 Shillings, and 3-1/2 Pence

     NEW CHURCH LIFE SUBSCRIPTIONS.
Kitchener and Waterloo                              $38.70
England                                         80.82
                                                  $119.52

     WEEKLY SERMONS.
A contribution of                                   $1.00

     EXTENSION FUND.
For the Year June 1, 1919 to May 31, 1920.
Balance on hand, June 1, 1919                         $245.13

     RECEIPTS.
From contributions:
Yearly Offering                         $33.41
California                               200.00
Colorado                               5.00
District of Columbia                     9.00
Illinois                              34.10
Michigan                              2.00

507

New Jersey                               2.00
New York                               13.00
Ohio                                    147.00
Pennsylvania                              1,325.06
Washington                               4.00
Wisconsin                               3.00
Canada                               90.82
Great Britain                               2.00
Holland                              1.00
Sweden                              3.75
                                                             $11875.14
Net Interest on Investments                               5,432.02
Stamped Envelopes Redeemed                               13.36

     Total Receipts                                    $7,565.65

     EXPENDITURES.
Extension Work                          $5,019.85
Aid to Societies and Circles                     1,973.80
Sundries                               86.43
Balance on hand, May 31, 1920                425.57
                                                             $7,565.65

     The sum of $33.00 has been paid to our agent in Kitchener and Waterloo, but owing to adverse conditions of exchange it has not yet been turned over to the Treasurer.

     SOUTH AMERICAN FUND.

     RECEIPTS.
Interest on Investments                     $500.00

     EXPENDITURES
Paid Loan from Pension Fund                $132.09
Interest on Loan from Pension Fund                26.36
Paid on account of Loan from Extension Fund      300.00
Interest on Loan from Extension Fund           221.29
Rent of Safe Box                         1.00
                                             $480.74                               Balance on hand, May 31, 1920                              $19.26

     The South American Fund has been invested in $10,000.00 worth 6 Bonds, as follows: $5,000.00 Keystone Telephone Company, $4,000.00 Salmon River Power Company, and $1,000.00 Ontario Power Co., all yielding 5%.

     The South American Fund still owes $300.00 on account loans.

     PENSION FUND.

     For the Year ending May 31, 1920.

Balance on hand, June 1, 1919                          $796.56

508

     RECEIPTS.
Interest on Investments                     $3,169.70
Interest on Bank Balance                    20.11
                                             $3,189.81
Total                                             $3,986.37

     EXPENDITURES.
Pensions                         $2,565.00
Miscellaneous                     6.00
                                             $2,571.00
Balance on hand, May 31, 1920                         $1,415.37

     Mr. A. W. Manning, of Riverside, California, has donated $1,000.00 to the Pension Fund of the General Church, with the condition that the money shall be invested and two-thirds of the income paid to him during his life. At his death the whole income is to go to the uses of the Pension Fund. The money has been invested in bonds of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, of face value, $1,119.50, yielding 5-1/2%.

     WEEKLY SERMONS.

     RECEIPTS.
From Contributions                                        $92.65

     EXPENDITURES.
Printing                              $183.82
Mailing                               30.49
                                                             $214.31
Deficit                                        $121.66
     W. B. ALDEN, Treasurer.

     17. The Rev. W. H. Alden read the following:

     REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON CHURCH EXTENSION.

     For the Year Ending June 1, 1920.

     As an extended report of the work of this Committee was made to the General Assembly in October last, and printed in the Life for December, a lengthy report at this time would appear to be unnecessary. Two meetings of the Committee have been held since the last report, namely, on January 22nd and April 15, 1920. In addition, two joint meetings with the Bishop's Consistory were held on November 11th and 20th, 1919.

     The uses maintained, as heretofore, were as follows: The assistance to the Arbutus, Md., Society; payment of one-half of the expenses of the Rev. T. S. Harris in making quarterly visits to Massachusetts; the support of Mr. Headsten in Chicago, M. Deltenre in Brussels, Mr. Baeckstrom in Stockholm, and M. Hussenet in Paris.

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     Important new work is that undertaken in South Africa among the Basutos. The Rev. Messrs. Fred. Gyllenhaal and Theodore Pitcairn returned to America for the General Assembly, and gave enthusiastic accounts of the opportunities for missionary work among the native Basutos. Mr. Pitcairn has now gone back to Basutoland, and is assisted in the work by the Rev. R. W. Brown, who has been given a year's leave of absence by the Academy. Mr. Theodore Pitcairn has also provided for the coming to America of Mr. George Mokoena, who has taken up studies in the Academy with a view to making translations into the language of his fellow natives.

     Some assistance has been given to the Rev. Karl R. Alden, in the form of a special appropriation for summer missionary work, and to defray in part the expense connected with the giving of two lectures recently in Allentown and Scranton, Pa., which amounted to more than $100.00, most of which was privately subscribed. The attendance at these lectures was very encouraging, about 200 in each place. Marked interest was expressed by some who attended. It is unfortunate that such an effort cannot be followed up Such lectures attract attention, but little permanent good can be accomplished without some means of holding those who become interested.

     At the joint meetings with the Consistory, two subjects were taken up for consideration, viz., the possibility 6 sending the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal to London, and the subject of "Weekly Sermons for the Isolated," which had been referred by the Joint Council last October. No action upon these matters was taken by the Extension Committee, but they were considered by the Executive Committee, and the action taken is included in, the report of that Committee.

     There still remains the need of missionary tracts, for which there should be a definite provision, and it would seem to be an orderly thing for the Extension Committee to take it up.

     Contributions to the uses of the Extension Fund from the Church at large are still very small, and from a small proportion of the membership of the General Church. The return from the yearly-offering cards sent out a year ago was only $33.41, which was little more than the cost of preparing and sending out the cards. The work open to this Fund is continually increasing. It is the sowing of the seed, and the seed plot is the world. If the members of the Church fail to provide more adequately for this sowing, we must believe that, in the good providence of the Lord, it is not well that the seed-plot should be more fully sown at present. As means are provided, the work will be done; faster it cannot be done, and we must patiently wait the Lord's good time to stir men's hearts to give us ampler means with which to widen our activities.
     W. H. ALDEN, Secretary.

     18. The Rev. W. H. Alden reported verbally certain actions taken by the Executive Committee at its meeting earlier in the day, which included an increase of the salaries of the Bishop and the Treasurer, a renewal of the Editorial Assistance Fund, and an appropriation for the needs of the French-speaking members of the General Church in Europe.

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     19. On motion, the matter of a periodical in the French language was referred to the Bishop.

     20. The Rev. W. B. Caldwell, as Editor of New Church Life, offered his thanks to the Executive Committee for the renewal of the Editorial Assistance Fund, which had afforded him needed clerical help, and had enabled him to make a nominal recognition to writers who had devoted time and study to articles written at his request. He explained that we are not yet in a position to pay generally for matter contributed to the pages of the Life.

     21. The Rev. Fernand Hussenet expressed his gratitude for the appropriation made by the Executive Committee for the needs of the French members.

     22. The Rev. W. H. Alden added verbally to his reports the information that Mr. A. W. Manning, of Riverside, California, had donated the sums of $1,000.00 to the Orphanage Fund and $1,000.00 to the Pension Fund, one-third of the income of these amounts to go to the Funds named during his lifetime, and after his death the whole income.

     23. On motion, it was Resolved, That the Secretary be instructed to communicate to Mr. Manning the appreciation of this Council for his gift to the Orphanage and Pension Funds.

     24. The Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom made a statement in regard to a sculpture of Swedenborg which is offered for sale by a Swedish sculptor, Mr. Adolf Jonson. (Centralpalatset, Stockholm), who has studied in Italy, and has a high reputation. The sculpture is a bust, now in plaster, and can be made in bronze for Kr. 5,000 or in marble for Kr. 10,000.

     25. The Rev. R. J. Tilson spoke on the subject of the situation in London, expressing confidence as to the future, and offering his heartfelt thanks for the opportunity of attending the meetings of the Council.

     26. The Rev. G. C. Ottley described how he had come to see and accept the Academy views many years ago, and testified to the great pleasure it had been to him to be present at these Council meetings.

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     27. Bishop Emeritus W F. Pendleton spoke briefly, saying that the time had come when past differences which had separated us from our brethren in England should be given to oblivion and a new, start made.

     28. The discussion of the subject presented by Mr. Walter C. Childs was resumed, and continued at length.

     29. On motion, the meeting adjourned at 4:30 p. m.
          W. B. CALDWELL,
          W. H. ALDEN,
               Secretaries.
COUNCIL NOTES 1920

COUNCIL NOTES 1920

At a meeting of the Executive Committee on June 26th, it was decided to abolish the Committee on Church Extension, which was created some years ago by the Executive Committee for the purpose of administering the Extension Fund. This Fund will now be administered by the Executive Committee itself.

At one of the sessions of the Council of the Clergy, the Secretary read a telegram which had been received by Mrs. R. W. Brown from Mrs. L. Brackett Bishop, of Chicago, Ill., who stated that she and Mr. Bishop had visited Basutoland a month before, had met Mr. Brown and Mr. Pitcairn, and were much impressed by the work they were doing there.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     BRYN ATHYN, PA.-The Spring Meeting of the Bryn Athyn Church followed the last Friday Supper of the season on May 21st. According to our custom, it was devoted to the hearing of reports from the Principal and Faculty of the Elementary School. During the interval between the supper and the formal meeting, opportunity was given the members of the Society to visit the school rooms where they were received by the teachers and shown examples of the work accomplished in the various grades during the year. The meeting was opened by the reading of the Word and prayer, conducted by Bishop N. D. Pendleton. After the reading of the minutes, Mr. Heilman presented a brief report. He showed that, including both regular and special pupils, one hundred children had received instruction in the past year. The work was carried by five regular grade teachers, assisted by special teachers in such subjects as art, manual training, dancing, French, and singing. Mr. Heilman spoke appreciatively of the spirit of co-operation and earnest purpose which had characterized the teaching staff, and had contributed largely to the success of the year's work. He then introduced each teacher in turn, by whom a short paper was presented, illustrating by outline of work actually accomplished the development of the theory and practice of distinctive instruction in some particular subject. Miss Lucy Potts sketched briefly her excellent work with the first grade in Nature Study. Miss Erna Sellner spoke of the place and importance of handwork from the New Church viewpoint, suggesting/various forms of manual activity which might be profitably introduced into the curriculum. Miss Venita Roschman presented the subject of Geography, and Mr. Bostock that of History, showing how they Were endeavoring to reconstruct these courses from the Writings. Miss Cyriel Odhner emphasized the value of dramatic representations as a regular part of elementary school training. The Rev. George de Charms spoke last, on the subject of Religion, not only as a special course, but as entering into all the classes, making a plea for concentration upon some particular subject each year by each teacher, with a careful preservation of notes and records, in order that the whole field of elementary education might be built up gradually in a new and distinctive way. A spirit of appreciation for the work accomplished, and of hope for its future growth, pervaded the meeting, and the papers evoked an interesting discussion in which many members of the society participated.

     A special meeting of the Society was called by Bishop Pendleton for the evening of May 29th to consider the subject of incorporation. An instrument of incorporation, together with by-laws, carefully prepared by a special committee-through many months of painstaking effort-was read and adopted, and a Board of Trustees was elected. It is hoped that this will result in the successful accomplishment of that unition of the civil and ecclesiastical uses of the Society which, because of certain legal obstacles that were removed by a statute of 1919, had previously been impossible. A request is now to be made to the Court for a charter, by which the Society as a whole will become incorporated under the laws of Pennsylvania.

     On Sunday, May 30th, the children's services were brought to a close for the year by an impressive religious celebration in the Cathedral. The children marched in procession, bearing an offering of flowers with which the front of the chancel was prettily decorated by members of the Chancel Guild.

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The recitation of the Ten Commandments in Hebrew, the Ten Blessings in Greek, and the Creed in Latin, together with the singing of a Hebrew chant and a portion of the forty-sixth Psalm, characterized the children's part in the service. The Rev. K. R. Alden delivered an excellent address, connecting the idea of Memorial Day with the sending forth of the Twelve Apostles throughout the Spiritual World. He presented the subject in language well accommodated to the understanding of the children. An added feature of interest was the singing by Miss Volita Wells of a song appropriate to the 19th of June, composed by the Rev. K. R. Alden.

     The work of the Elementary School culminated in the presentation of a very successful pageant on the College campus, on Monday afternoon, May 31st. The entire school took part in the performance. The story, symbolic of the awakening of Spring, was written by Miss Cyriel Odhner, and the children were remarkably well trained in appropriate and expressive dances by Miss Florence Roehner. The simplicity of the thing, and the unconscious grace of the children, were a real delight to behold. It is to be hoped that something of this nature may be made an annual event, to be developed and perfected from year to year.

     The first wedding in the Cathedral, that of Mr. Kenneth F. Hicks and Miss Mary L. Grant, was solemnized on Wednesday evening, June 2nd, the Rev. K. R. Alden officiating. Children of the fifth and sixth grades led the bridal procession singing a Hebrew anthem. A brilliant reception in the Auditorium followed the ceremony.

     We are enjoying the presence of several ministers from abroad who have come for the meetings of the Council of the Clergy to be held the latter part of this month. The Rev. Messrs. Tilson and Ottley, from England, have quite brought with them from across the water the spirit of the Old Academy. The Rev. Ernst Deltenre, who has passed through so many harrowing experiences in war torn Belgium, is receiving a most hearty welcome from his friends and former associates. We are delighted also to hear at first hand from the Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom of the successful missionary efforts in Sweden, the reports of which have been followed with so great interest. The Rev. M. Hussenet is expected within a few days, and will complete the number of ministerial representatives from foreign lands. Needless to say, we are looking forward with the keenest pleasure to the coming meetings, when the hopes and needs of the Church in those far-distant parts will be discussed. Surely, as a result of this mutual counsel, the bonds of charity will be strengthened, the River of Life will flow forth, and the vine which the Lord has planted will take deeper root, and send forth new branches, bearing fruit to the permanent upbuilding of the Church. G. de C.

     BRAZIL.-The Pais, of Rio de Janeiro, for May 16, 1920, devoted two columns and a half to an obituary notice of Dr. Manoel Carneiro de Souza Bandeira, who was an active member of the New Church group in that city, having been baptized on May 13, 1990. The Rev. L. C. de La Fayette ordained him as a priest of the second degree on Nov. 16, 1919. "He was a very distinguished engineer," writes Mr. de La Fayette, "and a man of elevated character. He represented the Brazilian government in congresses of engineering and industry. He spoke the chief languages of Europe, and was well versed in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. A man of great heart, and therefore heart and soul in labors of service." The address at his burial was delivered by Le Cocq de Oliveira, a representative of the engineers. The service was conducted by his brother priest of the New Church, the Rev. Henry Leonardos, and he was buried in his priestly robes.
     E. E. I.

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     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-June 6th to 9th were spent at WINDSOR, ONT., and DETROIT. On Sunday morning, the 6th, services were held at Windsor, at which sixteen persons were present, of whom ten partook of the Holy Supper. An infant was baptized. In the evening there was a gathering at Birmingham, near Detroit, and a talk was given on New Church education, the point emphasized being the need of establishing in the minds of children and the young the central idea that the Lord is the infinite Giver of all things, temporal and eternal. If this can be accomplished, we can have good hope that they will look to Him as He reveals Himself in His Word, and be led by Him throughout life and to eternity. The conversation drifted to the doctrine of marriage within the Church, and it was shown that this doctrine is to be followed not for the sake of the numerical growth of the Church, as some have advocated, but for the sake of internal growth by the establishment of conjugial love and its heavenly happiness in the lives of those who are of the Church; for all doctrine is given in order that by it what is heavenly may be attained. On Monday evening a doctrinal class was held at Windsor, and on Tuesday evening another in Detroit.

     The next place Visited was ERIE, Pa. A doctrinal class was held on Thursday evening, June 10th. On the following day we had a picnic in Glenwood Park, and all greatly enjoyed the outing. On Saturday afternoon, at children's service, the use of the School Hymnal was introduced. In the evening there was a social supper, followed by doctrinal class. After the class, arrangements were made for the celebration of the 19th of June a week later. On Sunday morning services were held, at which twenty-four persons were present. An infant was baptized, and the Holy Supper administered to sixteen communicants. The Erie Society has suffered a great loss in the death of Doctor Cranch, for many years the able, faithful and earnest leader in all church activities. The members, however, have determined that the work shall go on, and that they must all take hold and do the many things that were formerly done for them by the Doctor. And so, in Providence, there has come an increased zeal. The members meet every other Sunday for services, at which the Weekly Sermon is read. These meetings are held at the homes of members, and the man of the house conducts the services or invites some one of the members to do it in his stead.
     F. E. WAELCHLI.

     GLENVIEW.-New Church Day is gradually assuming its rightful position as the most important anniversary in the New Church Calendar. Beginning with the humble banquets of the early days of the Academy, its observance has advanced step by step until in the societies of the General Church of the New Jerusalem it is being realized that the birth of the New Church in the spiritual world on June 19th, 1770, can only be worthily celebrated by worship and glorification of the Lord in a sphere of festivity and gratitude for the salvation of mankind.

     This year, our festival commenced with a social and dance on the evening of June 18th, when the gathering also provided the opportunity to welcome home to Glenview our contingent of students from Bryn Athyn. The hall was beautifully decorated, and that very important adjunct to "really truly proper" dance was in evidence, namely, "hired music,"-an orchestra of pieces. Interest was added to the occasion by the announcement of the engagement of Miss Vera McQueen and Mr. Crebert Burnham.

     At noon on Saturday the 19th the School had a New Church Day Banquet. The Rev. Gilbert H. Smith presided, and the children enjoyed the material parts of the banquet in the usual manner. At the conclusion of the meal, short papers treating of the Last Judgment and the Second Coming were read by Warren Reuter, Edith Goerwitz, Mary Scalbom and Marjory Burnham.

515

The head master then gave an address in which he impressed upon the children the importance to them of the event they were celebrating. Mr. G. A. McQueen, being invited to speak to the children, said that while they possessed so many privileges and were permitted to receive their education in New Church schools, and feast in the land of plenty, it might be useful to remember that at that very moment there were thousands of poor children in European countries dying from starvation, and who had never heard that the Lord Jesus Christ reigns. Yet those children were equally under the care of the Lord, and His Second Coming was just as much for them as for the children in Glenview. These poor children in other countries would soon learn the news about New Church Day in the other world, and find a place of happiness provided for them in heaven. The children in our schools must hold fast to the truths they had been taught if they would reach the heavenly kingdom and become angels like those children who had gone before. After the speeches the children marched from the hall carrying the red and white flag and singing "Our Alma Mater."

On the evening of the 19th a banquet was held, when quite a number of friends from Chicago were present and added to the happiness of the sphere. Mr. Seymour G. Nelson was toastmaster, and introduced the subject of the evening-"Unity in the Church"-in the following stirring words: "One hundred and fifty years ago today, the Lord sent out into the whole spiritual world the faithful twelve who followed Him on earth, to preach the Gospel that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns, whose reign will be for ages of ages, and that they are blessed who come to the wedding supper of the Lamb. On that day was the New Church born in the spiritual world, and so on that day we celebrate the birthday of the New Church. Therefore New Church Day is the distinctive Festival of the New Church. If there be a festival on that day, there should be festivity. You all now can see the evidence of festivity, if you look around. What is festivity? The world replies: "Feasting and amusements." That is true enough from a worldly standpoint. But what from a New Church standpoint? The Writings state that festivity is the gladness of the mind ultimating itself in activity of the body. Now this gladness can only exist and ultimate itself in a state of freedom which comes from agreement and harmony. You can readily see how fatal to festivity disagreement, dissension and discord are. Because these take away the freedom and spontaneity, there can be no true festivity. Therefore let us relax, unbend, and prepare to agree and consent to the truths you will hear from the speakers, and all come into harmony with the sphere of festivity appropriate to this glorious celebration." He then called upon the Rev. W. L. Gladish to speak on "New Church Day, a time for rejoicing. (The writer had better explain here
that he dare not send full reports of the several fine speeches delivered at this banquet for fear of encroaching too much on your available space, and besides it is not our desire to crowd out reports from other societies.) Mr. Gladish pointed out that the message proclaimed in the spiritual world was the supreme truth of religion-that the Lord Jesus Christ is Man. That was the meaning of the message given by the apostles in the other world-"The Lord Jesus Christ reigns." It meant the worship of God-Man and conjunction with Him. In this faith are all in the heavens and all who are regenerating. He showed from the Writings that the reason the Lord was born upon this earth was that this supreme truth might be known on all earths. It suggested the great use of our earth to other earths, and we learn that angels from this earth were sent to proclaim the great truth to spirits of other earths, that the Lord Jesus Christ had become a Divine Man upon this earth.

Dr. J. B. S. King, speaking on "New Church Day as a time for Preparation and Consecration, said the 19th of June was really the beginning of the ecclesiastical year, or the New Year's Day of the New Church.

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The event celebrated is the greatest of any event ever celebrated. It is a custom in the business world to close up the affairs of the old year and prepare for the new year. It is well for those who believe in the Heavenly Doctrine to consider their spiritual year, to consider whether they have done as much for the Church as they might have done. If any of his hearers didn't know how to proceed in this self-examination, they might apply to Mr. Smith for information. If they examined themselves, they would feel very humble, and this was a good attitude to take on New Church Day, because none had taken full advantage of the opportunities the Doctrines furnish for spiritual advancement. It is also a day for making new resolves, and by this means to benefit from our New Church Day celebrations.

     Mr. H. L. Burnham dealt with the subject "New Church Day as a time for the renewal of friendship." He said that if there was a lack of unity among Newchurchmen, it could not be charged to the doctrines on which the Church rests, but the fault must be with the members of the Church and nowhere else. The evils which produce such conditions come from infernal spirits, and we must look for these in ourselves. We might ask ourselves: "Why are we Newchurchmen?" Surely not merely for the sake of individual salvation; for membership in the New Church is not essential to salvation. There are two essentials, which are belief in one God and to live well. We are taught that there must be a Church somewhere on the earth, in order that there may be a basis for the heavenly societies to co-operate with and how into, and those who recognize the necessity of living good lives will be in one or other of the several churches which have been on earth. Even where religion has been reduced to idolatry, those who worship those things from a desire to live a good life will be taught by the angels and led to the perception that there is but one God and that they should love the neighbor. As to our friends in the Church, whether in Convention or elsewhere, it is fair to assume that, while there may be exceptions, they stand for the fundamental doctrines, and are in the endeavor to order their lives accordingly. This acknowledgment with them becomes our basis of friendship in this world, and such friendship should be sought after.

     Dr. G. G. Starkey made the final speech of the evening. We can only quote a small part of this powerful resume of the subjects dealt with by the previous speakers: "The formers of this great Republic on its natal day spoke to the world their jubilation with rocking steeples and echoing cannon roars because of new-found natural freedom; the dark skinned sons of bondage in the South gave to the skies their shouts of joy and gratitude when Lincoln struck the shackles from their limbs. But what were even those great boons compared with the breaking of the bonds of hell and the ransom of the sin-enslaved race of mankind effected by the Hero from Eternity, and now made fully effective in His Second Coming with sevenfold light and power? And that is what New Church Day means to us."

     Between the speeches there were the usual toasts and songs, and a special topical song by Mr. W. H. Junge, each verse ending with that easily remembered chorus "Over and over and over once more."

     Our services on Sunday morning, June 20th, provided a fitting climax to our New Church Day Celebration. The peace and quiet of our little church building, with the Opened Word the central object before the eyes of the worshipers; the music and singing; the sermon and the administration of the Holy Supper; the highest form of glorification of the Lord for the benefits received at His Second Advent was attained. The internal enjoyments of true worship being known only to the participants, and untranslatable into natural language, explains the brevity of our report of this service.

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     On the evening of the same day, a play, entitled "The Academy Girl, or The Day of Days," was given by our young people, and was undoubtedly the most successful performance yet given on our stage. It is described by its versatile author, the Rev. Gilbert H. Smith, as a semi-original play, based upon the plot played at the Blackstone Theater, Chicago, with Mrs. Patricia Collinge of "Tillie the Mennonite" fame as the leading lady This play was rewritten by Mr. Smith, assisted by Mrs. Alvin E. Nelson, to express something more than mere comedy and patriotism, as in the original to add a little of New Church thought and life in contact with the sphere of wealthy society, and to mirror the contrast between strong Newchurchmanship and the indifferent kind. The original center of interest was shifted from the odium of poverty, as in Miss Collinge's play, to the triumph of an Academy girl who was looked down upon because she was an Academy girl. A military sphere pervaded the story, the scenes of which were laid in the neighborhood of Bryn Athyn. Mrs. John Gyllenhaal was very successful in the important part of leading lady, while the rest of the performers were equally good in their respective roles. The cast was as follows:

The Academy Girl-Mrs. John Gyllenhaal
Her Aunt-Miss Freda Junge
Dressmaker and Milliner-Mrs. Benjamin McQueen
Mother of the Heroine-Mrs. John Synnestvedt
Very Slow Housemaid-Miss Beatrice Nelson
One of the Friends-Miss Hilda Synnestvedt
Society Girls-Miss Nellie Synnestvedt and Miss Jennie Cole
French Maid-Mrs. Geoffrey Blackman
Rival Lovers-Mr. Harold McQueen and Mr. Geoffrey Blackman
Something of a Humorist-Mr. Alan Synnestvedt
A Friend-Mr. Arthur King
A Friend-Mr. Winfred Junge
     G. A. MCQUEEN

     ERIE, PA.-June Nineteenth, coming on a Saturday this year, was celebrated on the following Sunday afternoon by the Erie Circle. Although we did not have the pleasure of having our Pastor present, we managed to have a very enjoyable and instructive meeting at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Evans. Twenty-three of our members were present at the service. The sermon, "The Way to the Tree of Life," written by Rev. W. B. Caldwell, was read, together with the Lessons, by Mr. B. Evans. We were considerably disappointed at not having any singing for the service, as we had only two Liturgies, which only serves to bring home to us a little loss among the many great ones we have in the passing on to the Next World of our much beloved Doctor Edward Cranch. It has been through his kindness that we have enjoyed the use of his many copies of the Liturgy until we regularly forget to bring our own.

     A short time after the service we had a picnic supper. On account of rain we had to stay in the house. The supper brought by the various families was served in Cafeteria style, each one collecting what was desired while passing around the table in single file. We then found seats around the room as convenient. As we approached the end of the meal, it was remembered by one of our members that there had been a request in the announcement sent out for the meeting, that all able should come prepared to make a few "spontaneous remarks." We then started an investigation which bore much fruit.

     After a few introductory and explanatory remarks, Mr. E. Nilson read an article, interesting but pathetic, from "The Churchman," entitled "Humanizing Heaven," showing us how much we had to be thankful for in the New Church, as compared with the teachings of the Old Church in regard to Heaven. This was followed by the reading of a short paper by C. E. Cranch. Mr. Miltiades Glenn, being unable to attend, sent a short paper he had prepared, which was read. We then listened to a few remarks by Mr. Edwin Johnson and Mr. M. F. Near.

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This was followed by the reading of True Christian Religion, No. 108, and quite a little general discussion of the subjects brought up.

     Another call was then sent out for papers, answered by the reading of one by Master Frederick D. Cranch, which he had prepared for the occasion. Then the article in New Church Life, for June, 1920, by Rev. Andrew Czerny-'Mission of the Disciples in the Spiritual World'-was read. After a little more conversation and discussion' in regard to the papers, a request was made for announcement of the next meeting, and then the twenty-six who were present left for their various homes. And so ended a meeting which will go down in the history of our little Circle as one particularly to be remembered. We are finding out what we can do.
     C. E. C. for E. T. C.-our newly appointed Secretary, who was unavoidably absent.

     KITCHENER, ONT.-The Rev. H. L. Odhner informs us that he officiated recently at the funeral of the Rev. Alex. Lewis Slight, who died suddenly on June 3rd, at the age of 57 years. Mr. Slight, it will be recalled, was present at the Ontario District Assembly in Toronto last April, and spoke on that occasion. He was minister of the English Conference, presiding temporarily as Pastor of the Kitchener Convention Society.

     REPORT OF REV. J. E. BOWERS.-My recent itinerary in the missionary field began on March the 18th. In Ontario, Can., and in five of the States, members and friends of the General Church were visited in twenty-four places. Among the isolated and in circles where there are nonresident, ministers of our body, eighty adult believers in the Doctrines, and forty-seven children who have been baptized into the faith of the New Church, were seen at their homes. It is always a pleasure to me to meet the children in New Church homes, for obvious reasons.

     On Sunday; March 21st, I preached for the Rev. Hugo L. Odhner, at Kitchener, Ont. Near Milverton, a marriage was solemnized on March the 24th. At Milverton, Ont., at Youngstown and Bellaire, Ohio, and at Altoona and Renovo, Pa., the sacrament of the Lord's Supper was administered to the usual number of communicants. Preceding the communion service at Altoona, there was the baptism of an adult, notice of which appeared in the July issue of the New Church Life. Desiring to be fully united with the Lord's New Church, the person referred to made application at the same time for membership in the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and in due time received the Bishop's Certificate.

     At the home of every family, with all the individual members of the Church visited, there were held conversations on subjects of the Heavenly Doctrine. During our talks many passages were quoted or read from the Writings, in confirmation of the spiritual and rational truths of the Word, as illustrated by means of the sense of the letter. In this way much of my work among the isolated has been done, in the course of many years. And there have been many evidences to show that the use thus performed has been spiritually helpful to those to whom it has been my privilege to minister. But it is to be hoped that in the future the number of those who will be receptive of the genuine truths of religion will increase, and that circles or centers of believers of the new doctrines can be formed, and that there will be prepared men to give them spiritual instruction more frequently, than has been in the past, and to lead them by means of truths to the good of life. (H. D. 318.)

     In some of my former reports the names of the members and friends of our General Church who have been visited, and the names of their places of residence, have been mentioned. They will therefore kindly excuse the omission of names in the present report.

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     As an external matter of information, it may be said here that in the course of my labors as a missionary, the aggregate distance of my travels is not less than two hundred and fifty thousand miles. This is equivalent to ten trips around our terrestrial globe. And railroad travel is not now enjoyable to me,-for reasons that are obvious,-although I love my work as much as ever.

     Many of my New Church friends whom I visited thirty or forty years ago have passed on into the brighter and more beautiful spiritual world. As time rolls on, others follow them one by one. I cherish the remembrance of them; and hope to meet them again, and at least have some visits with them. But this entirely in accordance with what the Lord, in His good pleasure, will provide for.

     In conclusion, permit me to say that, as my age advances, and the mental and physical strength decreases, in thinking of my life's work, my mind is at times profoundly impressed with the idea of how very little it has been possible for me to do in the momentous use of New Church evangelization. But on the other hand is the encouraging and cheering conviction that others are being, and in the future will continue to be, prepared to perform all the uses of the Lord's crowning Church, the glorious Church of the New Jerusalem. Thus that the uses of genuine New Church evangelization, according to the spirit of the Writings, will be done evermore, in the ages of the future, till the whole earth as to the Church will be filled with the glory of the Lord

     BRYN ATHYN-NEW CHURCH DAY.-A capacity gathering attended the banquet in the auditorium on the evening of June 19th,-the 150th anniversary of the institution of the New Church in the spiritual world, as the Rev. George de Charms reminded us in opening the program of speeches. Mr. de Charms then introduced the Rev. E. E. Iungerich, whose remarks took the form of a "Message" containing many striking reflections upon the significance of the Day, and embodying twelve admonitions to New Churchmen, based upon those given by the Lord to His disciples when in the world, and showing how we are to "enter into their labors" at the Second Advent and thus promote the establishment of the New Church upon earth by means of the Heavenly Doctrine.

     At the conclusion of this thoughtful and stimulating address, the Bishop invited remarks from others, at the same time noting the presence of our ministerial friends from abroad and extending a warm welcome. In response, Messrs. Ottley, Tilson, Deltenre and Baeckstrom spoke in turn, delivering messages of greeting from the "friends across the sea," and treating of the theme of the evening in language both solemn and uplifting. Finally, also, M. Hussenet was prevailed upon to address the meeting in his native tongue, and those who could not understand caught the spirit of his description of the way in which the Church in France had borne the terrifying years of the war-for so were his words afterwards interpreted for us by Mr. Ottley in his own eloquent way. Other speakers followed, and the Bishop touched fresh springs of enthusiasm when he fervently voiced his conviction that this day would mark the beginning of a new state in the progress of the Church. Nor were the labors of the past forgotten. Toasts to Father Benade, to Father Pendleton, and Father Potts, were honored with a warmth that be spoke our affectionate remembrance and gratitude

     On the day following, a large congregation attended the Festival Service, which was also in memory of the laying of the corner-stone of the Cathedral. Twenty-six of the Clergy of the General Church were present in the chancel, entering and departing with the choir in procession. The sermon by the Rev. Ernst Deltenre set forth impressively the significance at this day of the coming of the wise men to the cradle of the incarnate Savior. The Holy Supper was administered at a special service in the evening.
     W. B. C.

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TO RENT 1920

Announcements.

Furnished house to rent for a year. Apply to Mrs. R. W. Brown, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

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BISHOP'S ADDRESS TO THE COUNCIL OF THE CLERGY 1920

BISHOP'S ADDRESS TO THE COUNCIL OF THE CLERGY N. D. PENDLETON 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL      SEPTEMBER, 1920          No. 9
     (Delivered at the Public Session of the Council, held at Bryn Athyn, Pa., Tuesday evening, June 22, 1920.)

     In issuing the call for this meeting, and in extending an invitation to the representatives of our ministry in Europe, the statement was made that the "need for the Academy movement throughout the New Church world was as great now as it has ever been, and that the success of the movement depended largely upon the leaders of it seeing eye to eye, both with regard to the existence of the need, and the means of its fulfilment." It was added, that to this end nothing would prove more beneficial than our coming together, discussing, and affirming the fundamentals for which we stand, and in so doing dedicating our lives anew to the undertaking.

     It may now be said that during the months which have intervened since the call was issued and the invitation given, we have been increasingly impressed with the need of this gathering and the importance of the use which it may serve. Certainly we have in mind the strengthening and, as well, the extension of General Church activities. We would strengthen our activities by every power and all means. We would extend them in so far as Providence gives clear indication of the need, but no further; for we are not seeking external dominion, but the extension of that spiritual service of which the General Church is an exponent. And if, along with this service, we offer the privilege of membership in the body of the General Church, we do so because experience has shown that in this way the service may best be made effective and its benefits lasting.

     Membership in a common body of those who are of like faith and spiritual state needs no justification.

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Those who hold as one the same attitude towards the Divine Revelation, and who have derived from the Revelation a body of distinctive doctrinal interpretations, looking to the performance of fundamental spiritual uses, vital to the welfare of the Church, may well be regarded as within their rights when they disregard the prohibitions of national boundaries, and rise superior to those inborn racial prejudices which are fostered by the limits of natural environment, and especially when these inhibitions are put aside in favor of a spiritual unity based on a similarity of love for, and a common understanding of, Divine things. In so far as membership in a common ecclesiastical body is significant of this unity, and in so far as such membership furthers this unity, the effort so to organize plainly works in the direction of that spiritual law which strives for conjunction in accordance with likeness of state.

     We have in view, then, a world-wide membership for the sake of an enlarged spiritually homogeneous body, in the hope of an increasingly intense and wide-spread interest in the Heavenly Doctrines. And this, not primarily for intellectual considerations, but for the sake of the work of salvation, as that work is understood in the New Church.

     Aside from our own body, we regard with friendly eyes every manifestation of activity which looks to the upbuilding of the New Church. Above all do we regard with interest every evidence of deepening thought of the Church, every sign of the growing realization of the unique mission of the Church of the New Jerusalem and the transcendent nature of its Divine Revelation. For only so may the Church,-its principles, its revealed truth,-take hold of men, convert them into spiritual powers for good, and wield their lives to the formation of that great human form, composed of all saints, called in the Writings the Gorand Man of heaven. In this we have our part to play-and in that part we must see to it that we do those things which Providence appoints. These things are called duties; they are uses which the mind perceives as needs,-the needs of the day, the hour, in which we live. They are needs seen in light; and revealed as imperative to be done by men in the faith that they are so many indexes of the Lord's will, working to further unseen consequences of His leading.

     We cannot doubt that the end in all those affairs which regard His Church on earth lead in the direction of spiritual unity.

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For the Church in its deeper aspect is one, even as its Lord is one; and this, however varied in externals it may appear. Superficially there may be in the future, as in the past, divisions of the Church-many organizations, perhaps-yet closely interwoven, held together by the invisible bond of charity. But be this as it may in the Lord's will, we cannot but regard with concern that conception which would enforce spiritual union on the ground of natural propinquity, which would insist upon the necessity of organization on the basis of national or even ethnic distinctions. Certainly allowance must be made for national differences and racial distinctions, but the spiritual must rule, and must be allowed its own demarkations. Only so may Church organization come into correspondence with inspiring spiritual societies, which are formed and organized solely and purely by the law of spiritual similitudes.

But the nationalists say: "Behold, there stand two churches near together, of one religion yet of separate organizations! The fact shouts aloud to all passers-by,-the sad story of difference and schism, of self-will and uncharitable bickerings. Put aside bickerings, compromise differences, and then the world will see a beautiful symbol of that internal unity which should prevail. Seeing this, the world may perhaps be converted."

It is doubtless true that those who bicker join in the devil's game. And in our human affairs there are some things which may be compromised for the sake of unity; but not all-not those that are essential. The compromise of essentials is dishonest. It is better not to strive for an all-inclusive external unity,-a universal dominion,-lest the freedom of growth in varieties which makes for beauty and perfection of form be impeded, least internal development be retarded. A living difference is better than a moribund unity. We believe above all things in a free Church, even in the allowance of disorder, provided there be at the same time freedom for order. For in such case the Church may gradually be introduced into the orderly freedom prescribed by revelation and experience, which allows of opportunity for development in accordance with impulse from the spiritual world. That which is given an opportunity so to develop may prove its worth, and in time spread far and wide its benefits. But what if it be crushed in its first beginnings?

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Certainly we believe that no good thing can be permanently withheld from the race by the adverse actions of men. In Providence, adversity serves only to purify and strengthen, while apparently retarding growth. Not even the lethal poison of slander can destroy that which is genuinely spiritual. This weapon of theological animosity in all ages, while seemingly effective, fails in this, that it is primarily self-destructive. The eternal truth is that "no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly."

     And yet, for himself man may destroy the new-born spiritual,-that good of spiritual truth which lifts the mind to Divine things and implants heavenly affections. The good of this truth constitutes the Church; and the extension of its service must be freely allowed in the growth of ecclesiastical organizations. Any and every movement so vitalized should have the right of way regardless of individual tempers, national differences, or of any dominion which men would impose. Let men beware, when faced with such a movement, lest they contravene a vital spiritual impulse, and in so doing, counter against the Divine purpose. Remember the words of the wise Gamaliel: "Ye men of Israel, take heed to yourselves what ye intend to do as touching these men.... Refrain from these men, and let them alone; for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought; but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God." (Acts V:34, 38, 39.)

     The Academy came into being at the call of a great need. Its first years were tempestuous. It emerged from its primary conflicts isolated. The Church in large part refused the guidance of the Principles for which it stood. But the end in the issue is not yet. It is my belief that in time the men of the Church will inevitably draw nearer together. But that will be only after the dispersal of the atmosphere of scandal, and when we have come to agreement as to certain vital principles.

     We have always held that the differences between ourselves and those who oppose us arose from a divergence of view with regard to the nature and authority of the Revelation given to the Church. While this was clearly the case in the beginning, a time came when the dictum passed from mouth to mouth that the difference was not so much doctrinal as moral. The insinuation involved was intolerable. It appeared as the extreme of uncharity-so much so that living together became a grievous affliction, and in time impossible.

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Ostensibly the General Church cleared itself of all entanglements, in order that it might be free to embody its principles in the externals of its own organization. But I submit we could have endured doctrinal divergences-we could have composed governmental differences-if only there had been charity. But the modicum of charity at that period of the history of the Church was insufficient to hold the feeble organization together. However, we doubt not but that this ecclesiastical disturbance was allowed in order that something new might be born to the furtherance of ends not then fully seen. It now appears as of Providence that that for which the Academy stood should be granted unhindered development-that the spirit of acceptance of the Divine Authority of the Writings should freely prevail in some societies of the Church, and with all those individuals whose minds were open to receive new and more vigorous standards of doctrine. In any case, the separation occurred, and while to us the providence of it seems clear, the fact of its allowance must be admitted by all. Every New Churchman must admit that the future good of the Church will in some way be served thereby.

I speak not in a spirit of apology, but to raise a thought which sooner or later must be faced by all,-that is, the Why of the Academy and the cause of its advancement. Indubitably we hold that the Divine Authority of the Writings is in no sense a temporary question. It is the most fundamental of all interpretative doctrines. It touches the heart of every teaching on every page of the Writings. It touches the life of the regenerating man at all points. It affects profoundly the modes of the government of the Church, and, as well, the manner of man's self-government. It substitutes the reign of the Divine law for that of human conceit; and if this acknowledgment be humbly made, and its purpose faithfully carried out, it will, we do believe, vitalize the Church as nothing else may.

The "Divine Authority," now sometimes referred to as the old "war cry" of the Academy, is that through which all that is worth while has come to us in this body. And to ask if we have in any sense become remiss with reference to it, is a fair question,-a pertinent and a proper question at all times. In this it will profit us nothing to "gain the whole world, and lose our own soul." For the soul of the Academy is bound up in the definition of the Divine Authority of the Writings.

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But it may be said that the state of the Church has changed. Thirty years ago almost every sermon preached in Academy circles was in some degree a proving of the Divine Authority. How stands the matter now? It appears that the time came when most of our ministers were disposed to consider the question proven, and that our laymen accepted the fact. Certainly there was a superficial change. Authority sermons, as such, became less frequent. Discourses looking to the correlation of science and revealed truth were substituted, to meet the need of new issues and interests.

Recently a remark was made to the effect that the same thing said in the same old way at length brings about, if not weariness, at least a lessening of the truth's first impressiveness, while the same or like things said in a new way, or from a new point of view, come to the mind as an agreeable refreshment,-almost as truth new-struck from the mint of Revelation. But what of this seeming change? The answer is simple. It is held by us that a true correlation involves an obeisance on the part of science to the authority of Revelation.

The Academy and the General Church have been defined as an attitude, a state of mind, with reference to the Revelation, a humble acquiescence with regard to the precise doctrinal definitions found in the Writings, because of faith that the word of this doctrine is the voice of the Lord to the New Church. The Academic Church is indeed this, but more than this. It is fundamentally an attitude, a bowing of the mind; and to this fundamental there is and should be constant recurrence, not only for the sake of renewed inspiration, but as well for a re-proving of all things The Academy, however, is more than this attitude of loyalty and obedience; it is a derived body of perceptive teachings, interpretative doctrines, which characterize all its life and doings. Hence we have the Academy interpretation of the doctrine of the priesthood; its understanding of the state of the Christian world; its teaching concerning marriage in the Church and New Church education. These general concepts have marked the Academy from the beginning, and they lie at the root of all our thinking today. The Church with us has been organized in recognition of priestly leading and government. Our ministers have not ceased to expose the state of the Christian world.

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We stand for marriage in the Church at all times, believing that only by means or such marriages may the Church be lastingly established. As to New Church education, our schools testify our devotion to that cause.

Our critics say that we are priest-ridden, that we hold an uncharitable view of other Christian bodies, that marriage between those of the old and the new faith is not the mixed marriage condemned in the Writings, that New Church education is a mistake and a failure, and even antagonistic to good citizenship. But I submit that these principles of the Academy are as true today as when propounded some fifty years ago. There is no inspired statement of them outside the pages of Revelation. I mean by this that, in so far as these principles are interpretive, the statement of them may be subject to amendment, but that the amendment can refer only to an ill-chosen word or an imperfect phrase. The principles are true. They were given of Providence for the lasting benefit of the Church, and one of them-the fundamental of all-is unalterable, and ever-binding upon our conscience. It carries all else with it. It is the breath of life to the Church as a whole, and it spells for the individual his regeneration. The authority of the Revelation is one with the power of truth to redeem.

But it is not my purpose this evening to bind the mind to the past; nor would I advise any restatement of old issues with a view to clarifying obscurities arising from verbal errors. In my opinion, nothing of this is called for. The record of the Academy is written, and we today stand upon that record. We take for granted that fair-minded men seek to know our intent, and will interpret our sayings and doings in the light of that intent. Rather have I spoken of the past in order that me may the better look to the future. It may be that there will be a lessening of the old conflict with. New Churchmen not of our body; but indubitably we shall in the future be deeply engaged with readjustments to meet the well nigh overwhelming changes through which the world is passing. In the midst of a universal flood, we stand a little group of men and women, having ideals drawn from Revelation which we can hardly place in the new society that is forming about us. To raise the hand in protest against these changes seems now like "shaking a feeble fist in the face of destiny."

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After all, is not the present state of the world one that Academicians should have anticipated? Is not the Judgment of 1757 in the spiritual world producing its sequel in this second and third decade of the 20th century? The state of the world of spirits at that time compares favorably with the present state of the world. The people were then, and are now, pleasure bent to the point of madness, even while they suffer artificial restraint destructive of personal liberty. At the wedding feast at Cana, our Lord turned the water into wine. In this land His deed would now be outlawed, and He would be subject to fine and imprisonment. The wine of spiritual truth is lacking, and what of the wedding! The most ominous note in the world-confusion is that of sex restlessness,-sex antagonism. When this comes to pass, surely the foundations are shaken. There is, however, no going back. We must look to the Lord to lead His Church through the flood, even as He led Israel through the dangerous waters. As I have said, Academicians might have anticipated these eventualities. And yet we stand amazed, like the man who wakes at night to find his city swept by flames. Much for which he has loved and labored will be destroyed; but with the morning, when the conflagration is over, he will begin laboriously building anew.

We do not see clearly what standing the Church will have in the new state that is arising. But this much is certain,-there will be those who will read and love the Writings. And herein is the answer to all doubts and despairs. For ourselves, we are consoled by a few signs. One is that our school is growing, and another that our temple now stands on a hill, to be seen and known of all men. Readjustment to a gravely changed state of the world must and will be made-wisely, let us pray, as each issue is joined. We have the strength that comes of holding the Lord's message; let us keep that message in our hearts. In the days to come we shall need nothing so much as the authority of truth which gives power to faith. This authority must not be apart from the light of truth. The truth itself must be seen. Healing will come when that truth is presented as the "self-evidencing reason of love." (Canons I.) The angel said: "How can I believe unless I see?" The sight of truth is even the ground of acceptance of Revelation in the first instance. Authority is derived from the fact that the Lord has revealed Himself in truth; but the human mind may not be bound until that which is revealed is seen, received, and acknowledged.

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Otherwise the truth passes by, as if it were not.

     The inspiration of Academic thought is not primarily a devotion to dogmatic phrases,-not a binding literalism. For we know that in the parsing of phrases the truth may be sidetracked; in giving a disproportionate weight to words the idea may suffer. No one saw this danger more clearly than Father Benade. He once spoke earnestly to this effect: Give words their relative value. See all things in due proportion. To do this is the essential faculty of the rational mind.

     No, the Academic is not a word-ridden, a phrase-laden, mind. On the contrary, it is dominated by perceptive values. It is impelled by a love for, and a search of, the inner truth Divine which lies within the sequence of human words and phrases-whether of the dark sayings of Ancient Scripture or the rational statements of modern Revelation. On the other hand, the stand of the Academy has been and is constant for that Divinity which lies in the adequacy of Revelation's vestment, and its irrefragibility, its plenary inspiration. This latter stand has given us the name of literalists. But devotion to the letter, in acknowledgment of its sanctity, is the only proper basis for a right perception of the inner rational truth. The spirit, the inner law, the light from the Urim, is that which guides; and herein lies the secret of the adaptability of the Church to all future needs. By this comes that pliability necessary to repeated adjustments. Accommodation is a word of potent meaning, even of Divine significance. It is recorded that the Infinite was accommodated when God became Man of this the Scripture is evidence. But the Scripture, when given, requires a further accommodation-requires repeated and ever-renewed adaptation. For this, a living, adjustable medium was appointed-the priesthood.

     This priesthood is a love and a gift,-the love of inquiry, and the gift of answer; even as of old the priest inquired of the Lord by Urim and Thummim, and, if a true priest, the Lord answered by a flashing of lights from the sacred stones. The stories now are the holy ultimates of Revelation. These are given for the sake of the light that shines from them. The light is an imponderable essence which waxes and wanes. Sometimes, may be, we strive for this light in vain. The Lord does not answer.

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Something is wrong with the priest or the people, or perhaps the question. Never does the fault lie in the Urim, if the stones in its holy series be unbroken. Remember, the Church is repeating Israel's history. There are times of temptation when defeat is faced, when the Lord does not answer. Then must there be a searching of minds and hearts to find the "accursed thing," that it may be cast out of the camp. If so, and only so, will the Lord again speak with His people. The accursed thing is human conceit,-a product of self-love. This conceit is none the less stupid when it employs sacred phrases. It is no true priestly. Though wearing the garments, it is not Divinely ordained; and when it inquires, it receives no answer. Orderly inquiry and reasonable answer present at once the inmost ideal and the highest duty of the priestly office. Thence is derived its essential power-thence the right and duty of the saying, "Thus saith the Lord,"-the Lord Who communes with man by spiritual Urim, Who speaks to him in the light of Revelation, with the "self-sounding reason of love," that is, in that truth which is called the light of love because it is celestial, and which alone may restore the fallen church. This is the true priestly, and its authority is purely internal. It is given for the enlightenment of all, and the constraint of none. Never must it become personal authority in the man; for this would be to pervert direfully a most holy influence intended as a blessing.

This spiritual mediumship of the priest-this living perceptive faculty-is to be guarded against perversions by the conventions of men, even as it is guarded of the Lord by the provisions of His appointment. The conventions of men have reference to fullness of preparation, adequacy of training, and induction into office by graded and orderly modes. The provisions of the Lord's appointment are unseen, but they strike deeper than the eye of man can see, deeper into the mind and heart of the candidate. These provisions of His appointment constitute man's inner ordination; and they so far overrule the outward conventions that one may undergo preparation and training-may be induced into office by the laying on of hands-and yet not be ordained of God; and if the priest be not ordained of God for this highest of priestly functions,-this inner perception of the revealed law,-the official hands are laid upon him in vain.

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Thus it is true, in spirit and in fact, that the priesthood is given by Divine appointment, here as well as hereafter,-given as a blessing of spiritual endowment for continual interpretation of the Lord's will revealed. And it is of order that the priests should pray for this Divine appointment.

     This priesthood is given as a blessing, and is itself blessed with the blessing of Moses on Levi: "Of Levi he said, Let thy Thummim and thy Urim be with thy holy one, whom thou didst prove at Massah, and with whom thou didst strive at the waters of Meribah; Who said unto his father and to his mother, I have not seen him; neither did he acknowledge his brethren, nor knew his own children; for they have observed thy word, and kept thy covenant. They shall teach Jacob thy judgments, and Israel thy law; they shall put incense before thee, and whole burnt sacrifice upon thine altar. Bless, O Lord, his substance, and accept the work of his hands; smite through the loins of them that rise against him, and of them that hate him, that they rise not again." (Deut. 33:8-11.)

     So vital is the need of the priestly function in the Church that, without it, orderly communion would be broken; there would be no answer to inquiry. We know this priestly is with every man. If it were not, it would not be with any man. But the Church is concerned now, as always, with the development of it,-its specialization, and its recognition-as official with some men. For this is of order and in order. The fact that a thing is with all men is the ground of its need and recognition with special men. When Joshua sent the two young men to tell Moses that Eldad and Medad were prophesying in the camp, that Moses might forbid them, the law-giver answered, "Enviest thou for my sake? would God that all the Lord's people were prophets, and that the Lord would put His spirit upon them!" (Num. 11:29.) In like manner, may we say: Would God that the Lord's people were a kingdom of priests, that He might enlighten them! In such case the official priesthood would suffer no less, but greatly gain; for it is to the priestly in man that the true priest appeals for consenting support in all that pertains to the holy use.

     Ordination places upon the candidate a sacred burden to hold the gift that comes inviolate, free from the constraint of other hands, and especially free from the imposition of his own proprial loves. Only in so far as he does this is he a true priest. He is under special command to look to the Lord, and to obey Him alone.

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This is the high source of his power, and the conditionment of his prerogatives. But let him observe lest, in externalizing his prerogatives among men, his spiritual influence suffer loss because of ecclesiastical vanity. Wisdom comes with humility. The priest is indeed set apart, but he perceives it not in pride. He strives to join himself intimately with those from whom and for whom he has been set apart. The need is felt for this union in the Church today. In our past, the differentiation of the clergy and the laity has been of order made. Let not this difference lead to disjunction. The real use in differentiation is not accomplished until that which has been set apart has been rejoined, and mutual service inaugurated. While the priest by virtue of his office is peculiarly independent, he is in other ways, and by the law of compensation, singularly dependent. He is in the hands of his people for all that concerns his material well-being, even as they are under his leading for their spiritual benefit.

Gentlemen, the order, the standing, and the spirit that enters into the labors of our priesthood, are at all times a matter of grave concern to the Church; for the saying, "like priest, like people," is ever true. In the changing states of the race, the burden of instruction, of accommodation and adjustment, is with the priesthood. Instruction requires knowledge, accommodation depends upon wisdom, and adjustment is a matter of judgment. Upon these, all spiritual advancement of the Church depends, and to these we must look for that guidance from the Lord which will pilot us safely through the deep present-day storms which are causing profound disturbances of an unprecedented nature, and which, when they strike the spiritual man, may induce spiritual temptations of unusual gravity. Herein a responsibility lies with the priesthood as the adjusting medium of Divine appointment; and the seriousness of the situation turns on this, that the needed accommodation may not become a fatal compromise, on the one hand, and on the other, that the medium itself may not become so congealed in form as to unfit it for the use and service for which it was devised.

Let me repeat. Accommodation is a word of Divine significance. Into it all wisdom concentrates. The Infinite accommodated Itself when God became Man; and again Divine accommodation was effected when the God Man revealed Himself in His Second Coming. The priests of the New Church are priests of this new accommodation, and their service is to interpret that accommodation and apply the truth thereof to the needs of the Church.

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But while this further priestly adaptation is a matter of vital import, the word-its meaning-has been sadly misinterpreted and misapplied. Too often has accommodation been taken to signify a method of doctrinal concealment, or a system of enfeebling palliation whereby the vigorous doctrines of the Church have been shorn of their distinctiveness and power. This is not the kind of accommodation I have in mind as the insistent need of the Church. Quite the contrary. A proper accommodation calls for a drastic exposure of falsity and evil, as well as a gentle presentation of the truth. This is a matter of judgment as to the needs of the time, and the circumstances.

     But at all times, and under all circumstances, the call to the priesthood is for a devout study of the truths of Revelation,-inquiry by Urim,-and from illustration, a bringing forth and placing before the people of the interiors of doctrine. These are the things that the Lord, by His appointed means, adapts to the states of life of men at any and all times. This is signified by the Lord's Divine injunction, three times repeated unto Peter: "Feed my sheep"; three times repeated to signify the Divine insistence that it must surely be done.

     Brethren, even as we reaffirm those principles of the Academy which have staid our minds and hearts in loyalty, so may we renew our vows of service to the General Church of the New Jerusalem. For the Academy and the General Church are one, and an instrument of power, let us pray, in the hands of the Lord, to serve the ends of His Providence in establishing the New Church.

     DISCUSSION OF THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS.

     Rev. Gilbert Smith: After such a magnificent address, I wish to say how much we have gained by listening to it. I think that all who belong to the priesthood of the General Church have felt very greatly inspired by the wonderful manner in which our Bishop has pointed out to us in a number of instances, and in a great many relations, the difference between the formal and the essential. I have noted in former papers by our Bishop that this seems to be a peculiarly strong faculty,-the facility of making us realize from time to time the difference between the essence and the form. To mention one or two illustrations in the address tonight, he has pointed to our schools and our church upon the hill as the form, and he has pointed out very dearly the essence of the love of the Writings of the Church as the thing which should be put into that form.

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He has spoken of the breast-plate of Aaron,-the Urim and Thummim,-as the form, and has shown what is meant by the flashing of light in those stones. And he has shown to us the value and necessity of our meeting together as one of the formal things which has an essential thing in it. I hope that this address will be published as a booklet for the sake of the whole Church,-the General Church, and anyone else who may be pleased to inquire what is meant by the Divine Authority of the Writings and the accommodation, the study, the knowledge, the judgment, and the adjustment of those things for which the General Church and the Academy stand.

Rev. Homer Synnestvedt: This paper contains in it the keynote of our freedom and power to grow in the future. I consider that you have touched upon the greatest principles we have for the answering of the problem that is before the Church today, as a rational and a growing Church, as contra-distinguished from those relies of former days which are so static that they are failing entirely to go along with our civilization, such as it is, on the natural plane. This is the great problem. The whole world is coming to realize that nothing is static, that all things are subject to development,-natural, spiritual, scientific, and physical. That is the great natural truth that has come and is effective in the world in the midst of all the breaking up of the heritage of spiritual and moral truths. But the Lord has provided a compensation; and we find that the thought of the world comes more and more to the realization of the fact that there must be progress; and that seems to thinking men to be contravened by the whole idea of authority. It is necessary, therefore, to realize and to know that the Authority of the truths proceeding from the Divine is by no means in contravention of growth on the part of men as to their reception and understanding. The solution lies in the word "accommodation,"-not accommodation in the sense of covering, concealing, and deceiving men, but by adapting and applying. That this should be a function of the priesthood indicates clearly the excellence of the priesthood, at this day as in the past. You have probably read in the Literary Digest an article on the "Foolishness of Preaching," as quoted from Paul. It holds that the priesthood continues to expound the natural sense of the Bible, which is no longer needed; that intelligent laymen have the same access to the expository material and charts, and can find out what they want to know about the natural sense of the Bible; and thus that the ministers expounding it over and over again is utterly foolish. The result is that the pulpit has lost its standing and use in the community. We see, however, and we realize in the New Church, that this is by no means the extent of the function of the priesthood. Our sermons are not mere expositions of the Letter of the Word, with the opinions of certain ministers and a few intellectual or poetical ideas added to make it interesting and attractive to the people; but they are the exposition and the accommodation of the Divine Truth, in an effort to bring it to application in the thought and lives of the people day by day.

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And this is what gives the priesthood its power of leadership, the power of accommodation; and thereby we remove the conflict there is in the minds of the world between the idea of authority and the idea of progress. We see that the Divine Authority rests in the Divine Truth itself. That it is from the Lord, and is the Lord Himself, gives us the form of the truth. But it rests with us to receive and understand it, and to carry forward the accommodation to the point of application.

     I was very much struck by your careful use of the word "interpretive." I fully appreciate the fact that what we call the Academy doctrines are interpretive doctrines. But, as we see them, they contain the essentials of the reception of the Lord in the Second Coming as the God of Truth, the King whose kingdom is of the Truth and "not of this world." I fully and most deeply agree that without this there is no adequate reception of the Lord in His Second Coming, and that there can be none without the acknowledgment that these Books, these principles, are His voice speaking. And while it is difficult to apply them from year to year, from age to age, to the states of the world, still it is His voice; and until the Church comes to that recognition, it is not the New Church. It has nothing that will stand against the storm, and hold the rising generation against the terrific waves that come against it.

     Rev. K. R. Alden: I feel deeply moved by a combination of this address and the speech you gave, Bishop, on the 19th of June. No doubt there have been days of Pentecost in the New Church, and the banquet here on Saturday night seemed like that to me. You said on that occasion that although we were celebrating the calling together of the twelve disciples in the spiritual world, it sounded to you as though you heard the voice of the disciples in this world, because you had heard the voice of the men who had dedicated their lives to the preaching of the sole Divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ as revealed in the Writings, which is the healing salve the world needs,-a message of peace and good will to men. To us in America, it was a tremendous inspiration to see and hear such men as M. Deltenre, who suffered the terrible deprivations of the war and yet kept the New Church alive in Belgium, winning to the Church one famed for artistic ability who has created a real work of art in the chapel at Brussels; to see and hear men like Mr. Tilson and Mr. Ottley, who told us why they have stood all these years for the Authority of the Writings, and now rejoice in a reunion with those who have held the same position; then Mr. Baeckstrom's experiences in Sweden, speaking to five hundred who came to hear the truths of the New Church; and M. Hussenet's speech in French! All these made profound impressions upon me, and this address tonight has gone one step further in consecrating the priest- hood to the fight for the Authority of the Writings, in the spirit that made the apostles successful when they were willing to give their lives for their friends.

     Rev. E. E. Iungerich: I would like to speak of two things that impressed me. One is that the Lord has a purpose to perform by means of the General Church. We are not going to compromise this purpose, or to allow any fanciful charity to interfere with the carrying out of that use.

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We are not going to say, "This is my territory, and that is yours." For external reasons such an agreement or compromise might seem good, but we are not going to give up outright to extend our activities to any part of the earth where the need for them arises.

     You also mentioned our responsibility for the development of our membership. We must strive to progress mentally, not only for our own benefit, but that the members may get intellectual views and activity of life in carrying out the doctrines. These two aims, which are a gift of the Lord to His Church undoubtedly inspired us all, inspired the last speaker, and have produced the feeling that is back of the meetings we are having at present.

     Rev. R. J. Tilson: I must say how deeply grateful I am to you for the splendid address you have given tonight. It seems to me we have been raised above any height to which we may at any time have attained in our humble efforts as priests of the Lord's New Church, and this by virtue of the fact that our Bishop has so worthily and so fully and so rationally developed the spirit which we find in the very early beginnings of the Academy,-that spirit which the Rev. J. P. Stuart said would go "thundering down the ages." It is not merely thundering now, but is more living than ever it was. It comes to me tonight with, the seriousness of priests who have been ordained, and to whom the privilege has been given to see that the Divine is with the people. It comes to me in a way I have never before realized that we should be humble, should keep ourselves out of our work, that the Lord may speak through us, in us, and by us. Tonight, Sir, you have given to me an understanding of the meaning of the word "accommodation" that I have never had before, and such a value and meaning to the work of the office that one feels that when he is fifty years old he is only then fit to go to college. Especially does it appeal to me as a priest to keep out any idiosyncrasies, any peculiarities of temperament,-to shun them as sins against God. What we have to say to our people should be the voice of the living God, permeated by charity and guided by real judgment, so that He may indeed speak through us.

     To you people at Bryn Athyn, who are privileged as no other men and women in the world are privileged, I would remind you of what he has said tonight, that "as priests, so people," you live up to your opportunities. You have before you a standard bearer worthy of all your confidence; and when you appeal to him for light and for direction, he will say as the angel said to the newcomer, "Follow the light!" I plead with all my heart that this paper be put in permanent form, that we may prayerfully study it ourselves, and be blessed as we are tonight with power from on high.

     Mr. Donald Rose: I would like to say a word of appreciation for the words of inspiration contained in Your address for those associated with the work in the Academy. The work of education presents similar problems, perhaps in a less degree, to the work of the ministry. To every teacher there come times of heart-searching as to whether the essential quality of his work is maintained, as to whether he is performing a truly spiritual use, and your address has been a wonderful inspiration to that state of mind.

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The problems of the teacher in the Academy Schools are as much greater than those in the schools of the world as the work of the priests is greater than the work of the priests of the world. They are the problems you have mentioned, of inquiry, presentation, and accommodation; and I thank you for all that you have said in regard to accommodation as it bears particularly on my own work.

     I gather from your address that it is important for every man in his own use to consider whether the essential spiritual quality remains as the first of his life and of his utmost endeavor, and that he commune with himself as to whether he has neglected what is essential and gone after false gods. The priest at the center of his work has the love of saving souls. The teacher should have as the prime object of his life the preparation of minds that they may be saved, and this ultimately is conjoined with the priestly use of saving souls, and he can admit no compromise to that aim. There are times when the apostolic spirit is of great value to every man in his own work, and I thank you for what you have said to the priests and teachers.

     Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom: I wish to express my agreement with what the Rev. Karl Alden has said in regard to the 19th of June banquet. You yourself spoke of it as an important moment. When we look out upon the state of the world, we realize that if the Revelation had not been given the New Church no flesh could have been saved. We feel very much the responsibility that rests upon us. If the Christian world is undergoing a judgment, some will be brought to a dearer light and a better understanding, and the time is at hand for us to take full responsibility and go forward in the assurance that the Lord will now do a great work in the establishing of the New Church.

     Rev. G. C. Ottley: It is now more than twenty years since I read an address of a similar kind delivered by the Bishop Emeritus. That address came home to us in England with all the force that was inherent in it, because it dealt with grand and comprehensive principles in the light of heaven, and it has borne fruit to this day. The address we have just listened to shows what it is to have an enlightened priesthood. It is the dearest sign of the times that such a thing as a priesthood has become discredited among men of the world as a medieval, ignorant, and destructive superstition. This idea, although not so prominent in the New Church, lurks in the minds of men in society at large,-the idea that anything coming from so tainted a source can only prove destructive. Humanity has so steeped itself in the natural, is so alien to spiritual truth, that any institution claiming to be in a special sense the exponent of truth is thereby discredited and rejected. You have shown that the principle is the other way, that heaven gives light according to the function that is performed, not more and not less, and that this holds good especially with regard to the priesthood, for the same reason that this use among men is not to glorify men, or to glorify anything outward, but that the Divine may be revealed.

     So far as I am concerned, the very name "priest," or "priesthood," was at one time repellant to my mind, as it was to my foreign contemporaries; for the perversion of the best is always the worst, and to the same extent is distasteful.

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But we see here that the Lord, who is the High Priest, grants to those who are in the performance of the highest function that light which is necessary, and which is to percolate to the lowest, to hold society together and build up the church according to the laws of order. As you all know, it is taught in the Writings that this illustration is given to man according to the function he performs. He who is in the highest degree of the priesthood receives that light and puts it before us in such a way that we can almost sensate it. We have had brought before us the very essenre of the principle. And I pray that this address may go far and wide.

I am now more convinced than ever that what has made this institution great among men on the spiritual plane is that it has held, in season and out of season, that there is this priesthood which is the plane of special influx. In England, there has been no development because there has been no rational recognition of this. At one time there was enthusiasm from a certain general recognition of the principle, but that gave way and melted like snow because there was no rational perception. But here it is seen that it must be so, not only by the clergy, but by every member of the laity. You now have a concrete example before you; for you have seen with your eyes what can come when men do their work honestly, fearlessly, and thoroughly. I hope others will spring up to do the work which is beginning. This work must be continued from generation to generation, for without it the human race cannot exist, for the powers against you are mighty and strong. Intellectualism has been growing since the 16th century, and even in the Christian Church, undermining its power. They it is who have destroyed all faith in the Letter of the Word-the ministers of the Old Church. Look at the list of the names, and you will find in nine cases out of ten that they are clergymen of very great note; many of them Right Reverends,-Bishops, well, that is the priesthood that has done the work of the enemy, the devil. In the New Church it will be a different kind of work, the work of the Infinite, the work which will never take away the freedom of a man, for that is as the apple of his eye. But it will strengthen that freedom, giving men power to judge for themselves, to see from heaven according to the laws of order. As the world is governed by order, so the priesthood will keep the church in that state in which it can always rectify any error in human judgment. Men are very imperfect, and can only he led by degrees, but the light they need will come from heaven through the proper channel, and will therefore ultimate itself not only in new lives, but in the new order of minds that will remove all the heresies which have led the present world to despair.

Rev. Alfred Acton: The opening note of your address took my mind back to the time when a Society of the Illinois Association joined the General Church of Pennsylvania. Immediately there was an outcry as to the right of a Society to join the Association of another State. It was borne in upon my mind then that the church is a church, not simply an organization; that the organization springs from the church; and that the church is not a, meeting-place of delegates, but is a church, and is made a church, by something which comes from the Lord.

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And that something is this doctrine of the Authority, or, in other words, the acknowledgment of the Lord appearing as the Son of Man in the clouds of heaven. When we have that acknowledgment in the New Church, we have something that draws men together entirely irrespective of any but spiritual considerations. When we have that doctrine in the church, we have a source, a spring, from which all doctrines of the church can be drawn. For we must remember that the Lord does not directly reveal those things that are ordinarily called doctrines of a church. What the Lord reveals is the Divine Truth, or the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Jerusalem; and when we acknowledge that it is a Heavenly Doctrine, that it is the Lord Himself, then men can come into illustration to draw forth doctrine that will make for the growth of the church on earth. It will be as so many mirrors reflecting the path of the Lord in His appearing. It is this acknowledgment of the doctrine of the Authority which has been the spring, the source, of inspiration to the priesthood of the Church to draw forth from the Doctrine that class of teaching known as the Academy doctrine; and it is according as a church draws forth doctrine that it will live or die. The Old Church has brought forth doctrines which have destroyed the Lord's presence. But so long as the doctrine of the Divine Authority rules in the New Church, the doctrines drawn forth will be doctrines that will not destroy the Lord's presence, but bring Him nearer to us; and this is what we trust has been done. It is to do this that the ministers and priests of the church must be inspired. They are inspired by the support of the laymen of the church. They are inspired by addresses such as we have listened to tonight. But the only real inspiration is that they shall look to the Lord in His Second Coming as the sole Source of illustration.

Now, as the Bishop has said, it is always in order to reflect whether we have maintained a doctrine. We now enjoy the fruits of those priests in the past who have drawn forth the doctrines which are our life now. It is always in order to ask ourselves whether we have maintained them in their purity. Every man must answer that for himself. But what led me to that reflection was a sentence in the Bishop's paper in which he stated that it was the priestly in the layman to which the priest addresses himself. And the priestly in the layman is the love of spiritual things. That is the priestly in the layman. Every layman is a priest in his house just so far as he loves spiritual things and is led by the desire that spiritual things may be implanted in his household. When laymen are like that, then they have a ground in the love of truth to which the minister addresses himself, and which alone is the ground wherein the seed of the church can grow. It is that spiritual love of truth in the hearts of men which really acknowledges the doctrine of the Divine Authority of the Writings, which alone makes the New Church.

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FUNDAMENTALS OF THE ACADEMY 1920

FUNDAMENTALS OF THE ACADEMY Rev. R. J. TILSON 1920

     (An extemporaneous Address delivered at the Public Session of the Council of the Clergy, Bryn Athyn, Pa., June 23, 1920.)

     This subject has been chosen in the spirit of "lest we forget," and simply that. I do not forget that others have dealt with this great theme in a way far exceeding that in which I can hope to deal with it. The Bishop Emeritus gave unto us a classic when his address on the "Principles of the Academy" was published in the NEW CHURCH LIFE, and afterwards in pamphlet form, in 1899,-a declaration which has been of the greatest use to many of us, in enabling us to place before those who have inquired what the Academy really is a statement to which we could give our heartfelt consent.

     Neither do I forget, nor can I ever forget, the inspiring address which it was our privilege to listen to last night, which led me to ask myself the question, What can I say tomorrow that can add anything whatever to such an address, and what is there left for me to say on such an occasion? However, we need to be reminded from time to time of the basic principles of our faith; and since, as the Bishop has told you, it was my privilege to be one of the earliest created members of the Academy of the New Church in England, and, with one exception, I am now the oldest member of the Academy in England, I need make no apology in addressing you on such a subject as the "Academy Fundamentals."

     The great use of our coming together here is to know each other, and to learn to know, to love, to remember, and to enter intellectually into the sacred mysteries of our faith. Firstly, then, what is the fundamental principle of our faith as members of the Academy, in the broadest use of that term? The answer can only be that it is an unequivocal and unhesitating acknowledgment that the Theological Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg are the very Word of God to His New Church and to the world. This cardinal fact was recognized in the very earliest days of the Church, and, in the Lord's mercy was as seed sown to bear fruit.

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     In the journal called the AURORA, for June, 1799, the Rev. Francis Leicester declared that the Writings were "The Word Itself in the Interior Sense." In 1800, that Venerable and diligent worker in the Lord's New Church, the Rev. Joseph Proud, the sweet singer in England who gave to the Church some hundreds of beautiful hymns, said: "Be assured that the Arcana Coelestia and the Apocalypse Revealed are no less or other than the Lord's Own Holy Word." In 1886, we find the great founder of the Academy, Father Benade, saying: "We must know and ever bear in mind the use given us to maintain the infallibility of the Writings, that there is only one Word, and that the Writings are the Internal Sense of that Word."

     As we pass down the history of the Church, we find that this early recognized fact that the Writings are none other than the Word assumed another outward garb of expression; namely, that they are of Divine authority. In that classic work, The Authority in the New Church, written by my beloved professor, Dr. Rudolph Tafel, he used the term throughout; and in his day and generation the recognition of the Divine authority of the Writings assumed that outward expression-the "acknowledgment of the Divine Authority of the Writings." In these later days, the phrase has returned once more and is being maintained in your midst, and also, thank God, in old England,-the unequivocal assertion that the Writings are the Word of God.

     What other position can you give to them, in the light of what the human instrument of the Lord's Second Coming wrote in that little sketch, entitled An Ecclesiastical History: "The books are to be enumerated which have been written by the Lord through me from the beginning to the present day!" And in the light of what he wrote to the Royal Librarian in Stockholm in 1765: "When I think of what I am about to write, and while I am in the act of writing, I enjoy a perfect inspiration, for otherwise it would be my own; but now I know for certain that what I write is the living truth of God." To that we add the evidence of the Writings themselves, so conveniently placed before us in that latest publication of the Book Room as a re-issue,-The Testimony of the Writings concerning themselves. And that pamphlet breathes the lovely and adorable spirit of fairness and justice, because, at the end, in parallel columns, are placed the ideas of each school of thought; and so every man and woman, is left free to make his own choice.

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     The Writings are the Word of the Lord on a higher and more interior plane than the Letter of the Word. Can you imagine the Divine giving or creating anything without a soul? And as the Lord has given us the Writings, has He given us a body, and not a soul within that body? The Divine Truth is given in degrees; each higher degree is within the lower, and each degree is Divine. Therefore, in the Writings you have an internal sense, within which is the celestial sense, and within that the Divine sense,-the Lord in His fullness and almighty power.

     But the denial of the Divinity of the Writings, whence comes it? I would ask you to realize that the spirit within the denial of the Divinity of the Writings,-the denial that the Writings are any other than the Word of God,-is but the old Arian heresy of the former Christian Church now held by the Unitarians, who find so much of beauty in the man Jesus, but who deny that he is God incarnate. So there are those who believe that the Writings are a good "commentary" on the Word, an indirect revelation rather than direct; for they are infested by the spirits who gave birth to the Arian heresy of the First Christian Church.

     I would that I could inspire every young man and woman before me tonight to make it one solemn duty of their lives to read the early journals of the Church, beginning with that first serial of the Academy, Words for the New Church, which must ever be a classic in our midst; and then, that magazine which is still going on for power in the New Church, the NEW CHURCH LIFE; in England, THE NEW CHURCH MONTHLY, THE NEW CHURCH STANDARD, and in Canada, the TIDINGS. These should be studied by our young men and women, that they may know something of the spirit which started the Academy.

     Now, a new and distinct revelation demands a really new and distinct Church. In the recent Convention, as reported in the last issue of NEW CHURCH MESSENGER, we find one minister stating that the "Convention has ceased to represent anything distinctively New Church, and its condition is hopeless." Further, he says: "Make our secular and theological schools, wherein is the promise of the most efficient New Church women, men, and clergymen, fundamentally, avowedly, thoroughly, openly, distinctively, really New Church from the Kindergarten to the finishing of University training."

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There is something hidden behind this multitude of words. It was not, (as I hope to show you soon), it was not the Academy spirit. It was a dim recognition of a disorder, of a weakness, a hopelessness. It was not the inspiration of that spirit which knows that the Academy was founded upon the Divine Truth, and, to use the expression of one of its original founders, that "it will go thundering down the ages as the Lord's true Church upon earth."

Another minister at the recent Convention said: "In trying to get in touch with the world, we have been losing touch with the kingdom of heaven." Now this is an expression of one of our brethren of the Convention Church, and it was given in the midst of those who refuse to take the Lord's own declaration concerning the state of the Christian world. As in the early days of the Church, our forefathers saw that the first thing was to place before their hearers a true statement of the state of the Christian world, so today, in a more interior sense than then, is it necessary for us to remember this great fact. We must take the Lord's own statement concerning the State of the Christian world. We must not judge of its states from friends who are outside of the New Church, nor even from the civil liberty, the polity of nations. The Lord says that "the quality of the Lord's Church in the countries of the earth cannot be seen by any man so long as he lives in the world." (L. J. 41.) And of that which we cannot see rightly, we should forbear to conclude from our own knowledge; but the Lord has revealed in the Arcana Coelestia (1886-Pref.) that "those who come into the other life from the Christian world are the worst of all." And in the Spiritual Diary (5978) He tells us that the "Christians at this day are worse than the Jews were." Nor has that condition improved since Swedenborg's time. The old Christian Church goes down, down, down to its utter consummation, and we are living, let us hope, in the last period of that Church.

Again it is written: "The Lord, and the Divine Truth which is from Him, is less received and loved in heart within the Church than out of it" (A. C. 9191-giving the spiritual sense of Luke IV:25.) The angels, we are told, have little hope of the Christian world. It must be in a bad way, therefore, if the angels have little hope of it; for the angels make the best of every man. But the angels have little hope of the Christian world, and therefore we need have little pity for it.

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Again we remind ourselves that we speak of principles and not of persons. But we should remember that the sphere of that Christian world is ever actively, seductively, and insidiously with us. We breathe its atmosphere. And only the kingdom of God, which is implanted in remains, and in the things which we receive from the New Church, from the Academy of the New Church,-only in these is our salvation to be attained.

     This sphere of the vastate Church invades the New. We find it in the exchange of pulpits by those who have written, and written splendidly, upon the utter distinctiveness of the New Church. We find they can preach from the pulpit of the Old, and have the clergy of the Old in the pulpit of the New. Yet a minister at the recent Convention said: "The New Church is not a Protestant body, and therefore should not merge its identity in whole or in part with them." The Word of the Lord says: "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins." We are in the world, but there is no reason why we should be of it. We are in the Old Church spheres, but there is no reason why we should not pray to be kept from the spirit of that Church.

     As a third fundamental of the Academy, we come to the question of the Priesthood. I would ask, What were the things the great founders of the Academy stood for more than any other! Although the majority of them have passed to the other side, there to help us more powerfully than if here, I would say that their great work was to make the priesthood free, or rather, to establish it free as an organization; and next, that their work was to make prominent in the minds of the members of the Church the doctrine of Conjugial Love, and, as an outcome of that, the necessity for New Church education.

     Now, if we look at it from the Academy standpoint, the organization of the New Church outside of the Academy denies the doctrine of the priesthood. What other judgment day you pass When you remember how some of us entered upon our priestly work? For forty years I have rendered my report as a New Church pastor, but it is only thirty-eight Years since I was ordained; for it was decreed by the Conference that I should work two of the hardest years of my life without ordination, or until the Society to which I ministered would approve; and then they would ordain me. Thus they would have the priesthood ascend from men.

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The Academy says the priesthood descends from God out of heaven as the first of the Church, that it comes down from the Divine.

     They have "ministers" in Conference and Convention. We have priests. Do not forget it. Do not be afraid of the only honest translation of the word "sacerdos." You can only make it "priest," and because the Roman Church has abused it is no reason why we should not use it.

     As was so splendidly shown last night, in a way that should put new spirit into the doctrine of the priesthood, their work is on the plane of conscience; their work is of spiritual use, their spiritual affection for the truth. They leave you free to ultimate in your conduct what you wish; that is your business, not theirs; but their's is to see that the Divine is among the people, that they give you from God's Holy Word those principles which come from heaven, and come to you through them with the power of a "Thus saith the Lord." The priesthood is not man's office; it is the Lord's office adjoined to the man. Humility and reverence are ever needed by the priest in the exercise of his holy office. As little as he possibly can should he call attention himself in his holy administrations, by any peculiarities, by anything which separates him from other men. When in the sacred office, he must speak not as the servant of men, but as the servant of the living God; and he should at all times bear himself, even to the externals of dress and demeanor, as one to whom that holy office is adjoined.

     Another Academy fundamental is that which is allied with and the outcome of conjugial love. O what a duty has been thrust upon the Academy to maintain this! Unspeakable things have grown up in England and here. In your ex-President Roosevelt you had one who condemned what is the curse of England today, namely, race suicide. The only thing that will kill that in the end is the Academy fundamental concerning conjugial love. Let us study that book, therefore, and as an outcome let us keep alive the old Academy fundamental that marriage with those outside of the Church is heinous in the sight of heaven. The problem is a large one, but the truth must be held before our young men and young women. If you want all that conjugial love can bring to you, then you must think alike in religious matters, for conjugial love goes hand in hand with man's religion in his life.

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     But another matter which grew up in my conversations with Father Benade and the early members of the Church is this, that conjugial love calls upon every man to recognize and fulfill the duties and affairs of his home. Every husband has a duty to his wife and family. Of course, you say: "There are some who get so busy in the work of the Church that they cannot find time for recreation with their wife and children." But everything that urges a man to do so much work that he cannot do his home work is the outcome of that man's conceit. It was said by a certain man that he worked so hard for the Church that he had no time to read the Writings! And the meeting applauded him. Twenty-eight years ago, a friend of mine made a statement to me in Chicago. When he invited me to spend the evening with him, he said: "Tomorrow evening I visit with my wife." I asked him what he meant by that, and he told me it was his weekly custom to spend one evening with the good wife at home that they might think and talk of the doctrines of the Church. We must recognize the claim of the wife and family to a reasonable amount of attention in time, recreation, and instruction.

     The question of New Church Education comes up, of course, as an Academy fundamental. Again I would remind you and myself of one or two fundamental ideas concerning it; and first of all this, the absolute necessity for loyal and whole-hearted co-operation on the part of parents with priests and teachers. To do that, you must begin at the beginning by remembering one of Father Benade's statements: "Do not anticipate states with your children." In England, we are coming to this position, that we have babies for about three months of their lives; then they become girls or boys, as the case may be; and soon they are like young men and women. Keep your children young as long as you can. Help them to shun self-consciousness. Teach them the old lesson that children are made to be seen and not heard-too much; avoid putting them in competition with other children, which only causes them to have around them spirits of jealousy, envy, etc., which will destroy their sense of honor if it be persisted in. Keep them as long as you can sweet and innocent, trusting in their parents, and respectful to all men.

     The work of New Church Evangelization is another Academy Fundamental. In the Divine Providence of the Lord, you have been called recently to what promises to be one of the most glorious things to which men have ever set their hand faithfully to do.

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I refer to the work now going on in South Africa, to our beloved brethren there, Rev. Brown, Rev. Gyllenhaal, and Rev. Pitcairn. Our prayers must go out daily that their hands may be strengthened in that great work. Think of it. The Lord has revealed that the Church will be established among the gentiles. It was thought by some that this would be with Japan and China. That may come yet; but you have a brighter promise there in Africa. You have sent out men to commence the work there by beginning with the little ones. There is your hope, on the Dark Continent as well as here; and the Lord has shown us that "the harvest truly is ripe, but the laborers are few." You must help them by your financial aid, by your whole-hearted sympathy; and "pray ye the Lord of the harvest, that He may send forth laborers into His harvest."

     And now let me refer to the Academy Spirit, which lies within and at the back of the Academy fundamentals.

     Brethren; after all, that which is essential is the spirit of a thing. The Bishop Emeritus wrote: "What makes the Church is not so much its doctrines as its spirit." You have it all in a nutshell when you say that it is the Spirit of the Lord, and that alone, which makes the Church. The Lord promised that "when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all Truth." (John xvi, 13.) The Spirit of the Lord has come. He has made His Second Advent in the Writings of the New Church. The Lord has come, the Spirit of Truth is here in the Writings of the Church. We acknowledge their spirit; and, guided by their teaching, we shall "enter into all truth."

     And here I come to what I would call the "perceptive" of the Academy. In the Academy there is the perceptive, and not merely the intellectual. Unless we get the soul of the Academy, we shall go under in our battle. You ask me: How shall I get the Academy spirit? I answer: Get it as those got it who have imparted so much of it to us. Study the Writings, read them daily, listen affirmatively to the teachings of your priests and pastors. Meditate, reflect, live. And as you do that, help will come from those we have loved and not lost, as they have only gone before. They will imbue Ms with the spirit of the Academy, and that has in it charity and freedom. In all the churches of the past, charity was the fundamental; but real genuine charity, not the mock charity of sticky sentimentalism.

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     The Divine definition of charity is, that "according to the quality and quantity of truths, so is charity with man." (A. C. 21892.) "Charity is the affection of being of use to others without any end of recompense." (A. C. 34193.) Of use to others! Use is a Divine ultimate, the golden tie of all real co-operation. The angels see a man, but they think of a use. Use called yon mighty cathedral into being, according to the Divinely revealed law: "Use existed before the organic forms of the body came into existence; the use produced and adapted them to itself, and not contrariwise." (A. C. 4223.) The world today believes that the forms of life produce life. Too often the New Church has provided forms before it established uses; places of worship put up, but no priest to officiate therein. Not so with the Academy spirit and those imbued by it. Often have you begun in the home, and from there to the temple; but you have gone with the priest.

     As to freedom, it is to act according to the truth-to acknowledge its laws, to obey its precept's. A man must be free to do wrong, or he can never freely do that which is right. Forever it is true that "he is the freeman whom the Truth makes free, and all are slaves beside."

     Is conclusion, my colleague and I can say: "Lord, it is good for us to be here"-to be here, to be strengthened in the Academy spirit. We have never been apart from you in basic idea and thought. Externally, we have stood aside for twenty years. Would that you had sent for us earlier, or would that we had come; but this is the Divine Providence. We have come; and let us swear that, by the help of heaven, we will stand squarely and sincerely with you. We are here through the works of others; for others have labored. You remember them with all affection. They have labored, and you have entered into their labors. To them, heaven has said: "Well done"! To you, heaven says: "Go thou and do likewise."

     It may be I am singing my swan song; but let that song first and foremost be: "Barook Yehowah"-"Blessed be the Lord." And with it: "Our own Academy, we pledge our faith to thee, and o'er and o'er and ever more, our love, our loyalty!"

     Fundamentals are to be sacredly kept, and they will increasingly yield a hundredfold as the Academy goes "thundering down the ages"; for remember, the Academy is doing work not merely for today, but for all eternity.

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It works from the spiritual affection of truth in a Church which is universal, the crown of all the Churches which have existed hitherto in the earth. In the Lord's New Church are the celestial, the spiritual, and the natural (A. C. 3653), the "called," the "chosen," and the "faithful" (A. E. 1074).

     Its inmost and crown is trust in the Lord and absolute loyalty to His truth, under His guidance. Therefore, let us be true to Him, true to each other, true to ourselves, and then not all the hells can prevent the ultimate triumph of the truth, and the complete establishment of His Church.

     "Hold fast that thou hast, that no man take thy crown."

     DISCUSSION OF MR. TILSON'S ADDRESS.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: It requires courage to speak after so eloquent an address. But I have the courage because Mr. Tilson has given me a little of that spirit which has sustained him these twenty years he has been separated from us. It seems to be concentrated in that address. The real Academy spirit is not the spirit of the worship of a man, is not the spirit of the worship of customs, or of institutions, but it is the spirit that comes from the firm conviction that the Academy is built upon the rock of Divine Truth. It is the spirit of the New Church. And I was impressed with this thought, that while we have seemed to be separated from our brothers in England these twenty years past, there was no real separation. They and we have held up the same standard; and it we have seemed externally not to be marching along together, internally the same work has been done by both. We now find that our brother, Mr. Tilson, and our brother, Mr. Ottley, come among us and speak our language, express our thoughts.

     Now Mr. Tilson is well qualified to talk on this subject, for he has held this standard aloft in England under the most bitter persecution. He was inspired like Father Benade was inspired, like the early workers of the Academy were inspired, by the conviction that the Writings are the Word of God. And when Father Benade saw, and others saw, that the Writings are a Divine Revelation: they at once saw that this was a New Church, and that the Old Church was consummated because it had rejected the Word. Not because it did not understand, nor because it was ignorant, but because it had willfully rejected the Word. Hence followed the third doctrine, that it is the duty of the priesthood 6f the New Church to teach the pure truth as it comes from the Writings, undiluted so far as they may be able to give it. Those three are the great fundamentals of the Church-the Divine Authority of the Writings, the absolute newness of the New Church, and the doctrine of the priesthood as a source of instruction.

     Now Mr. Tilson has said that it is the spirit of the Church that makes the Church; also that doctrine makes the Church, or the understanding of the Word.

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The Old Church has the Word; many families have the Word, and never open it; but it is the spirit, the reception of the Word, which makes the understanding, which makes the Church. You know that the Word was given to the Jews, and that they might have drawn true doctrine from it. We can see that in the Old Testament the doctrines the Lord Himself taught are plainly stated, if only men had read the Old Testament with some acknowledgment of it as a Divine guide. But what did the Jews do? They substituted their traditions. It became buried to them; they did not understand it; they did not draw true doctrine from it, but empty formulae and traditions. So the Lord came on earth and re-revealed the doctrine of the Old Testament. He stated to them: "Now is this Scripture fulfilled." He explained the Scriptures to them, and gave them a new revelation, so that the whole Christian Church was united upon that one thing, that the Jewish Church had killed the Word by its vain traditions. Then came the study of the New Testament, and the understanding of that Word. Origen studied the Word, and he drew from it the beginnings of the doctrine of the Spiritual Sense. Augustine studied the Word, but he mixed it with his philosophy, his doctrine of predestination.

Then came the Council of Nice, and drew from the Letter of the Word the Doctrine of the Son born from Eternity, the doctrine of three gods. In the Apostolic Church they were willing to accept the Gospels as the Word of God; and when men began to study them in the early days, they began to draw forth some true doctrines, but the Word became obscured from the false doctrines of the Council of Nice, which destroyed the understanding of the Word, and that is why the Old Church has come to an end. Now a new revelation has come to us, and in that revelation the explanation of the New Testament, the explanation of those genuine doctrines which the Christian Church might have drawn from the Letter of the Word, is given in clear, unequivocal language-so dear that in the New Church there is no difference of opinion as to its general teachings that the Lord is one God, that man is saved by a life according to the Commandments, that there is no last judgment in the sense of the destruction of the earth, etc. All those doctrines the Christian Church might have drawn from the Letter of the Word, but instead they drew false doctrines.

But now comes this Heavenly Doctrine, this Word now revealed, which is to be studied by men in illustration from the love of truth, in order that they may understand it and formulate the doctrines of the New Church, by which this Church will stand or fall. If we draw true doctrine from the Writings, then our Church will stand. If we draw false doctrine from the Writings, if we read them so as not to understand them, our Church will fall. All bodies of the Church are united in the general understanding of the genuine doctrines which the Writings draw forth from the Letter of the Word, which the Christian Church might have drawn forth; but when it comes to the doctrines to be drawn from the Writings themselves, then we begin to divide, and to have schools of thought.

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These principles, of which Mr. Tilson has spoken so eloquently tonight, and of which the Bishop sounded the leading note last night,-these principles are the doctrines drawn forth from the Writings by men in illustration; and we firmly believe and see that, they are the right understanding of the Doctrine.

     Mr. F. Hodson Rose: I wish to express the great pleasure it has given me to hear this address. It recalls to my mind that Mr. Tilson introduced the Academy views tome thirty years ago. He was also the means of introducing them to practically all of your membership in England. I was an isolated receiver when I first met him, and I recall the intense importance he gave to the doctrines of the Church. Others were associated with him during that stormy period, but he was the standard bearer.

     Rev. J. E. E. Iungerich: I was delighted with the concrete way in which Mr. Tilson treated his subject. He made it very clear that the spirit of the Academy consists in having allegiance to the doctrines which enter into our lives universally. He also introduced here and there a touch of humor. The early Academy was noted for this, and some of Mr. Tilson's points were very quaintly put.

     Rev. W. H. Alden: I was greatly roused by this address. There are sound men in other bodies of the Church, but there are also many who teach doctrines utterly subversive of the New Church, such as the notion that they should mingle with the Old Church, and the notion that charity should think there is good in all while it ignores the necessity of doctrine to lift men out of themselves into the light of heaven. There are those who would be willing to join the Federation of Christian Churches, if the Federation would have them! There is a statement in the Brief Exposition to the effect that the faith of the New Church cannot be together with the faith of the Old, for such a collision would ensue that nothing of the Church would remain.

     Rev. Fernand Hussenet, speaking in French, described a New Churchman of his native country, now passed into the other world, who was an intimate friend of Mr. John Pitcairn, and did all in his power, thirty-five years ago, to spread the principles for which the Academy stands. He translated a form of service prepared by Bishop Benade, and whenever they were to hold worship took great interest in every detail of the preparation for the service.

     Rev. G. C. Ottley, after interpreting M. Hussenet's remarks, went on to say: My friend, Mr. Tilson, has given us this evening a most eloquent, clear, and thorough statement of the fundamentals of the Academy. It is a curious circumstance that every church in its beginning as the successor of another church is in doubt as to the principles which are revealed to it. Some years ago I read a book, entitled The Canon of Scripture, by a distinguished English writer. It was written from the Oxford standpoint of exegesis, and mentioned the curious fact that the New Testament did not become of Divine Authority, and was not recognized as the Word of God, until the very end of the 2nd Century. It was published, it was expounded; but the acknowledgment of it as the Word of God did not come until after a good deal of contest and difference of opinion.

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How history repeats itself! Here the New Church has been in existence nearly 200 years, and the mental condition is precisely the same. We have taken 200 years to come into a perception of what the Writings are. At first it was seen by a few, who have been referred to as the editors of the AURORA,-Proud, Leicester, and Sibley. Those ministers began to see that the Writings were something more than a commentary, more than an explanation,-a revelation which could be none other than the Word of God. And so strongly did they place it before the New Church world at that time that it led to discussion in the AURORA, and one of the correspondents stated these two views of the Writings, (1) that they were very valuable, but still the works of a man, and (2) that they were none other than the Word of the Lord. Then he added that those who held the latter position were so convinced of the correctness of their views that they wondered how anyone could have the twist of intellect not to see what was so obvious. That was in 1799, but it all disappeared gradually. It was the first scintillation or moving of a star, but it disappeared. It took a long time to bring men to their right bearings; the position of the Academy did not come at once into existence, but it came successively. It began in this country in a more systematic way, and while Hindmarsh, in England, was the founder, a perception of what was contained in the Writings came from America, and the man who took the lead in this was Richard de Charms. He was the one in America who, amid darkness and hallucinations, saw that there was more than the human element in the Writings, that there was the Divine element there and therefore he fought with all his power. He was a man well-trained in the university, and therefore trained intellectually, and he fought for the Authority of the Writings. I do not think you will find that he uses the term "Divine Authority," but he meant that. I want you to notice the quiet, steady way in which he fought for the Authority. He did his work in a grand way at the cost of a life-long struggle, at the cost of condemnation and the isolation of one holding a flag which no one seemed anxious to follow.

Father Benade was a young man at that time, and to show you the quality of mind Mr. de Charms had, when the then Mr. Benade showed that he had received the doctrines of the New Church, and what is more had studied them, the Convention was anxious to ordain him, but Mr. de Charms opposed it on the grounds of order that he had not been properly taught for his use. And the ordination was postponed to await the result of education. It was then that Mr. Benade conceived the fundamentals of the Academy. So you see how, in the Divine Providence, this was brought quietly and steadily to the front. Then it was that this great minister saw that the Church could not exist except as a separate and distinct organization, for the simple reason that the Church was given a Revelation which was not simply authoritative in the sense of a teaching of science, but Divinely authoritative. And when he read a paper before an assembly of ministers at Cincinnati, in 1873, on the Divine Authority of the Writings, or some such title, it was there that the principles of the Academy were first set forth in the language which you can use today as if it were simply born in you.

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He saw that this principle involved even more, as he showed in that famous Report on the Priesthood which is the foundation of the New Church.

Mr. Harold Pitcairn: I wish to express my appreciation of the address. It raises this point: What should be our attitude toward those who hold that the New Church is the heart and lungs of the Old Church? It has been said tonight that some New Churchmen think of the Writings in the way the Unitarians think of the Lord; they say the Writings are good books, and the Unitarians say the Lord was a good man. As the Unitarians do not acknowledge the Lord to be Divine, neither do such New Churchmen acknowledge the Writings to be Divine, because they accept what they want and throw the rest away. It is said that they are New Church because they acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ as the only God of heaven and earth, as He was acknowledged by some at His first coming; but if He is not acknowledged at His second coming, is He really acknowledged in the New Church?

The Bishop: A year ago, when Mr. Theodore Pitcairn and I were in England, we met Mr. Tilson and Mr. Ottley by chance. During that interview, my mind ran back to the old days, and the years seemed to fly away as I listened to those two voices with the old ring, the old Academy war cry. I was very much moved; and now the Providence of the Lord has enabled these two gentlemen to come before you at this time and give you something of the sensation I enjoyed on that occasion. It has been a great pleasure to go back through the fundamentals for the reunion in our spiritual uses; for this atmosphere of spiritual communion bodes well for the future of our Church.

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MISSIONARY WORK VIEWED SPIRITUALLY 1920

MISSIONARY WORK VIEWED SPIRITUALLY Rev. ERNST DELTENRE 1920

     (An Address delivered at the Public Session of the Council of the Clergy, held at Bryn Athyn, Pa., June 24, 1920.)

     As with every work, missionary work may be viewed spiritually or naturally. Viewed naturally, it is a work performed by a church or a religious institution and its delegates for the promulgation and the propagation of its doctrines. The natural end is to make proselytes, to gain new adherents to the doctrines, and to increase the membership of the institution. This natural end is good in itself, but it will be evil if the love inspiring the work is evil, or if the methods which are made use of are evil or contrary to the Divine Order.

     If the love inspiring the work is devoid of selfishness, if the desire for increase in members is subordinated to the true end of missionary work, which is spiritual, and if the methods used are not against order, then this natural end will be good, and the institution may congratulate itself and rejoice over the external results of its missionary work.

     But, if the love inspiring the work is from the proprium-and every human organization has a proprium-or if the methods employed are wrong, missionary work will be evil.

     The love inspiring missionary work may be the love of self or the love of the world. So far as I know, the love of the world or the love of self have never inspired missionary work performed by any of the New Church organizations. But these evil loves often inspire missionary work performed by the former Church,-by the Roman Catholics for the extension of the ecclesiastical as well as the political dominion of the papacy, and by many Protestant missionaries to the end of extending the influence and the trade of their country, and to prepare their neophytes to be more easily conquered and subjected.

     The love inspiring the work may also be evil in the missionary himself. Remember what the Writings tell about the zeal of Paul the greatest missionary of Christendom.

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Remember what they tell about Francis Xavier, the greatest missionary of the Roman Catholic Church, a Portuguese Jesuit who was sent to India and the surrounding islands at the request of John the Third, King of Portugal, and who there preached from 1543 to 1548, converting during these four years more than 70,000 gentiles to the Roman faith.

     The methods employed in missionary work may also be evil or wrong, methods naturally and physically compulsory, like magical miracles, hypnotism, promise of gain, conditional gifts, or even, as was often the case in the Dark Ages, the choice between baptism and death! Such-evil methods have never been used by New Church missionaries; but wrong methods, contrary to the Divine order, have often been used, and are used. These wrong methods consist principally in minimizing, misrepresenting, compromising, and even perverting the glorious truths of the Heavenly Doctrine, for the purpose of making them more easily acceptable to the world. It is with this end in view that even this great fundamental, upon which the New Church rests, and without the acknowledgment of which no New Church is possible, has been minimized, compromised, or perverted. I mean the fact that the Writings are a UNIVERSAL revelation, having Divine authority, that thus they are the Word, the manifestation of the Lord Himself, the Adventus Domini.

     In a recent folder, written by a Convention missionary, the Writings are represented as being "a Revelation which is the best commentary upon the Sacred Scriptures, which are the Word." In the same folder we read that since the creation of the world there have been five churches, each having a distinct Divine Revelation as its basis. These bases, of Revelations, given to the Ancient Church, the Israelitish Church, the Christian Church, were the Word. But the Revelation given to the Crown of all the Churches,-the New Jerusalem,-as a basis, is only a commentary upon the two preceding revelations!

     How is it possible to believe that any Church can be built upon a commentary,-a particular or private revelation, devoid of any authority, and subject, to error? A church, to be a church, must be founded upon the Lord. Is it not a most lamentable theology which would build a church upon a mere commentary? If the Writings of the New Church are only a commentary, there is no New Church, but only a new and insignificant little sect among the thousands of Protestantism.

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This is the inevitable conclusion of this misrepresentation of the Writings.

     And not only are the Writings misrepresented as to their quality but all the cardinal truths of the Writings are treated in the same way, in order to please the world, and from fear of the world. For instance, Baptism, as the gate of introduction into the New Church, is declared to be "not necessary," for fear of offending those who do not wish to separate themselves from the Old Church, and who do not believe in the authority of the Writings, which declare that the Old Church is consummated and dead with no hope of resurrection, and that consequently its sacraments also are dead things. The sacrament of the Holy Supper is profaned and reduced to nothing by the taking away of one of its correspondential elements, and this simply to please some fanatical prohibitionists. For the sake of the world, it is judged to be inexpedient to teach openly that marriage between one of the New Church and one of another faith is "heinous in the sight of heaven," and through fear of offending the hypocritical puritanism of our modern Pharisees, the laws of order given in the latter part of the Divine Book concerning Conjugial Love for the preservation of the conjugial with man are rejected as coming from hell.

     Sometimes these wrong methods are carried so far, in order to please the world, that the teaching given is just the opposite of the teaching of the Writings. Recently, for instance, I read in a New Church magazine: "It is hard for Protestants to give up their faith in Paul as a supreme authority. But he still exists for us a man of genius, a Saint and an Apostle."

     Such methods may for a certain time produce some results in attracting a number of people. But, even if the number of people attracted should reach the 70,000 of Francis Xavier, do you think that these 70,000 converts would be true New Churchmen? Or that a congregation gathered by such methods would be a true New Church Society? By name, yes; but in fact, no. Are those who believe more or less in the teachings of Jesus Christ, but who deny His Divinity, true Christians, although they bear this name? Even so, a New Churchman who does not believe in the authority and in the Divinity of the Writings, and in the testimony they contain concerning themselves, is a New Churchman in name only.

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These deplorable methods would not be used if, instead of viewing missionary work naturally, it was considered spiritually as well. For then they would be able to realize that the presentation of one single unperverted truth of the Faith of the New Church, and its acceptance by one single man, is beneficial to the Lord's Kingdom, and to the soul of this man, but that the acceptance of a thousand perverted truths by a thousand men has just the opposite effect.

     Missionary work considered spiritually has for its end the salvation of souls, and ipso facto the increase of the Lord's Kingdom. New Church missionary work has the same spiritual end as New Church education, which is preparation for heaven. The love which inspires the work is love to the Lord,-the love of doing the Lord's will, which is the salvation of the souls of men, and love towards the neighbor.

     Now, the only means of salvation are the Divine means, which are the truths of Revelation,-the truths of Revelation which proceed from the Lord and are Himself. And so it is the Lord Himself who is doing the missionary work, and who is acting with His own Divine Providence and Foresight. The missionary is only an instrument in the hands of the Lord. He is a servant whose duty is to preach exactly, without changing' or omitting one iota, what the Lord Himself teaches in His Revelation. Besides this, the only thing he has to do consists in understanding the degree of the capacity of reception with his hearers, and in the accommodation of the teachings to their degree of receptibility. But to accommodate a truth does not mean to compromise, or to misrepresent, or to pervert the truth.

     Accommodation will consist in presenting first the essentials, leaving the particulars for the time when the neophyte has fully accepted the essentials and is ripe to accept the particulars. When a question concerning a particular is asked, and the one asking the question is not judged capable to receive the naked truth, accommodation will consist in veiling the truth. Let us take, for instance, the particulars concerning Paul. Accommodation will consist in attracting the attention to the passages in the Epistles of Paul where he is speaking concerning himself. It is easy, with the writings of Paul in hand, to show that he was an ambitious man, full of himself of his supereminence, and of his own glory, daring to compare himself to the Lord.

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In this way, a man may be made capable of receiving the naked truth concerning Paul. But to say to people, in order to flatter their prejudices, that Paul is a saint and an apostle, when it is known from the Revelation that in the spiritual world he is just the opposite, is simply to bear false witness.

     Missionary work viewed spiritually has for its end the salvation of souls, or, what is the same, preparation for heaven. As every one is allotted a place in the spiritual world according to his idea of God, and, he who has a just idea of God to some society of heaven, the first essential to be preached by a New Church missionary is who God is. To have a just idea of God is supremely important, for if this idea be false, the presence of the Lord is not caused, and thus it is impossible to enter into heaven and be saved. (Coronis 41, 42.)

     The presence of God makes heaven, and no one has the Lord present with himself unless he knows the quality of the Lord. This quality is proclaimed by the truths of Revelation. And we are told that dualities are of two kinds. One kind belongs to the knowledge concerning the Lord Himself, that He is the God of heaven and earth, that He is the Human of God the Father. The other kind belongs to the knowledges of those things that proceed from the Lord and which are Himself; as, for instance, those things which He teaches concerning charity, the freedom of choice, repentance, regeneration, the sacraments, and very many other things. These things also constitute the idea of the Lord, because they are from Him, and are Himself.

     The first kind of knowledge concerning the quality of the Lord is indispensable; it is the knowledge of the Divine Human, the idea of God as a Man. The idea of God as a Man is the idea of the Divine Human, that the human of the Lord which He assumed in the world and glorified is the Divine Man, the God-Man. The acknowledgment of this cardinal truth makes heaven, introduces into heaven; the denial of it makes hell, and makes entrance into heaven impossible to man. God is Man. God is in the human form from all eternity, and in order that even the natural man, who is not able to raise his thought above his senses, may also have a just idea of God as a Man, God came into the world, assumed the flesh, and appeared in the human shape. From this natural idea of the Lord as He appears in the Gospels, one may be introduced to the spiritual idea of God-Man.

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But this natural idea of God-Man comes first in order of time. It is an introductory idea, but it is also the basis of all. It is the corner-stone of the foundation of the just idea of God as a Nan, This natural idea of God Man has to be just and true. Therefore, it has to be derived from the Word, where He appears as a Man. If this fundamental natural idea is false, if it is derived from any other source than the Word, the whole structure will be unsound.

Since the last judgment, the efforts of the magical hells have tended to destroy with simple men even this natural idea of the Lord as He appears in the Gospels, where He presents Himself and speaks to the imagination of the simple. In order to destroy this ultimate idea as to the personality of the Lord Jesus Christ, false Christs have been invented. Theosophists, for instance, teach that Christ and Jesus are different persons, or that there have been two Jesus; or they identify the Lord with the persons of the magician Apollonius of Tyana. According to all of them, the identification of "Jesus with Christ is due to gross ignorance, and the Gospel narrative is the crude degradation into the semblance of historical facts of sublime truths accessible to occultists alone." Happily these teachings are not popular, and they seduce a comparatively small number of people.

But another attempt of the same kind,-the presentation of a false Christ to the worship of the simple,-has been made by the Church of Rome, and alas! it is successful. I mean the new cult of the false Christ called "The Sacred Heart." As the victory of the Allies has been attributed to the influence of the "Sacred Heart," and as his sign was placed upon the national banners of France and Belgium during the great war, it may be of interest to you to know the truth about this idolatry. The promoters of this new form of fetishism evidently have for their end to distract the thought of the people from the personality of the historical Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently from the Gospels, for the sake of strengthening their own dominion. This need not astonish us; for we read in the work on the Last Judgment that in general all the consultations of this Babylonish nation tend to this, that they may have dominion; and in order to obtain this, they continually devise and hatch out new laws and new doctrinals, and these doctrinals are dictated from the deepest hell, though the hearers know it not.

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In the spiritual world, they placed on the summit of a mountain a certain person of unsound mind, and gave out that he was the very God of heaven appearing under a human form, to whom they paid Divine worship. They did this, says the revelator, because the people were desirous of receding from their idolatrous worship; wherefore they devised it as a means of keeping them in obedience. (no. 58.)

A short narrative of the origin and nature of the worship of the "Sacred Heart" will show that the one adored under this name is of the same kind as the false Christ spoken of in the Last Judgment, and that Rome has put him on the altars in this world for the same ends. It is interesting to note that the "Sacred Heart" appeared from 1673 to 1688, thus before the last judgment, but that his public worship was approved by the Church of Rome only after the last
judgment had taken place. The history of the Saints of the Roman Catholic Church contains numerous stories of women lovers of Jesus who, having entered into solemn marriage covenant with "their dear Jesus," had rapturous personal communication with filthy spirits who love to personate Christ; but never before the last judgment did the Roman Church present these apparitions or hallucinations to public worship, and as really being the manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.

The one who was the instrument for the introduction of this new worship, which, according to a well-known French author, is "one of the most revolting superstitions spread among the ignorant and the simple," was a young French nun, Marguerite-Marie Alacoque, born at Verosvres, in 1647, who, at the age of twenty-four, entered the monastery of "La Visitation" at Paray-le-Monial, there to lead a purely contemplative life. Her diary reveals that she was an enthusiastic visionary, and a lover of Jesus as a mere person, and she often expresses her love in terms of erotic passion. She tells how once, when she was praying before the Host, she felt herself invested by the presence of the spirit, and abandoned herself entirely to the power of his love; how he held her a long time on his breast, and discovered to her his physical heart, saying: "My heart is so dotingly fond of men, and of you in particular, that, being unable to contain any longer the flames of its ardent love, it must needs expand them through you." . . .

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"I have chosen you as an abyss of an unworthiness and ignorance for the accomplishment of this great end, and in order that everything may be done by me."* On the 16th of June, 1675, the spirit appeared again, bearing outside of his breast a bloody anatomical heart, surrounded with thorns and surmounted with a cross, and said: "Behold this heart which has loved men so much!" He then asked that a special holiday be instituted, and dedicated to the worship of his physical heart.
     * La Theorie de la Devotion au Sacre Coeur, by the Rev. Jules Thomas, p. 180.

     Later, on the occasion of several other apparitions, and especially on the 2nd of July, 1688, the spirit told Marie to call upon the Jesuits for the realization of her mission, and twelve special promises were given by the spirit to those who should devote themselves to the propagation of the new cult, and who should worship his heart. Among them I note the following:

     "I will bless abundantly all their undertakings.

     "I will bless the houses where the image of my sacred heart shall be exposed to worship.

     "To the priests I will give the power to touch the most hardened hearts.

     "To all those who shall receive the sacrament on the first Fridays of nine consecutive months, I promise the grace of final repentance, that they will not die in disfavor before me, nor without having received the last sacraments, and that at this last hour my heart will be for them a sure refuge."

     Is not this the destruction of all religion? Worship for the sake of success in business and worldly undertakings; idolatry of the hideous image of a theatrical Christ bearing a bloody anatomical heart upon his breast, introduced into the homes of the simple; promise of magical power to the Roman priests, in order to increase their dominion over the souls and the bodies of men; and finally, instantaneous salvation, not only by faith alone, but by superstition alone! That the end with the promoters of this cult is dominion, is quite evident. Receiving the sacrament requires that it shall be preceded each time by a secret confession of sins to a priest. It is easy to understand that a simple man who has been under the secret direction of a Roman priest during nine consecutive months will be entirely subject to his control.

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And how immoral is this promise, leading to the imaginary security of final and infallible salvation without the works of charity! The introduction of the cult of this pseudo-Christ, especially among the Catholics, is the more diabolical, in view of the fact that a promise is given in the Writings to the simple among the Roman Catholics who approach the Lord Jesus Christ immediately and receive the Holy Supper in both kinds. We are told, indeed, that they are conducted by the angels to the gates of the New Jerusalem, or the New Church, and are introduced therein with joy and shouting.

Here becomes evident the great importance of preaching the doctrine concerning the Lord, especially among the Catholics. If they accept this doctrine, they will be introduced into the New Heaven; and I may add, for the consolation and comfort of those who view missionary work spiritually, that it has been my experience that they accept our Doctrine concerning the Lord with the greatest facility. The prevailing ignorance of the Letter of the Word in Catholic countries is an obstacle to the easy reception of all the glorious truths of the Faith of the New Church. They ought to be entirely re-educated, and trained slowly; for same of them, on account of their business in the world, or on account of their advanced age, it is very difficult, if not impossible. But we have the assurance that, with the acknowledgment of the cardinal doctrine of the Divine Human, what is difficult here for them will be made easy hereafter, for we are told, indeed, that those who approach the Lord, and worship Him alone, come into the power of knowing all truths (T. C. R. 354).

We have said above that the first kind of knowledge of the quality of the Lord belongs to the knowledge of the Divine Human; the other kind belongs to the knowledge of those things that proceed from Him, and which are Himself. These things are all the doctrinals of the Church, and all these are the Lord Himself, the very Word. If the New Church priest or missionary minimizes, compromises, or misrepresents one of these things which proceed from the Lord, and are the Lord Himself, he minimizes, he compromises, he misrepresents, he disqualifies the Lord Himself. If, before the world, he is ashamed of some of the doctrinals of the Church, he is ashamed of the Lord Himself. If he rejects or forsakes one of these doctrinals, he is rejecting or forsaking the Lord.

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     The are told that the Doctrines of the New Church not only are the Lord, but that they also constitute the idea of the Lord. Thus, if a New Church missionary, viewing missionary work naturally only, is led to compromise or misrepresent the Doctrines of the Church for the sake of the world, he is giving to his hearers a false or an incomplete idea of the Lord, and, ipso facto, he fails in his duty to make the Lord known as to His qualities, he puts the Lord aside, and he does not prepare his hearers to enter into heaven, and to be Saved. In doing so, he prevents the Lord from establishing, through him, His Kingdom in both worlds.

     The Doctrines of the New Church are the Divine stones with which the Lord is building His Church,-the Divine Temple of His Divine Body; and we New Church priests and missionaries are but very poor instruments in the hands of the Lord. The Lord is building His Temple on earth through the instrumentality of His appointed priests. They are nothing but the servants of the great Architect; and if, in using the stones for the building of the temple, the priest is mixing with them bricks made by himself; or if he neglects some of the stones, and leaves them out of the construction; or if, according to his own judgment and prudence, he disposes the stones in opposition to the Divine plan, he is an unfaithful servant, and his work will be a vain work. For

"Except the Lord build the house,
They labor in vain that build it." Amen.

     DISCUSSION OF M. DELTENRE'S ADDRESS.

     Rev. H. L. Odhner: We are very much indebted to M. Deltenre for bringing out the great essential in all our church work,-the most interior doctrine of the New Church, the Doctrine of the Lord. Every man has his place in the spiritual world according to his conception of God, or of the Lord. In the same way, a church organization is characterized, and its work limited, by its idea of the Lord. Now what is perhaps the most distinguishing thing about the organization to which we belong is that we stand for the spiritual idea of the Word,-of the Lord,-and for this remarkable identity, that the Lord is the Word. Now, without that conception I do not think there can be any truly New Church missionary work done. In the Christian dispensation, the love of the Lord was very soon turned into the monastic idea of a personal love, a love of His personality.

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Even today, we feel what our patriarch last night called the sticky sentimentality which characterizes the Old Church, and which enters into the very foundation of all truth, their idea of the Lord. Sentimentality enters in-something which disturbs the true, deep reverence which one must have for the Divine Human. It is that which we must approach,-the Divine Human; and therefore only a spiritual conception of the Lord can be possible in our missionary work. Intimately associated with that, of course, is our idea of the Writings, that they are Divine. If the Writings were not solely from the Lord, the Lord as the Word would still be in a sort of hypostatic relation; the Lord as the Word would not be solely Divine. It is to be the foundation of our missionary work,-the spiritual idea rather than the material idea of the Lord.

Rev. F. E. Waelchli: Like Mr. Odhner, I feel that we are very much indebted to M. Deltenre for emphasizing the doctrine of the Lord as the fundamental duty in missionary work. In the Writings of the Church, the Doctrine of the Lord is the first presented in every one of the works. In Heaven and Hell, which has been called the great missionary work of the New Church, the opening chapter is concerning the Lord, that He is the God of heaven. The same is true of the other Writings. If we find a person willing to receive the Doctrine of the Lord, then we can feel certain he will come to the New Church; but if he will not accept that doctrine, he will not come. It is a common experience to find people ready to express their approval of and delight in very many of the doctrines of the Church until you come to the Doctrine concerning the Lord. They will be delighted with the teaching about the other world, with the doctrine of charity, with the New Church idea of marriage, and many other things; but when you come to the Doctrine concerning the Lord, there is where very many balk. They will go no further; they are unwilling to accept it. It is the stone upon which they fall. We can see, therefore, how very important it is that, first and above all, the doctrine of the Lord be presented. It is not necessary, when we go into some new locality to do missionary work, that we should in the first discourse present the doctrine of the Lord; there may be reasons why that should not be done; but it must come very soon, and therein will lie the test as to whether there are to be any results from the work, in so far as reception of truths of the New Church is concerned.

In the address, two principles were given as important in the doing of evangelistic work. One was, ever to keep in mind that it is the Lord's work; that the work must be done in accordance with His will. The other was that there must be true accommodation. It is in the accommodation of the truth that we find many of our great difficulties,-how to accommodate properly, simply. We think we know very much about this, and then discover that we know very little. I have been doing missionary work for over thirty years. Every now and then I would come into the idea that I just about knew how the work ought to be done, and then I would realize that I knew practically nothing about it. I had an experience this spring which brought me to the realization that it is an error to do too much contrasting in evangelistic work.

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I had been following that method for many years, but I now think it is a mistake. There is a time for contrasting the doctrines of the New with the Old, but not right in the beginning of the work. In the Writings themselves, the truth is presented affirmatively, without contrast, often for pages and pages. You will find that in the True Christian Religion, and it is very much the case in the work on Heaven and Hell. It is true of the New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine and others that I can mention. In some, however, we find contrasts made, especially in the Brief Exposition. Then, again, in the T. C. R. we find it especially in the Memorable Relations. But for the most part the truth is given affirmatively. It is stated that such is the truth, and it is pointed out that this truth is in the Word. Now, if we want to follow the Lord's method of presentation of the truth, we should present it in the same manner. If you start out with your audience against you, what can you accomplish? You want to get their affection from the start. If they are antagonistic from the start, you can accomplish nothing. Present the truth in an affirmative way, hiding nothing, concealing nothing, giving it as dearly and openly as the Doctrines give it; but wait for the controversial element until the time comes for it, when there is an attack made on the truth. Then let there be a vigorous reply; then make the contrasts. You will notice in the Memorable Relations that when the contrasting is done so strongly, it is mostly in a discussion, and then truth and falsity are set side by side.

     Now this is one of the things which has come to me of late, and has caused me in some measure to change my methods. I would be pleased to hear others express themselves in regard to it.

     Rev. K. R. Alden: I want: to thank M. Deltenre very much for his able address. His description of the sacrament of the "Sacred Heart" interested me especially, for it was celebrated in Philadelphia a few days ago, lasting nine days, and all good Catholics went every day. One of the girls of my society happened to attend with one of her friends. It is their belief that, as they turn the host to that bloody image, any wish they may have will be granted, so they wait patiently for that particular moment. As M. Deltenre noted, the Writings say that the salvable feature of the Catholic Church is that they worship the Lord as a Man, But this heresy is taking away the idea of the Lord as Man, and substitutes the anatomical heart.

     I agree heartily with Mr. Waelchli. When we come before an audience for the first time, that audience is antagonistic, and it is ridiculous to start in knocking down the Old Church to our own satisfaction. They will never come to hear us again. That is useless work. Some New Church missionaries try to please the audience, while they themselves have no honest belief in the Divine of the Doctrines. When they do get converts, they do not give them the right idea, and so they do not hold them. The first step in missionary work is to nail your audience, and you cannot do that by controverting the things which they hold as sacred remains. When we go to hear Billy Sunday talk, and he uses something contrary to the New Church doctrines, you know the horror that goes down your spine: that is what you do to a pious Old Churchman.

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"A bruised reed ye shall not break, and smoking flax ye shall not quench," until the acceptable day. And I believe the acceptable day with each individual is when that person comes to trust the judgment of the missionary to such an extent that, when the opportunity arises in his life that he needs the New Church, the missionary will be able to give it to him.

     Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom: Mr. Waelchli asks for the experience of others. When I began the work in Sweden, I started to fight against the falsities of the Old Church, with the result that people thought I wanted to pick a quarrel. My experience is that the negative work has been done so well by those who deny everything, that for most of the people in the Old Church there is very little left. It is for us in the New Church to build up, and only to attack when attacked ourselves.

     Rev. George de Charms: I was delighted to hear the paper of M. Deltenre tonight, because of its power in presenting this central thought that the Gospel we have to preach is a spiritual thing, and that the Church we have to build is a spiritual church. Now, when it comes to a matter of method in the presentation of that spiritual idea of the Lord in His Divine Human, it has seemed to me just as Mr. Waelchli has so well put it, that it must of necessity be an affirmative statement. We are not a protestant church; we are not established to protest against the teachings of Christendom, but to proclaim the Lord in His Second Coming. We begin therefore with the affirmative.

     It was said to me the other day that the great trouble with Academy missionary work is that-it does not accommodate its language to the comprehension of the ordinary mind outside of the Church, but uses terms from the Writings, from the Doctrines of the Church, which are not understood. Now, while it is true that we must learn more and more to accommodate to the minds of men, I think it is a mistake to hold that the General Church or Academy missionary work as a whole is at fault in this respect. I think it is a mistake because of the very fact that what we are proclaiming is a spiritual idea. I do not care whether we use the terms in the Writings, or other terms that are understood in their external sense by people outside of the Church; for they have not a spiritual idea of any of the terms we may use. When we say "truth and good" and "regeneration," and use other terms which mean spiritual things to us, they do not, of course, mean those things spiritually to persons outside of the Church; but we are willing to find words that do. It is only gradually that they understand the expressions given in Divine Revelation-gradually their minds are educated to appreciate the true meaning of those words. For instance, the expression, "Divine Human," which was the means of bringing in one of the greatest men in the early times of the New Church. Nobody outside of the Church understands that term. And yet it is the one upon which the New Church idea is to be based and founded. We cannot get the idea of the Lord in the Divine Human unless we are willing to use the term, and then bring others to see, as far as we can, what the meaning is in the New Church sense.

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My thought is that it is not a cure for an, apparent failure in missionary work to get away from the terms that the Lord Himself has given in the Writings. We will not find terms in the world around us that will be better accommodated than those, although it is true that we must accommodate according to the circumstances in which we are placed at any given time.

Rev. R. J. Tilson: My dear friends; I am almost inclined to ask, after the last three speeches: Where are we? For, ever since I was acquainted with the doctrines of the New Church, I have thought that the Academy spirit led us along different lines than those now suggested. I have had some experience in missionary work, and I have found that those have been the most successful who, in the full assurance of the message which they have given to the world, have given that message courageously, frankly, and sincerely, not smothering it, or bothering themselves about this much-flaunted accommodation, and about this sentimental idea that we must come into some loving association. The truths given by the Lord to the New Church have been accommodated by heaven, and the very fact that the book on Heaven and Hell is historically recognized to be the greatest force in converting those who are ready shows us the danger of being Divine Providence to the people brought before us. It is for us to speak the truth-firmly and sincerely, as it is given to us to speak,-to appeal to the rational faculties of the men before us. For they are not all fools. Some cannot recognize, some will not recognize. There is a two-fold reason in giving the truth; the first is to feed the hungry soul, and the other is that those who do not want it may reject it. What matters it to me whether my audience accept what I say or not, so long as I am sure that what I say is the truth which-is revealed. I am not a patriarch, (although I have been so called), but so long as I am of the Lord's New Church, I hope I shall be a fighter from the top of my head to the soles of my feet. The greatest encouragement to me, and a sure sign that the missionary work of the Academy has not failed, is the number now facing me. Why, it is worth all the efforts of a man's life to make a true New Church man.

Rev. E. E. Iungerich: I was very much pleased with the last speaker's remarks, and I am sure that with him in the missionary work, we would have a fine line and a fine hook, but we must have the bait. So I think we need team-work. Those who have the fine bait, let them co-operate with the person who has the fine line and hook. It was said to the Pharisees: "You compass sea and land to make one convert, and when he is made, you make him twice the devil you are yourselves." This is not meant to discourage missionary effort. I have sometimes wondered why this was said to the Pharisees, for they did no missionary work; but perhaps, as said in the Writings, it applies to the Church to follow. In this sense, I can see that, by "compassing land and sea to make one convert, and making him twice the devil you are yourselves," refers to the efforts of the Christian Church which M. Deltenre has set forth in his admirable paper. It contains a potent lesson. Do not try to make them doubles of ourselves. We do not want duplicates of ourselves in the Church.

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I am, of course, speaking of "yourselves." What we want is to increase the variety in our Church; we want men to come in who will develop their own variety, their own specialty. And the more plainly we can present to them the idea of the Lord, the more the Lord can lead them; for it is said that we cannot make any man's mind; but if you let the Lord come to him, the Lord can lead his mind, and bring out of it what will be of service to the Church.

Rev. G. C. Ottley: In introducing my good friend, M. Deltenre, to this appreciative audience, you said that he was well-known to practically all of you, since he made his abode here for two years. I can claim something more, for I believe I am the one through whom he came to the knowledge of the Academy. With the exception of Mr. Barger, in Holland, I was the first New Churchman he came across in his own country. And after a few hours' conversation when I visited him, I saw that I was face to face with a young man who exercised his thoughts on spiritual subjects in a way I had not so far come across. This age does not favor that form of mind. In France they have a word which is intended to stigmatize anything spiritual. This young man, coming from an intensely Catholic family, I was surprised to find, not only able to receive the Doctrines, but that he had a very rational idea. After a short conversation, I began to tell him that there were two ways of looking at the New Church; one from the natural point of view,-looking at the instrument of Revelation, so that you could see only the human instrument; the other, that he was simply an instrument in the hands of the Divine; and, therefore, that the work of the New Church was to be done from an interior point of view, and could be done only from the point of view of interior doctrine, and the perception of what its real meaning was. At first he was not very much inclined to follow this idea, because, he said, you glorify this thing higher than it appears to be. He could not dissociate his mind at first from Swedenborg and the work done by him. But you can see him here. I was the one to baptize him, so I think I have established a sound claim to knowing him before you all did. I followed the whole of his interesting lecture with special interest, and I was glad to see how he advocates presenting a thing from the interior point of view and not from a natural, which is inseparable from the idolatrous point of view.

When I was studying a history of European morals some thirty years ago, I was very much surprised to find that the early Christians were imbued with the fundamental idea that the religion for which they stood was true, and, per contra, that the religions around them were, as they said, the work of the devil. Of course, this was a clear case of contrast. They lived the life of charity among themselves during the first three centuries; but mark you, they were face to face with persecution. There were some who would quake, but they were ignorant. In that age, slavery had existed for hundreds of years. Everyone took it for granted: they did not consider it wrong. How did that slavery disappear? By an attack made from a political or humanitarian point of view? None whatever.

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Those early Christians preached systematically, in season and out of season, at all cost, that principle which was to be the "axe against the root of the tree,"-brotherly love and charity, and slavery melted away before this teaching.

     I agree with my friend, who hails from London like myself, that there is no use mincing matters. It does not mean that you must put it offensively. Anyone teaching the truth from heaven can put it in such a way as to show that he has no hostility against anyone present, but that he is fighting a fundamental falsity; and he can put it in a way that is perceptible to those who can perceive it. Hindmarsh, Noble, and others did this with extraordinary force, and the societies in England were built up. But now they go with anxious words, and say that "your Christianity meets ours-somewhere in the East," and they go away feeling that they are not so bad. Such a missionary, as M. Deltenre has said, is natural. It is not spiritual, or from heaven.

     The Bishop: I want to express my pleasure this evening, in that I was interested not only with the view presented the spiritual view of missionary work,-but the recalling of an atmosphere that we have not here to the same extent. M. Deltenre is surrounded by the Catholic Church in Belgium, which must be keenly felt by him. We have that Church here; but unless we happen to come in contact with it, we do not know a great deal about its force; and the "bleeding heart" has bled in vain, so far as the great bulk of American citizens is concerned. Nevertheless, it is a most potent thing, and it is growing even here.

     I was also very much interested in the discussion of methods in missionary work. Personally, I am convinced that the method is not of so much importance; it is not so important where you begin as where you land. I am quite willing to trust Mr. Alden to begin in almost any way he pleases; for if he gets hold of a man, he is going to land him in the right place. And I do believe, with all apologies, that the methods advocated by our young missionaries are a little misunderstood by the older gentlemen. Their idea is to study some of the modern methods, to study the psychology of an audience with a view to finding if there is not some degree of responsiveness in that audience. To do this, you must approach them with an atmosphere of friendliness to begin with, and that friendly attitude is quite harmless. But when they get hold of a man, they are going to bring him the right way.

     On the other hand, my heart is always uplifted when I hear such a speech as Mr. Tilson has given us. He not only carries me forward, but he also carries me backward. I remember how we were thrilled with the idea when we were students with Father Benade. He knew we were going to make an effort to make converts, and he knew the difficulties we would have. We did not, but we do now. He said: "You are not going to convert many, but wherever you preach the Word of God, you make a judgment; for the Word of Divine Truth is a Word of judgment." We were inspired by that. When I had just graduated, I had a, talk with Father Benade in the home of Mr. Pitcairn. He said: "What do you want to do?" I said I wanted to do missionary work. "Do you want to go this summer?" I said: "Yes." He said: "Where do you want to go?"

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I had heard where Mr. Price had been in the mountains of Pennsylvania, and I thought I would go there. So I said: "Father Benade, I have a new idea on the subject of missionary work. I am not only prepared to talk the falsities of the Old Church, but the evils of the Old Church as well." We filled a school house, and I was quite determined to carry out my end of the program. I took the Old Church falsities and evils from top to bottom, and was about halfway through the process, when a gentleman arose and said: "I have listened to this long enough." He went out, followed by half a dozen others. I thought the judgment was beginning, and I continued. They left me in sections, until there were none left in that room but Stacy Bowman and myself. And I said: "Well, Stacy, we have performed a judgment anyhow." Just then the stones began coming against the windows. Stacy Bowman was one of the greatest fighters in the country. He went through the window and they heard him coming, and started running, with Stacy after them.
MISSIONARY WORK IN SWEDEN 1920

MISSIONARY WORK IN SWEDEN Rev. GUSTAF BAECKSTROM 1920

     (An Address delivered at a Public Session of the Council of the Clergy, Bryn Athyn, Pa., June 25, 1920.)

     At the end of the last century, there were two, or possibly three, New Church societies in Sweden, and these were fighting one another. If you read the New Church periodicals of that time, you will not get much of an impression that heaven was descending upon earth. And the memory of all that fighting still lives with many who seem to think of New Church people as we do of the quarreling sects of the Old Church. "Behold, how they love one another!" Some who are interested in the Doctrines do not wish to join any New Church organization because of the sad past.

     When I returned from Bryn Athyn to become minister of the Academy circle in Stockholm, we had not more than seven members. Soon others joined us, and then we had twelve adults and five children. We rented a hall; and I remember our first public service, how I had prepared a thundering sermon against the idea of three gods and faith alone. Having advertised in the newspapers, I waited for the crowd to come. But it was just our own twelve members over whose devoted heads the thunderbolt went out-and nobody else. This was my first as well as my last purely missionary sermon.

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Since then I have preached to our own people, at the same time trying to adapt it so that strangers could understand; but my missionary work has been done by lectures. At our services now, more than half of those who attend are outsiders. All states are represented, from those who have studied the Writings for twenty years to those who hear about the New Church for the first time. All states are to be met, and all to be fed at the same time. It is not an easy undertaking.

     During the first three years, the work went on steadily but slowly; in the fourth year, the Spanish sickness raged in Sweden as elsewhere, and many died. At that time I was, unfortunately, compelled by the constantly increasing cost of living to take up secular work, and that took away five of the best hours of the day. But I thought that the time was now come to lecture on the "Life after Death," as so many had lost their dear ones. So I started a series of lectures on the subject of the "Spiritual World," and we found for the first time that our hall was too small. As lots of people had to go away, I repeated the lectures, and even then had a good attendance. The same was the result of a series of lectures on "Conjugial Love," which I began after those on the "Spiritual World." The average attendance at the lectures that year was 80, a considerable increase over the 30 of the previous year.

     The same year, I thought that I ought to try to do something in Gothenburg, where we have a few members. I will tell you how I started missionary work in the way I did. I announced a sermon in Gothenburg. Some one had been engaged to play the organ for us, but we found that the organ was locked and that there was no key. So when I found so many strangers present I thought it best to adapt the sermon as a lecture, and to address myself to the audience in a purely intellectual way. I saw in this little event a sign of Providence to show me the way.

     I was bound five hours a day by the secular work, and felt most unhappy not to be able to make use of the great possibilities I thought that I saw before me. However, by taking vacations now and then from the secular work, I was able to deliver three lectures in Gothenburg and preach there, also two lectures in Stranngas and two in Eskilstuna. At these seven lectures, there was an average attendance of 151 persons. At these lectures, and at those in Stockholm, people had to pay an entrance fee of 50 are, that is, about 11 cents.

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The first year, there was no admission charge, but a voluntary collection was taken up; but that did not cover the expenses, which became more and more heavy. During the past year the expenses for the missionary work in connection with lectures have amounted to almost $1,000, and without the entrance fee, it would have been impossible to undertake this work. Now it has paid for itself.

     This last year I have been more fortunate. I have been free from any secular work, and therefore have been able to try to realize my plans of doing missionary work on a larger scale. The idea was to visit most of the larger places throughout the country. And in the autumn of last year I was pretty busy traveling, generally every other week between Sundays, and lecturing every evening during the trips. During the first year I used to invite discussion, but it seemed that this sometimes took away from the impression the lecture had made, and it was difficult to make people keep themselves to the subject. After the lectures, however, some would stay, and enter into discussions or disputes, and I would be kept talking until midnight. As I also preached on Sundays at Stockholm, and even lectured there, the work finally became too much for my strength. I had a swoon New Year's day, and was confined to my bed for a week. From that time, according to the advice of our Bishop, I have confined my work mostly to Stockholm.

     A greater activity than ever has now been displayed in that city. I rented the big hall of the Academy of Sciences for a lecture every other week, and was quite startled when, at one of the lectures, before it was time to start, the attendant came into my room and told me that the whole hall was filled (550 persons), while there were as many out in the street who could not gain admittance, and who wanted me to repeat the lecture. This same thing happened at the next lecture in the same place; and when I repeated the lecture a few days afterwards, the hall was filled a second time, and even then not all could gain admittance. The subject of the first lecture was "The Enigma of Death;" that of the second was "The Life After Death," and covered the first two states in the world of spirits.

     After the lectures I would sell books. These were placed on two big tables, one within the hall and the other at the exit, so that no one should miss seeing them.

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They were surrounded by quite a crowd eager to buy. During the past year I have sold New Church literature amounting to Kr. 3,048, or about $640, thus in one year almost three times as much as during the previous four years together; while during the preceding year,-the fourth of my work,- I sold about twice as many as during the first three years together. The book selling has thus shown a very rapid progress during the last two years, and quite a flood of literature has been spread. I usually sold Heaven and Hell, and in the beginning many copies of T. C. R., but the price was increased on that book, and it was more difficult to sell it. Other works that have proved useful are Foundation Truths, by Bayley, and The Nature of Spirit, by Giles. It is very difficult for many people to understand the Writings at first, and so I think it is very important to have collateral books of this kind. The books are comparatively cheap. Heaven and Hell sold for about 50 cents; T. C. R. at about 60 cents at first, and now $1, unbound. Very much of the literature has been sold in Stockholm.

     Most people have very vague ideas about Swedenborg. They know that he saw the fire in Stockholm when he was in Gothenburg, etc., and the spiritists claim him to be one of them. You may think that it is dangerous to speak on the spiritual world because we get spiritists to us, but they do not come back. We can easily take up the fight against them; and if people see we take a decided stand against them, they have confidence in us and come to our worship. If we were to avoid them, we would have no opportunity of fighting them.

     During the past year I have delivered fifty lectures, with an average attendance of 181 persons. Thirty-four of these lectures were delivered at Gothenburg and eleven other places outside of Stockholm, with an average attendance of 147; and sixteen lectures were given at Stockholm, attended by 255 persons, on an average. Eight of these were given in our own little hall for worship, and were not advertised in the papers; the other eight were delivered in the big hall rented for the occasion.

     As a result of the lectures, many have come to attend our worship. The average attendance at the services has increased in five years from 21 to 24 to 30 to 36 to 52; and the number of baptisms has been respectively 4, 10, 6, 5, and 18, thus totaling 43 during these five years.

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The number of the members of the Society has increased from It adults and 5 children to 37 adults and 22 children, of whom 27 adults and 11 children are in Stockholm and 10 adults and 11 children in Gothenburg and other places. Of those who have joined, all except two are also members of the General Church. There are others who are ready to join us; for instance, when I was about to leave for the train, the telephone rang and a lady said she wanted to join the Society. Ours is a young, growing society in its first aspirations, its first struggles, and its first hopes.

     With regard to the missionary work this year, I have undertaken it on my own accord, contrary to all advice. Not that I knew so much better than others, but that I dared to hope. I believe that confidence or hope is the first thing that is necessary for us in any undertaking. What, then, will be the spirit in the missionary work? Every missionary must have first in view the saving of souls. The love of saving souls is the love of our priestly function. Is this love only for those few sheep who are already of this fold? The Lord speaks of other sheep, too. Those whom we want to save-I mean that word, not in the Old Church fashion, but in the New Church sense-we shall not approach only with the sword of truth, but also with the love to help and save; not with truth alone, but with love united to truth; and not sentimental love, but real and active.

     Let us never forget that we ourselves, though we be in light, are in obscurity when compared to those who are in the spiritual world, in heavenly light, or the Light Itself. We know that our own little flocks that listen to our voice are by no means pure in the sight of heaven. But we do not thunder against their fallacies and evils. We show them what they are without hiding the truth, but in a spirit of love for their eternal welfare. We love to mould their minds in an image of heaven; we love to watch this work, and we rejoice when it is done. Let us extend this love further than to our own. This love is not sentimentality. It is the love that does the work; it is He who builds the house; it is the Lord.

     The spirit of fight is kindled in us when this work is attacked, even as a mother's wrath is kindled when some one wants to hurt her child. The minister, as a representative of the Church in its highest sense, must have such a love for all who will listen to the Heavenly Father's voice.

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     We do not go to our work to show our courage. It is a courage in itself to try to do the work. We are not sent to judge. The Lord says: "Judge not." But we are sent to plant the seed, to protect, to instruct, and to lead.

     I think that we ought to make a clear distinction between lectures and sermons. A lecture can be of a controversial nature, and sometimes must be so, depending on the nature of the subject. But a sermon must not and ought not to be so. People may come to a lecture for the purpose of fighting, and they may begin a fight; they have a chance to answer you. But not so in the service. We go to the house of the Lord to worship, to pray, to be fed by the bread of heaven.

     I fully recognize the great fundamentals for which the Academy stands. I could wish nothing more than Academy schools and Academy education. But these are instruments which are of no use when there are no people to educate, no children to send to the schools. I must try to get the people first, and when they listen to the call, to educate them-not all of a sudden into the old Academy stamp from top to bottom-it would be impossible-but by gradually bending their minds, patiently molding them.

     As I must have patience with them, I ask you, brethren, to have patience with us, as the Lord has patience with you.

     DISCUSSION OF MR. BAECKTROM'S ADDRESS.

     Rev. K. R. Alden: Mr. Baeckstrom has put in a single phrase what some of the younger generation of our ministers have, as it were, been fighting for. He said that he "dared to hope" for the big things he has been telling you of. Not for a generation has a New Church missionary filled a hall with the capacity of 550, with another 550 waiting outside, unable to get in. In the good old days, when the natural correspondent of spiritual truth was still with us, Rev. Theodore Pitcairn and I used to drink a toast to the day when we would speak to a thousand. That was merely an expression of our "daring to hope," and we never expected that a fellow minister, ordained about the same time, would so soon accomplish this; for he spoke to his thousand, even if it did take him two nights to do it. As young men, we do not like to feel that a "wet blanket" is wrapped around the neck of our infant projects. Let me tell you of an experience of Theodore's in Philadelphia. He had prepared a thundering lecture on "Faith Alone." Moving pictures were to be shown at the same time. There were twelve children and one old lady present.

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Theodore had a Scotch conscience, so he thundered on faith alone, and at the end of the lecture the old lady came up to him and said: "I enjoyed the picture very much, but I am deaf and could not hear a word you said." But Theodore had dared the result. Now he has gone to Basutoland, and has spoken to pretty nearly his thousand-at least three hundred. And I recently had the pleasure of addressing an audience of 210 at Scranton in a hall that held only zoo.

     I must rub in one point. I agree with Mr. Tilson, that a man must have the conviction to tell the truth-but in time. For instance, when I dine with an Englishman for the first time, I do not tell him all I think of England; nor does he tell me all he thinks of America. First we talk of the weather, and then about what we think of our friends. It is common sense.

     In the Apocalypse Revealed, 547, it treats of the "woman nourished in the wilderness for a time and times and half a time," meaning that the Church must be segregated until the fundamental truths are established, and then it will grow from the few to the many. In the Latin, the word here for "many" is "plures," but one translation renders it "until the Church has grown to its appointed state," while another has it "from the few to the more." The translators seemed to be afraid of the idea of many, or that the New Church will cover the earth "as the waters cover the sea." But I think we must "dare to hope for it," and I believe the time has come to hope for big results.

     Rev. H. L. Odhner: I never dreamed that Sweden was such a fertile field as Mr. Baeckstrom pictures it, or that such a work as he has accomplished would be possible there-not at present. And I just wish to thank him from the bottom of my heart for being the instrument, and the very able instrument, in that work.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: Only eight years ago, Mr. Baeckstrom knew nothing about the New Church, and for the last five years he has been working practically alone in a very fertile field, with remarkable results. How manifest were the workings of Divine Providence in the various instances he told us of! We have often had discussions about missionary work in our meetings, and our aspiration has always been to do such work, but the opportunity did not come, or when it did, we did not have the right men or could not get the audiences. But all that was in the Divine Providence, because a strong center was needed first. While we have always been interested in missionary work, we were more concerned about preparing men for the ministry, and in doing all we could to support their hands. We were more interested in establishing the real source of strength to the missionary,-the conviction that it is the Lord who is doing the work. And I think, with Mr. Karl Alden, that we may look forward-it may not be this year, it may not be this generation-but we can surely look forward to the spread of the Church by missionary work. Mr. Baeckstrom has shown in his work in Sweden that he has courage and also modesty; for these two go together when the man is inspired by the conviction that he is preaching the Lord's truth to the end that men may be saved.

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     Mr. Wilfred Howard: I feel that the spirit carried through all these meetings has been first and essentially the spirit of the Academy accommodated to different states. We have had arguments about the relative value of different methods of missionary work; but is it not true that, if the men of the Church hold to the principles we know to be true, a change of method does not mean that the principle is given up in any sense whatever? In the address Mr. Tilson gave, it did one's heart good to realize the essential powers of the Divine Truth,-of the Divine principles of the Church, and of the Lord's Word, which do not depend for their truth upon a few men getting together and stating them to be true. These principles must succeed, and nothing can stop them. In Sweden a new field is opening up, and we cannot say what will be the success, any more than the founders of the Academy could say definitely what would be the success of their movement. It also did my heart good to hear Mr. Karl Alden speak with a spirit that is full of promise for the future, as was the case with the founders.

     Rev. E. E. Iungerich: What prevents the New Church from spreading is the persistent effort of the dragon to destroy the Man Child by floods of water. Historically, it is the Old Church doctrine opposing the reception of the doctrine of the New Church. It has been similar in all ages. Socrates had to face it, and was willing to suffer death rather than be untrue to what he believed to be the ideal for the civil state. The Lord Himself suffered death, with His disciples deserting Him, and many thinking that His work was going to fail. Yet He conquered by knowing that His Divine purpose was going to be fulfilled. And He said of those who opposed Him: "Forgive them, for they know not what they do." It is remarkable that Socrates used similar words about his executioners, and it would seem that some one among the Gentiles to whom the Christian Church was to come should thus transact a period of suffering by which they were prepared to receive the knowledge of the Lord Himself in His similar great struggler We cannot say that this struggle is ever going to cease. In the growth of the New Church, new great principles will arise to be fought for. This will begin with a few, and stay in the eggshell period of development until those who hold those principles prove their courage. What sustains them is that they have heard the voice of the Lord, and are going to follow it. That, of course, is the great thing in a man's life. If he feels he has seen some great principle, he is willing to "forsake father and mother, sister and brother" for it, as the Lord said.

     Rev. R. J. Tilson: I wish to express my gratitude to Mr. Baeckstrom for his most interesting address. Twenty-six years ago I visited Stockholm in company with the Rev. Carl Theophilus Odhner, and a number of us dined together- the largest number of New Church priests that had ever been in Sweden at one time, I believe. Only last year, the Rev. Mr. Bjorck told me in England that he traced his coming into hearty association with the Academy to what Mr. Odhner said at that meeting.

     I do not know exactly what Mr. Karl Alden meant by talking of "wet blankets." I have never felt them, and since I have been here, the less I have had to do with blankets the better!

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So I think he was very unhappy in the likeness he drew between the Englishman and the American, that one must not tell the other all he thinks of him, for when an Englishman speaks to an American he asserts he is a jolly good fellow! But to return to the question before us. I say most seriously, and after careful thought, that the curse of the New Church organization in England has been the thirst for what is called missionary work. The ministers of the Conference have literally starved their flocks in following after it. While I do not believe anyone in the Academy would make that mistake, there is danger in this hungering for the "thousand." I admire that spirit with our young men, but at the same time let them remember this, that I, as an old preacher, firmly believe that the greatest missionary you have had in America was Father Benade. His work was so great that the world will not hold it.

     I believe in taking advantage of every opportunity that comes to us to make known the Gospel of the Second Advent. Recently, in crossing the ocean, I had the pleasure of being asked by the Purser to take the service on board ship. I told him I was a Swedenborgian. He asked me if I knew Mr. John Pitcairn, as he had taken him to South America in that boat, and he added that if I was of John Pitcairn's religion I should go ahead and preach. In each of the sermons, I gave them the straight truth. I told them I was not there to proselytize, but that I was there to present the truth, and that I must tell them that every truth I gave came from the Lord through the instrumentality of Emanuel Swedenborg. Now if our good friend can get this thousand to listen to him, let him fire away and do his best. But I cannot help feeling that we should avoid the spectacular accompaniments of beating the drum, moving pictures, and all that. Let us take men in a rational state, and when you get them in that condition, give it them straight from the shoulder, and do not offer it with lollipops.

     Mr. Harold Pitcairn: There are two ideas as to how missionary work should be done in the New Church. One is to hand out the New Church straight from the shoulder, but they will not accept it. The other is to hand it out weakly, not claiming too much for the Writings, not saying that the Writings are the Word because we might scare them away. On this plan, we should go to people and say that they are really one with us, and then they may come in. But the inspiring thing about Mr. Baeckstrom's work is that he does not mince matters, but preaches that the Writings are the Word of God, He believes in New Church education, and stands up for all the other principles of the Academy, and he is succeeding in his work. We must adapt our truths to the states of those we meet, but that does not mean we must surrender anything. As was brought out last night, in the General Church there is authority with freedom and accommodation without compromise.

     Mr. Frank Hodson Rose: The address this evening chows that when the truths of the New Church are presented from the standpoint of the Academy there is a power in such missionary work which has never yet been felt. I have been associated with the missionary work of the Conference for years. A while ago I prepared a lecture on a special subject, and was told that it had never before been the subject of a special missionary lecture.

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The subject was "The Second Coming of the Lord." Their missionary efforts have failed, and perhaps it is just as well, since they present the doctrines under such a cloak that men would be disheartened if they afterwards went to the Writings themselves. There is a great field before the General Church for evangelization, and I am sure that once missionary work is done by the Academy, and from the Academy standpoint, you will get results.

     Rev. E. S. Price: Mr. Baeckstrom's very successful work is a very great contrast to my own experience. I sold a book once. That is about as far as I got, or as far as I made any impression. I never got a response at any of my missionary lectures except once when I made something of an attack on the doctrine of physical resurrection, which was suggested to me by the fact that a burying-gown hung just outside the school house where I was speaking. I demanded of the audience whether they thought they were going to be able to get up out of that burying-gown on the judgment day. It was certainly inspiring to hear of the fine beginning in Sweden, and I hope Karl will have the chance to speak to his thousand some time, for he will tell them what is true.

     Rev. G. C. Ottley: I have listened with the greatest pleasure to Mr. Baeckstrom's address, for I cannot conceive how any New Churchman, knowing that the Church was born in this world in the brain and mind of a Swede, can fail to take the keenest interest in the establishment and growth of the Church in the native land of that great man. We heard a good deal about the New Church in Sweden forty years ago, and I have always wondered why it afterwards seemed to stagnate. I believe it is due to the fact that they ceased to present the New Church as a system as distinct from any form of Christianity now in existence as this was distinct from the system which preceded it. In other words, that a new philosophy, a new religion, a new life had come into being. But sow a young man has been well prepared to begin the work with his eyes open; sympathetic to his audience, since he was born a Swede; having the power of language, and that sincerity which speaks for itself. I have not the least doubt that the success of Mr. Baeckstrom is due to his dear exposition and the sincerity of manner accompanying it, even under adverse circumstances.

     In the year 1910, there was great hope that the Swedenborg Congress held in London was going to bring about a new state of the Church in Sweden, but I warned them that a Congress is no test of anything. No Church can exist or Subsist by mere persuasion. It is the recognition of the Divine element in it that gives it vital force. Our friend, Mr. Baeckstrom, has begun with the right tone and key, and we may be quite sure that, with the patience and a desire to meet the varieties of opinion, recognizing that the acknowledgment of the Divine in the Writings is the only principle that will heal the evils of mankind, he will build up the society on a sure foundation.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     LONDON, ENG.-Since our last appearance in these columns we have received the good news from Bishop N. D. Pendleton that the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal has accepted the call to the Pastorates of the London and Colchester Societies, and will leave Durban during August.

     Pending the arrival of our leader, the London Society took courage to celebrate New Church Day on its own." Sunday evening, June 20th, was set apart for the reunion, and despite a heavy rainfall, practically the whole Society assembled. The program was arranged by three of the senior members, its inception being prompted by the paper recently published in New Church Life on "The Laws of Social Order," by the Rev. Gilbert H. Smith. The theme of the evening was therefore directed to "The New Gospel and its Relation to Social Order," and comprised the undermentioned six "ten minute" discourses. Mr. James Waters presided, and after making a fitting reference to our late Pastor, Mr. Czerny, who was with us in person only a year ago, he proposed the toast to "The Church," and introduced the first paper of the series, entitled "The New Gospel and The New Church." Mr. Ball thereupon addressed himself to this subject. After quoting the well-known New Church Day memorandum in T C. R., the mission of the twelve disciples throughout the spiritual world was briefly considered, and reference was made to the quality of the feasts which characterize New Church celebrations.

     In response to the toast to "The Academy," Mr. Waters dwelt upon "Instruction and Education," and indicated the vital need for distinctive education, the importance of which was not even yet fully realized by the New Church generally. Useful quotations were made from the Writings and the Word relating to the development of the mind. Mr. Derick Elphick then tackled the subject of "Government," briefly noting how the revealed principles given in the New Gospel, if applied to the political and economic sciences, logically lead to their entire reconstruction. In illustration of this, quotation was made from the authorities on economic science, and examples were given from every-day political phases.

     After a short recess, Mr. Ed Waters, Junior, read a concise paper, entitled "The Employer," which embodied the ideals of a New Church employer, and cited the difficulties to be met with in connection with profit and labor. Being a "maiden" paper, it gained a very hearty reception. Mr. Howard supplied the complementary half of this subject, namely, "The Workman." Centering on those passages in the Doctrine of Charity dealing with artisans, husbandmen, etc., note was made of the pleasure and satisfaction to be derived by always putting the best workmanship into every production. Such pleasure, when derived from the love of use, is the true reward, whether the material reward is advantageous or not.

     The final ten-minute discourse was given by Mr. Ed J. Waters, and treated of "The Home. The writer effectively noted the various aspects e and uses of the home-sphere,-the sphere of freedom, the sphere of rest, the sphere of children,-all originating from the sphere of conjugial love. In response to an impromptu toast to "Charity," Mr. J. Pryke comprehensively summed up the trend of thought presented, showing how it had been demonstrated in a variety of ways that charity and the love of use were the essential Principles underlying true social order. Mr. Anderson expressed appreciation of the ideas set forth, and congratulated those who had formulated the program.

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At the commencement of a new year, and at a time following the Great War when there is so much unrest and confusion,-which involves a war of a more insidious character than the one just over, it is useful to dwell upon such subjects as had been presented.
Nothing can be done in a hurry; it is a case of "here a little and there a little."

     Sufficient time was left for an informal discussion, and after Mr. Anderson had proposed a vote of thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Ball and family for arranging the festive tables, a very pleasant and homely celebration of June 19th came to an end.

     The British Assembly is the next important reunion, which, naturally, everyone is looking forward to with pleasure.
     F. W. E.

     SYDNEY, N. S. W.-The Rev. Richard Morse writes: "For nearly five months during the past year the Society has been deprived of my services; three (Sept., Oct., Nov., 1919) On account of my visit to Bryn Athyn, and two (April and May, 1920) owing to an attack of typhoid. Consequently, the only visit to our isolated members was one paid on August 30, 1919, to Mr. H. S. Jones, at Lithgow, to whom the sacrament of the Holy Supper was administered. Here I will add, with warm appreciation, that Mr. Charles H. Morgan conducted the Sunday morning services and Wednesday evening doctrinal classes during my absence at Bryn Athyn, and, during my illness, took charge of the Sunday School and doctrinal class at Hurstville."

     GLENVIEW.-July, the month for vacations and the suspension of the usual activities, has been exceptionally full in the life of the Immanuel Church. Independence Day was celebrated in the regular form with parades, patriotic orations, sports and fireworks. The program was successfully carried out by Capt. Bert. Henderson

     The class for the study of Shakespeare, conducted by Dr. J. B. S. King, has continued its meetings every two weeks with good attendance. The series opened with a sketch of the life of the poet and was followed by the reading and study of "Twelfth Night." At the last meeting the class took up Goldsmith's "She Stoops to Conquer."

     On Sunday, July 4th, at the invitation of our Pastor, the sermon was preached by the Rev. Adolph L. Goerwitz, who was on a visit to his brother, Mr. Alfred L. Goerwitz. The leading idea in the discourse, which was greatly enjoyed by the congregation, was "The Power in Ultimates," as revealed in the teaching concerning the woman who touched the hem of the Lord's garment. At the same service our Pastor administered the rite of confirmation to the Misses Phyllis Burnham, Vera McQueen, Phoebe Junge and Maude Reuter.

     Beginning Tuesday, July 6th, we were favored with a five days' visit by our two English priests of the General Church, the Rev. R. J. Tilson and the Rev. G. C. Ottley. Except to a few friends who had been associated with them in the early days of the Academy movement, these gentlemen were almost strangers; but it soon became apparent that they felt very much at home because of their spiritual kinship with us. Their presence in our midst had somewhat the effect of a spiritual tonic, stimulating our common affection for the things of the Church and filling us with gladness at the prospect they entertained of the future growth of the New Church in the various countries of Europe. As to the visitors themselves, their stay was filled with enjoyable incidents, no doubt on account of the peculiar character of our community life. The sermons and addresses given by our English brethren made an impression upon the minds of our people, young and old, which will not be easily obliterated. In fact, we heard the expression that "it had been just like an Assembly." (As this is not the first time we have reported the use of this expression, comparing our doings to meetings of the Assembly, we hope all your readers will accept it as indicating the high esteem in which Assemblies are held by our people.)

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     Coming, as it does, in the natural order of events on the first Wednesday in the month, our visitors had an opportunity to be present at a Steinfest. It was held on Mr. W. H. Junge's porch, and practically all of our men were present. Mr. Winfred Junge was toastmaster, and introduced for the debate the question: "Is a University education essential to success in business? and does it pay!" We have no detailed report of the speeches, but, as would be expected, most of the speakers treated the matter from the spiritual point of view; this for the simple reason that New Churchmen cannot limit their thoughts merely to the natural plane of the mind. The addresses by Mr. Tilson and Mr. Ottley lifted the subject to the spiritual rational plane, and were listened to with delight. During the evening several toasts were drunk and some of our original steinfest songs were sung. It would be interesting to hear the reports of this meeting which will be given by our visitors to their people at home.

     At Friday Supper, the whole of the society welcomed the visitors. Our Pastor presided, and after expressing his pleasure in having his brother ministers present on this occasion, he told us of some of the events connected with the recent meetings of the Council of Ministers at Bryn Athyn. The Rev. R. J. Tilson spoke with reference to the work of the Church in England, and the Rev. G. C. Ottley told us about the state of the Church in France. The general effect of listening to the addresses was to make all feel conscious of the oneness of purpose which exists with the members of the General Church in all parts of the world. The meeting closed with a social and some dancing, which provided an opportunity for our new friends to become personally acquainted with our people, including those who were present from Chicago.

     On Sunday morning the sermon was preached by the Rev. R. J. Tilson. The text was from Jeremiah 47:6, 7: "O thou sword of the Lord, how long will it be ere thou be quiet? put up thyself into thy scabbard, rest, and be still. How can it be quiet, seeing the Lord hath given it a charge against Ashkelon, and against the sea shore? there hath He appointed it."

     The discourse was a forcible presentation of the truth that the New Church is a militant Church, quoting many passages from the letter of the Word to show that real peace is only to be obtained as the result of spiritual combat. New light was shed upon these words of our Lord, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you," and it was pointed out that this text was much misunderstood when used to support the idea that permanent peace could be had in this world. The peace which the Lord left with the First Christian Church did not remain long, but the peace which He gives at His Second Coming will be spiritual peace wherever it is received, "not as the world giveth."

     The Rev. G. C. Ottley preached in the evening of the same day, taking as his subject the sad state of the Church when it has come to an end through the separation of the natural from the spiritual sense of the Word. The teaching was drawn from the words in II Kings 2:11, 12: "And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it, and he cried, My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof. And he saw him no more; and he took hold of his own clothes, and rent them in two pieces." These words mere connected historically with the withdrawal of the spiritual understanding of the Word from those in the church who separate the Divinity of the doctrine of the internal sense of the Word from the Divinity of the Word in its letter. But Elisha seeing the translation of his master, and exclaiming, "My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof," represented the vision of those in the church who acknowledge the Divine in both the letter of the Word and its Spiritual sense,-one Word for the New Church,-the chariot of Israel and its horsemen.

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     At the close of the service, the congregation gathered in the parish hall to bid farewell to our visitors, who were asked to convey greetings from the Immanuel Church to our fellow members across the sea. On Monday they left for Toronto to pay a brief visit to our friends in Canada.
     G. A. MCQUEEN.

     COLCHESTER, ENGLAND. Among recent events in our Society the most interesting was the wedding of Miss Florence Cooper and Mr. Raymond Cranch on Sunday afternoon, July 11th. The church was daintily decorated with foliage and golden-colored flowers, and looked more attractive than it ever did before. The wedding service was conducted by the Rev. Albert Bjorck, and opened with the singing of the 19th Psalm. The ceremony came to an impressive ending when the bride and bridegroom partook of the Holy Supper. The bride, in ivory crepe de Chine, was attended by little Miss Mary Waters and Master Noel Appleton, who scattered rose petals in the aisle before the couple as they left the church. All present then adjourned to the studio, where a reception was held. Toasts to "The Church," "Conjugial Love," and "The Bride and Bridegroom" were followed by speeches from the Rev. Mr. Bjorck and others, and the cutting of the cake by the bride amid hearty cheers brought to a close an event marked by a most happy and impressive sphere throughout.

     The Colchester Society is now busy preparing for the Assembly to be held here from July 31st to August 2nd, which promises to be a record meeting, the first since 1914. The Rev. Alfred Acton will be present as the Bishop's representative. About a month later the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal will reach England to take charge of the London and Colchester Societies, and will be warmly welcomed.
     M. G.

     PHILADELPHIA.-The Rev. K. R. Alden preached his farewell sermon on July 25th, and will shortly begin his duties as Pastor of the Olivet Church, Toronto, the Rev. Ernest Pfeiffer becoming Visiting Minister of the Advent Society on September 15th.

     KITCHENER.-The Rev. L. W. T. David has accepted a unanimous call to become Pastor of the Carmel Church, and on September 30th will succeed the Rev. Hugo L. Odhner, who becomes Pastor of the Durban, Natal, Society. Miss Eva Campbell will continue as teacher in our School, and we are arranging for the resumption of the Sunday School on the same basis as last year.

     The jubilee event-overshadowing most occasions of the kind in past years-was the 150th anniversary of the New Church on June 10th, taking the form of a special banquet with printed programs and prepared speeches, the decorations including a tasteful transparent with "1770-1920," the "Nunc Licet" motto, and the coronal symbol of the New Church. The Pastor spoke on "The Establishment of the New Church in the Spiritual World," emphasizing the reality of the Holy City in whose palaces we dwell and whose walls protect us from the falsities of evil, and comparing the new heavens seen by Swedenborg with the scattered clusters of societies on earth striving to perform the same work. Mr. Theo, Kuhl outlined the story of the "Rise of the Church in the Natural World," and Mr. N. Stroh, with a like wealth of historical illusion, traced the "Progress in the Last Century." Mr. Samuel Roschman treated of "The New Church and the Consummated Christian World," and Dr. R. W. Schnarr, speaking on "The Future Generations," believed the time of greater progress not so distant, because we now have an organization capable of growth and adaptation to new conditions, yet firm in the acknowledgment of the Lord in the Writings and in the principles of true government. The Pastor recalled that the fifteen decades of the New Church had been outwardly a continual struggle against opposition, persecutions, heresies, temptations; but these judgments and reorganizations had crystallized the concepts of a New Church established in distinct order, sounding a definite, clear message, with which we can face the future fearlessly, whatever new discipline it may have in store.

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Mr. Richard Roschman made the concluding speech, pointing out the necessity of a priesthood, of its orderly institution and governorship in the spiritual progress of the Church, and of a laity responsive and ready to uphold the hands of the priests.

     On July 2nd, the marriage of Mr. Arthur Schnarr and Miss Vida Doering was solemnized in the church, and happiness was very much in evidence at the delightful wedding-supper and reception which followed at the hospitable home of the bridegroom's parents.

     The summer has been very cool, but has brought us visitors galore. Mrs. F. E. Waelchli, Miss Venita Roschman, and Miss Cyriel Odhner have been visiting their respective "folks." The Torontonians have just waked up to the good times we have on holidays. On May 24th a few came; on July 1st (Dominion Day) more; and on August 2nd the "whole" Toronto Society was found on the campus, trying by arm or voice to wrest the honors of baseball from our local talent. We did have a good time of it, too. After the baseball, (hush-22-6-and the Schnarrs going strong!), we were treated to some Irish plays, staged in the wagon-shed by Miss Cyriel Odhner, and later the young people danced till midnight by the light of an artificial harvest moon.
     H. L. O.
HELPER WANTED 1920

HELPER WANTED Mrs. ELDRED IUNGERICH 1920

     Announcements.

     Opportunity offered to young woman as helper in family of six. Children of school age. Leisure time may be spent at College if desired. For particulars inquire of
     MRS. ELDRED IUNGERICH,
          Bryn Athyn, Pa.

585

GOVERNMENT IN THE NEW CHURCH ACCORDING TO DOCTRINE 1920

GOVERNMENT IN THE NEW CHURCH ACCORDING TO DOCTRINE Rev. GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL          OCTOBER, 1920          No. 10
     (A paper read to the Council of the Clergy, June 23, 1920.)

     When we look abroad, that is, take a general view of the worldwide state, we are strongly impressed with the idea that all at present is in a chaotic condition,-a state of flux,-that even conservative nations and communities seem to be losing, in various degrees, those fundamental principles of freedom not previously called in question, and without which there is no security for the individual or the community at large.

     For this state of things,-unparalleled except in a general way in the events which followed the destruction of the Roman Empire-there must be a profound reason. Even thoughtful people are at a loss to account for a catastrophe of this kind after a century, at least, of marked progress in the social, industrial and mechanical planes of life. Obviously there must be a serious cause for this apparent collapse of society in more ways than one. I shall endeavor to throw some light on it as an introduction to what I shall have the privilege to lay before you later on, namely, what I conceive to be the only possible form of government we can have in the New Church.

     If we reflect carefully on the fundamentals of human existence, we come, at last, to see that true government, in a political sense, is the bed rock of all things on the social plane. As history clearly testifies, it matters not what progress the arts, the sciences, or literature in general may make; if the principles of government are false and destructive, human society must, in the long run, be subject to decay, and even to destruction.

586

     We see this illustrated in the region of science. A knowledge of spiritual causes has been totally lost in the course of many ages, and to such a degree that man at this day knows nothing of God except what is erroneous, nothing of his soul as a spiritual and immortal substance, and nothing of the spiritual world, which is the final receptacle of all humanity, whether on this planet or any other in she universe of worlds. Profound skepticism reigns on all these subjects, and is so deeply rooted through the final "secularization of the European intellect," as Mr. Lecky says, that they are mostly relegated to the region of speculative philosophy, of imagination, and even of poetry!

     What has followed? In the domain of science, men have concocted, in order to supply the deficiency, from the day of Descartes down to the present time, more or less ingenious theories, or "working hypotheses," as Huxley called them, to explain the origin of man and of material things in general. For instance, in a work entitled "Fragments of Science for Unscientific People,"-a remarkable collection of brilliant articles on a variety of scientific subjects,-Professor Tyndall, than whom England has never produced a finer or a clearer exponent of scientific ideas, says:

     "In the eye of science, the animal body is just as much the product of molecular force as the stalk or ear of corn, or as the crystal of salt or sugar. "Take," he says, "the human heart, for example, with its system of valves; or take the exquisite mechanism of the eye or hand. Animal heat, moreover, is the same in kind as the heat of a fire, being produced by the same mechanical process. . . . Every particle that enters into the composition of a muscle, a nerve, or a bone, has been placed in its position by a molecular force. . . . The formation of a crystal or an, animal is, in the eyes [of scientific men], a purely mechanical problem, which differs from the problems of ordinary mechanics in the smallness of the masses and the complexity of the process involved."

     This work was published in 1871,-forty-nine years ago, and the general attitude of scientific thinkers, here so forcibly described, has become more accentuated after a lapse of nearly half a century. And with what result to man?-that the darkness half increased tenfold; all is involved in doubt, in hesitancy, in mistrust. Men hardly know what to believe, even on the plane of natural life.

     In 1914, the very year in which the war broke out, a learned writer wrote as follows:

587

     "Nowhere is the extraordinary doubt, hesitancy and mistrust of the old settled ideas, that is the future and the great problems of this generation, more apparent than in the held of science. Modern science confesses that it does not know what light is, what heat is, what electricity is, what magnetism is, what matter is, what life is, what anything is! Physics has lost the laws of matter in a world of doubt!"

     We are living, therefore-if the above picture of the present situation is in the main correct-in the most profound skepticism respecting the origin or possible cause of natural phenomena! "If the foundations be destroyed, what shall the just do?"

     Now it is equally true that in the region of government, or a right and wise ordering of things on earth among men at this day, we are faced with similar chaotic conditions. The signs, indeed, seem to indicate that a spirit of distrust of all forms of government which have hitherto prevailed is in the ascendant, in whatever direction we look. I have lately been studying with care and benefit a remarkable work-an edition of which was published as recently as 1918-by a brilliant Oxford scholar, entitled The City State of the Greeks and Romans, which seems to throw a certain light on the general situation. The learned author, Mr. Warde Fowler, goes fully into the principles of the various kinds of government adopted in the past, viz., kingly, aristocratic, oligarchic and democratic, and shows hour, for deep reasons, one and all failed in the course of ages to secure or render permanent the well-being of mankind. I wish, briefly, to refer to what he lays before us in this instructive work, because it will enable me, finally, to lay before you-I trust calmly and rationally-what I conceive to be the only kind of government which we can have in the Church, that is, on the spiritual plane, which will enable us to steer dear of the shoals which have wrecked the various forms of government alluded to. What now is the testimony of history (which is "philosophy teaching by example") on this particular subject?

     At the outset, there is an important fact which we must not overlook, and which the learned author now under notice specially emphasizes on the first page of his work, viz.: "that no region of utter desolation lies between ancient and modern civilization and divides them from each other." He emphasizes also another fact, which will commend itself to our attention as New Churchmen, viz.: that, in the ancient world, when at its best, the "vivifying power of religion was itself so strong and irresistible as to be almost beyond the comprehension of a modern, unfamiliar with the life of the ancient world."

588

In what way, in particular, did this show itself? By the kind of government they first adopted and strongly favored-the kingly form which was identified with religion, To quote further:

     "The first unquestionable fact which meets us in the life of this new kind of community is that it was originally governed by kings," who at the same time filled the position of High Priest.

     "We have to learn, once for all, that there was no such distinction in antiquity between magistrate and priest as our modern ideas would lead us to imagine. As every father of a family was the sacrificer for his household, so was every king a sacrificer on behalf of his people."

     And then he adds something confirmatory of the teaching of the Doctrines:

     "Sacrifice was the most universal and efficacious act of early religion; it was a matter of daily performance, and nothing could be undertaken without it. Whoever was in authority must be able to perform it rightly, that is, according to traditional ritual, for to him all looked for the due maintenance of salutary relations with the gods."

     But, what is surprising and also highly suggestive as a fact, is that this kingly form of government assumed a "triple form," and re-minds us of the "trinal" form which the Writings teach us is the "most perfect" of all. The king was:

(1) Sacrificer, or Chief Priest;
(2) The Commander of the host;
(3) The Judge of his people.

     Find the reason of this is significant enough. It was because the king was supposed to have a "divine" ancestry. For Mr. Fowler says:

     "The kings of all degrees, by virtue of their divine ancestry and nurture, are provided with judgments or dooms by Zeus which are unquestioningly accepted by the people. These judgments do not rest upon anything which we can call law, for Homer knew no law, and has no word for it. They are separate, isolated judgments not connected by any thread of principle. Only a firm belief in the Divine source from which they proceed could give them a binding force in men's eyes."

589

     And here I would call your attention to the fact that, not only was this "triple form" of government so absolutely centered in the king and priest among the Greeks in early days, but that among the Romans the same "triple form" existed, although with a modification which suggests an immense deal to us, as we shall see. "The functions of the [Roman] Rex," adds Mr. Fowler, "show the same three sides as those of the Homeric Basileus. He was
(1) Priest for the whole people;
(2) commander of the army in war; and
(3) He dispensed justice at home."

     Where then, we might ask, came in the change or modification just alluded to? By the introduction of the word imperium, with which we meet for the first time; for "there is no Homeric word which can be regarded as such politically." Imperium is a "technical term of wonderful force and meaning. It introduces us at once to a new range of ideas which we may call political, and which belong to the newly realized life of the City-State." This translation, therefore, clearly characterizes a new period or state among men. In other words, it implies that the "state," as such, is now being organized on a new basis-a political basis. The idea or conception of the purely Divine origin of government is also about to disappear, and the human element in government to enter for the first time. Mr. Fowler says:

     "All power [now] exercised by any individual besides the Rex is delegated to its holder by the Rex and emanates directly from his imperium. . . . This power, we must notice, was not now his by hereditary [or Divine] right; but was given him by a formal vote of the citizens; whatever might be the mode of his appointment or election, it is certain that he only became supreme after the vote had been passed.

     The distinction here is well worth noting. On it, Mr. Fowler remarks:

     "While in the Homeric Basfeus or King we have the undefined stage of early magisterial authority, we have in the Roman Rer its complete and final realization."

     But there is another subjective or religious change of attitude we must also take note of, for it is pregnant with meaning to one acquainted with the teaching of the Doctrines.

590

Whereas "the Greek conceived of his gods as bodily presences, rather than as spiritual essences, so it was the personality of his kings, their ancestry and breeding, rather than their constitutional powers, which filled his mind with reverence." It was not so with the Romans. "There is little trace of this feeling among them-a 'prosaic' people. It was the power of their gods, and their use of it, which conditioned their religious thoughts and actions. So it was the king's power, and his use of it, on which they fixed their eyes as citizens."

     Now what do these interesting facts teach us?-that government, as such, was, in the first ages, believed to be of purely Divine origin, and associated also with a divine "personality," and that it was only by degrees this fundamental idea disappeared. As men became, in the course of ages, more and more external, the perception of this great fact was finally lost, and the idea that all government was man-made came into existence. Ancient history teaches us that it assumed, in general, four distinctive forms,-the monarchial, aristocratic, oligarchic, and democratic. Each was open to objection, as Aristotle affirmed. "Monarchy," he says, "may become tyranny; aristocracy may, and indeed always did, pass into oligarchy; and democracy in the best sense may become in the worst sense government of the mob." Such was Polybius' idea.

     It would lake too much time, and would not promote the end I have in view, to enter fully into the various aspects of this interesting subject. There is only one of the four I would select for brief consideration, namely, the democratic; for the age in which we live favors this form of government as supplying, as is vainly imagined, a panacea for all the ills and miseries of mankind!

     Now, if it be a fact that the ideas we hold at this day on this subject have to a great extent come down to us from the ancient world,-from Greece and Rome, by whom the first experiments in democratic government were made,-let us see what "fruits" it bore in those far distant ages, and how far it realized the loftiest conceptions of its great expounders. Let us see, first, what it meant in the heyday or golden age of Greece. One of the greatest of Grecian statesmen-Pericles-shall speak for it:

     "Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We do not copy our neighbors, but are an example to them.

591

It is true that we are called a 'democracy,' for the administration is in the hands of the many and not the few. But while the law secures equal justice to all in their private disputes, the claim of excellence is also recognized; and where a citizen is in any sense distinguished, h, is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as a reward of merit. Neither is poverty a bar, but a man may benefit his country, whatever be the obscurity of his condition. There is no exclusiveness in our public life, and in our private intercourse we are not suspicious of each other, nor angry with our neighbor if he does what he likes; we do not put on sour looks at him, which harmless, are not pleasant. While we are unconstrained in our private intercourse, a spirit of reverence Pervades our public acts; we are prevented from doing wrong by respect for authority and for the laws, having an especial regard for those which are ordained for the protection of the injured, as well as for those unwritten laws which bring on the transgressor of them the reprobation of the general sentiment."

In the light of the above, which you will find in the works of immortal Thucydides, it is clear that democracy among the Greeks of that period meant a real thing. Mr. Fowler, in a chapter on "the Realization of Democracy," tells us in attractive scholarly language what it implied. It meant "people actually employed day by day in the details of its own government" It even meant that "every Athenian must, at one time or other in his life, take part in the conduct of public business," and not, like the Vast majority of the members of our so-called democracy, be wholly ignorant of them, utterly inexperienced in the burdens and responsibilities of office." We must not forget, however, that if the Athenians had real, and not so-called, democracy, at what a cost it was realized! "In two ways," says Mr. Fowler, "Athens impinged upon what we may be disposed to call the rights of other individuals and states. She was, in the first place, a slave owning state,-a character she had in common with the states of the ancient world. Secondly, in this golden age of hers, she was an imperial state whose so-called allies, including nearly all the important cities in and around the Aegean Sea, were obliged to follow her lead, to contribute to her treasury, and generally to obey her orders, or risk the chance of severe punishment. Had she been neither a slave state nor an imperial state, it is hardly possible to suppose that she could have attained the high Political and intellectual level which I have been describing." Pericles himself saw the drift of this real and not "so-called" democracy. In his estimation, it had led to tyranny: "You have come by this tyranny," he exclaimed, "and you cannot go back from it; you have outrun the tardy motion of the Greek world of political ideas; you must keep your power, but use it for the noblest ends."

592

But, as Thucydides shows, that power she did not keep. The Peloponnesian War, which lasted thirty years, put an end to it! Or, as Mr. Fowler expresses it: "The tyrant city fell."

     If, therefore, real and not "so-called" democracy Produced such results in the past-led, in fact, to tyranny which was finally "put an end to" by a long and bloody civil contest,-it will not be surprising to find that the illustrious founders of your own constitution-men deeply cultured and of a pure, logical, and acute turn of mind, and who doubtless bore all these facts in mind-should have foreseen, in laying the foundations of your great Commonwealth, the possibility of a similar denouncement in the future-in a word, democracy ending in despotism.

     Mr. Lecky, in his monumental work, Democracy and Liberty, published in 1896, dwells with emphasis on this point. I would quote the following, which will yield food for thought:

     "The American Constitution was framed by men who had, for the most part, the strongest sense: of the dangers of democracy. The school of American thought which was represented in a great degree by Washington and John Adams, and still more emphatically by Governor Morris and Alexander Hamilton, which inspired the Federalist party, was utterly opposed to the schools of Rousseau, of Paine, and even of Jefferson, and it has largely guided American policy to the present hour. It did not prevent America from becoming a democracy, but it framed a form of government under which the power of the democracy was broken and divided, and restricted to a much smaller sphere, and attended with far less disastrous results than in most European countries. Hamilton, who was probably the greatest political thinker America has produced, was, in the essentials of his political thought, quite as conservative as Burke, and he never concealed his preference for monarchial institutions. Democratic government, he believed, must end in despotism, and be in the meantime destructive of public morality and to the security of public property." (Vol. I, p. 55.)

     This outcome of democracy is already patent to Englishmen who see with an open eye the clear outcome of this form of government. As recently as the 18th of May, the most influential of London daily papers published the following in a leading article, under the heading, "Democracy and Freedom:"

593

     "In a hundred ways, the Englishman, who has so long prided himself upon something called liberty, finds that such freedom as he had has been surreptitiously filched from him. In Ireland, freedom has been gradually replaced by a bloody and brutal despotism. Those who wield it, and those who encourage these murderers, impudently declare that the British government is the despot, knowing very well that the real crime of the government is its surrender to violence. But whether by extortion or by surrender, liberty is still extinguished. . . . It is steadily becoming more and more evident that it is possible for democracy and tyranny to be identical."

     You must forgive me for having dwelt at such length on this aspect of a grave subject. In doing so, I had in view one important point, viz., that we might see that there is nothing in the world which can serve, even remotely, as a pattern of government for us in the Church. What I have laid before you above makes it clear that, just as modern science, by proceeding on wrong principles,-from matter upwards, from circumference to center, from effect to cause, the way of all foolishness and insanity, as the Writings affirm-has landed the whole world of scientific thought in chaos, in a negative skeptical state, closing the interiors of the mind, and opening the lower degrees to the influx of hell and its lurid light, so the figment of government "by the people for the people" has, as in the days of antiquity, brought mankind to the verge of a political and social catastrophe which bodes ill for man in both hemispheres.

     The Lord at His second coming has given us the means-the sole means, indeed-of escaping from a pitfall of this kind. It is now revealed from heaven, and in sufficient detail to make the subject of true government in the Church plain to all who are teachable and willing to be led by the truth.

     In matters of the Church, the only kind of government sanctioned by heaven is that form of spiritual government which is known as government according to doctrine. Of the Priesthood, it is revealed that it is the "firs" of the Church." This is no figure of speech, but a teaching pregnant with definite, spiritual meaning. It means that all ecclesiastical matters, as such, are of the Office of the Priesthood-that government and administration are its inalienable prerogatives. The "first" is ever in all the series; and so there is nothing in the Church, as a spiritual body, which does not come within the scope of this law or principle.

594

We are taught again and again in the Writings that the church is both internal and external, and that the clergy are in the internals of doctrine by virtue of their ordination, (which, of course, implies a previous careful and even elaborate preparation for their office), and in the illustration which accompanies a purely correspondential rite; and that the laity are in the externals of doctrine, because their function or use in the Church is on the plane of co-operation and reaction. No church can exist which is not both internal and external. It must have its ministers and its laity.

In order to steer clear of the danger ahead, (which at this day is greater than ever, because the day in which we live is one of vastation and consummation in the Old), we must adhere strictly to those laws of order which have been revealed from heaven. The Lord's presence, we are taught, is where order exists. We are also taught that the converse holds good, that He is absent where order is non-existent. The Church, as a whole-in England, America, and elsewhere-has ignored this teaching, and has substituted man-made ideas having no other source than the proprium of man, which is an "image of hell." The laity, who have no kind of authority from the Writings for the authority they exercise in ecclesiastical matters, have arrogated to themselves a power which has been steadily undermining the existence of the Church.

The gifted and noble founder of the Academy was the one to place your feet upon the rock of doctrine respecting this subject. For this guidance we must ever be thankful. A younger generation of competent and loyal ministers must carry forward the fundamental principles for which he stood. That we shall make mistakes at times, serious mistakes, is quite possible. Humanum est errare. But this need not in the least act as a deterrent, or inspire fear or despair. The angels themselves, although regenerate, are liable to err, and have sometimes to retrace their steps and begin anew. But if our hearts and minds are raised to the Lord, who is our sole Light, we may be sure that, if we are sincere and steadfast-ever holding the love and the good of the neighbor in view-our evils, inherited and acquired, will never be permitted seriously to imperil the work we have in hand,-the establishment of His Kingdom on earth, the Church in which He delights to dwell.

595

ADDITIONAL NOTES ON RITUAL 1920

ADDITIONAL NOTES ON RITUAL W. F. PENDLETON 1920

     (Delivered at the Council of the Clergy, Bryn Athyn, Pa. June 25, 1920.)

     The men of the Ancient Church constructed by at an elaborate ritual which has remained in some form even to the present day. But with the men of our it, the need and use of ritual has come into doubt, and the forms of rite and ceremony are to a large extent regarded as meaningless, because men have lost the knowledge of their signification. This, too, is of Providence, because the representatives of worship in the decline of the Ancient Church were perverted and applied to evil uses. Hence it was permitted that a plenary ignorance should come over the world, as to the true significance of the representatives of worship. But in the New Church, the true knowledge and understanding of the use of a representative ritual is to be restored, in order that in public worship there may be an opening by the internal way to heaven and the Lord. Baptism and the Holy Supper are now to perform their essential uses, in which two are involved all the representative rites of the ancients, and out of which is to be evolved a true representative worship for the New Church; and a use to the New Church is a use to heaven itself the ancient ritual, then, is subjectively present in baptism and the holy supper. In baptism are all the washings of the Ancient and Jewish Churches, and in the holy supper all the bread, all the food, all the eatings of every kind, and all the offerings of them to the Lord. There were further memorable changes made by the Lord, such as the substitution of baptism for circumcision. This was an important change for several reasons, one being that woman was to have her proper place in the Christian Church, and be baptized along with the men, thus preparing the way for the establishment of the conjugial, which could not be effected in the Jewish Church.

     Ritual and Instruction

     Another change was the introduction of the didactic element into ritual,-doctrinal instruction, or exposition of the Word.

596

The way was prepared for this by two modes-for there is always preparation in the old for the beginning of the new-and these two modes were the philosophy and science of the Greeks and the exposition of the law in the synagogue, which was begun after the captivity. This principle of exposition was taken up and carried further by Paul and the other apostles, and has been continued in the Christian Church to the present time. Exposition is to be more fully developed in the New Church, for the doctrine of genuine truth has been given, and the internal sense of the Word revealed, which is to be expounded in sermons.

     Primitive ritual was without doctrinal instruction (A. C. 1141), and this condition existed in the Jewish Church until the Babylonish captivity. It may be said in general that, previous to the coming of the Lord, worship was without instruction, but that after His coming, instruction was added. However, ritual still continued. There are still those, and will continue to be those, who are in states similar to that which preceded the Lord's coming. That is, we still have with us the simple and children. The poor are always with us, even as our Lord said (Matt. 26:11). But the intelligent and the wise also return to these states, which are then as states of spiritual recreation for them. Let no man think that he is not in need of external worship, that he is not in need of the administration of baptism and the holy supper.

     When there is both ritual and instruction in doctrine, all states are provided for. The first part of the service is more like the primitive or representative ritual, and in it the primitive and simple states are reached; but in the last part of the service, in the sermon, the state of spiritual intelligence which is to be in the New Christian Church is directly addressed. For this state, prose or didactic writing has been provided; but for the former state the truth is veiled in the forms of poetry, in which affection and representation are the dominant feature, as in the Old Testament. These forms prevailed in all the early writings, but prose was developed among the Greeks in preparation for the coming of the Lord.

     That instruction and worship are now to go together, is made evident throughout the Writings, and distinctly in many places; but let one number suffice. It is as follows:

597

     "'To minister'-that it signifies whilst in worship and evangelization, appears from the signification of ministering, when concerning Aaron, by whom is represented the Lord, as denoting worship and evangelization. By worship is signified everything representative of worship from the good of love and the truths of faith; for worship from those is truly worship, whereas worship without those is as a shell without a kernel, and as a body without a soul; still such was the worship amongst the Judaic and Israelitish nation, for it only represented internal things, which, as was said, are of love and faith; nevertheless the Lord provided that such worship should be perceived in the heavens, and that thus by it should be effected the conjunction of heaven with man, not by internal things, but by correspondences with external things, on which subject see what was cited, n. 9320, 9380; this worship is what is signified by the ministry of Aaron. That it denotes also evangelization is because by evangelization are meant all things which in the Word treat of the Lord, and all things which in worship represented Him; for evangelization is annunciation concerning the Lord, concerning His coming, and concerning those things which are from Him, which relate to salvation and eternal life; and whereas all things of the Word in its inmost sense treat of the Lord alone, and also all things of worship represented Him, therefore the whole Word is Evangelium (Gospel), in like manner all worship which is performed according to those things that are commanded in the Word; and because priests presided over worship, and also taught, therefore by their ministry was signified worship and evangelization" (A. C. 9925). The teaching is here plain that evangelization or instruction and worship are to go together in the worship of a true internal church.

     Origin of Ritual.

     I have had occasion to call attention before to the fact that ritual is the first of the arts, and out of it grew the other arts, as handmaids of ritual, such as speaking, writing, sculpture, painting, music, the drama, etc.; and also that the first of ritual, or the first of art, took the form of poetry. Philosophy and science followed, which gave rise to prose, and this latter was provided that doctrine might be given for the sake of the spiritual understanding of the Word.

     Though ritual flourished in the Ancient Church, it had its spring in the Most Ancient Church itself. In their visions they saw objects in the spiritual world and were given a perception of their signification, and from this origin they were able to see that all things in the natural world, appearing before the senses of the body, signified the same.

598

All objects, whether existing in a native state, or brought into worship, served as a means to spiritual thought and for exciting spiritual affection. From this source arose the representative rituals of the Ancient Church handed down from generation to generation (A. C. 1409, 1977, 2896, 2995).

     It must be remembered that the origin of the ancient ritual and the origin of the ancient Word is one origin; and that the remains of ritual seen everywhere in the world are nothing else than remains of the ancient Word; but these have been preserved mainly in the representatives of the Jewish church, as recorded in the Old Testament Scripture, and embodied in the two great sacraments of Baptism and the Holy Supper. Guided by these two universals of representative ritual, a rich field is presented to us from which to draw for the formation of a new ritual for the New Church,-a field even wider than that of the religious practices of the many and various religions of the world. For custom and law are also remains of ritual. Every individual man, every family, every group or society of men, every nation, every function great or small, has certain established modes of doing, adapted to needs and conditions, which were originally correspondences and representations. But in religious worship, and in all services where dignity and solemnity are leading features, these customs, laws, practices, originally representative, and in themselves still representative, now receive the name of rite or ritual.

     Ritual in general may be defined as reading and acting the Word. Hence, in the Jewish Church "all things appeared holy in the sight of spirits and angels which were done according to the appointed rites; as when the high priest washed himself with water, when he ministered in his pontifical vestments, or when he stood before the lighted candles," etc. (A. C. 1361.)

     And since the origin of ritual is one with the origin of the Word, or is in time its first derivative, it may be said with exact truth that ritual and worship in all its forms is from the Word in its literal sense, with genuine truths appearing in it here and there, and that its use is similar to the use of the Word itself.

599

It is, in fact, the Word made living in action and speech, and this leads to and inspires obedience in the daily life. From such a source, especially from the sources of the Old Testament, ritual does not directly teach truth but insinuates it, and at the same time begets the affection of what is holy. Memory of this affection returns, and aids and strengthens in temptations and leads to a life of piety and charity.

     Uses of Ritual.

     It is a truth that should be deeply implanted, that ritual and all the externals of worship are the beginnings and constant spring of a life of piety; and a life of piety so begotten becomes a life of charity, or a life of shunning evils as sins against God (A. C. 1679). And further, that a life of charity, or the internal worship of the Lord, would cease if there were no public worship to inspire a genuine piety among men (H. D. 123-128). Ritual is not ritual without religion, that is, unless there be in it the idea of God and a life after death, and preparation for that life. Ritual serves its use when it becomes the means of thinking about God and eternal life. And we are reminded here of the spirit who kneeled down and prayed that he might learn about heaven and the Lord, and who was rewarded with the knowledge which he sought, because he had thought about God and holy things from his early youth (T. C. R. 570). We may well imagine him as inspired to this thought in the life of the body by the recitation of the commandments, and other passages from the Word, in the public services of the church. We even read of the use of images in this connection (A. C. 9972), the use of stimulating thought about God. Images are but forms of ritual. But when the images themselves are worshiped it becomes idolatry.

     It is clear, and is of special interest to us as ministers, that ritual prepares for instruction, for the understanding of truth looking to the life. For this reason a ritualistic service precedes the sermon, and prepares for introduction to the internal sense as expounded in the sermon. As is well known, this is the use of the literal sense of the Word, from which the ritual of the service is derived. In this manner the teaching is fulfilled that there are two things essential to worship, that there may be a holy external, and that the internal may be opened, both of which take place when there is the confession, acknowledgment, and repentance of the heart.

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     A New Ritual.

     It is a striking fact, as I have more than once had occasion to remark, that there is little that is new in the forms of ritual, but that there is to be a new combination and arrangement of the parts, and in it all a new spirit and life. This is what is meant by the words, "Behold, I make all things new," which signify, we are told, that there is to be a new internal in the external that exists. When this takes place, even the external is then new. This is true of ritual because the literal sense of the Word is not new, and yet it is made new when falsifications are removed and the life of the new heaven enters into it (B. E. 96).

     In illustration of this point we are told that worship in heaven is not unlike worship on earth as to externals, but it differs as to internals (H. H. 221). This is the same as to say that worship, as it is to be in the New Church, will not be unlike the worship of the Old Church as to externals, but it is to differ as to internals. The indication afforded in this teaching is that we are to draw on the externals that exist for the worship of the New Church, but that there is to be in that external a new internal from heaven. It is even as the Lord said to His disciples, "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat; all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works; for they say and do not;" (Matt. 23:2, 3), which signifies that the New Church is to accept the forms that exist as drawn from the Word, from Moses and the Prophets, but to remove from those forms the love of dominion and the love of the world, together with all falsified truths. This is also meant by borrowing the vessels of the Egyptians (A. E. 193:9), and by making friends of the mammon of unrighteousness (D. P. 250, A. E. 700:17).

     Church Buildings.

     Ritual in general is a vessel, that is, instrumentality for the regeneration of man; but it is a vessel or an instrument that is living, movable, active, variable, changeable, as it were fluid, like the forms which appear in the spiritual world; but, like these forms, it is in need of a more ultimate and fixed instrumentality; in other words, it is in need of buildings, made of wood and stone, for a fixed and permanent abode of the Lord with men.

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For the Lord is in ritual from the Word, and heaven is in it, but for security and permanent establishment there is the further need of a building resting upon the foundation of the solid earth.

     A church building or a temple dedicated to the worship of the Lord is not only a dwelling-place for Him with men, but it is also the abode of a choir of angels. (See the Adversaria on the tabernacle). But it may also become the abode of evil spirits, or a "den of thieves," as described by the Lord in speaking of the temple at Jerusalem (Matt. 21: 13). And we are told that the images in the temples were representative of the one presence or of the other. Because of the presence of evil spirits, the use of such images was forbidden in the Primitive Christian Church. But "abuse does not take away use, as the falsification of truth does not take away truth, except with those who do it." (D. L. W. 331).

     Spirits, good or evil, are present in a holy external, or in the forms of ritual, and thus in the temple, according to the loves in which the men are who worship in the temple. But good spirits must be present, not only in the worship, but also in the life; otherwise they do not remain, and evil spirits take their place. Hence we read that for those with whom good spirits are present in worship and in the life, the holy of worship is profitable while they are in this world, and also after death (A. C. 4311). And we read further that when external worship is made the all of worship, angels and good spirits recede and spirits from hell draw near, by whom man is then led (A. C. 4680). The temple of the Lord is made a "den of thieves."

     Improvements in the Service.

     Let us now present a few suggestions for the improvement of the Service and of the Liturgy in any future revision, some that were not mentioned in the printed Notes,* and are of special interest to the clergy. Study and experience will reveal other necessary changes.

     First as to the Service. One thing that looks even to present improvement is the importance of avoiding any break in the continuity of the service. It should run smoothly, and nothing be allowed to enter that will distract attention. For this end, time should be given to preparation, such as care in the selection of the lessons, prayers, hymns, and in the other essential features.

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The lessons should be read over until the language is thoroughly familiar, for it is important that the minister should not halt or stumble in the reading. It is well, too, to avoid excessively long lessons. The service is but a skeleton, to be made into a form of life mainly by the thought and preparation, and afterward by the speech and action, of the minister, the congregation co-operating. In this connection it is of interest to note that the word rite is derived from a Sanskrit root signifying "a stream," from which we also have river. The prime idea is that of running or flowing.
     * See New Church Life, January, 1919, to June, 1920.

     Another thing that will contribute to this flow and rhythm of the service is promptness in all the transitions, avoiding awkward pauses, or introducing anything foreign or heterogeneous that may distract attention from the thing in hand, bringing about a degree of self-consciousness, or, like discord in music, disturbing the mind and causing it to descend from its elevated state of affection and delight.

     For instance, when a period is needed by the minister for a change of position, the people should be occupied with singing, as when the Gloria is sung between the Psalter and the first lesson, or between the Creed and the Commandments, or when the Alleluia is sung between the Commandments and the third lesson; so that the transitions may be made easy and natural, without diverting attention to what the minister is doing. To preserve a spiritual elevation of thought by order, symmetry, and harmony of the parts, is essential to ritual, that it may perform the use for which it has come into existence.

     When the passage to be delivered in unison by the people on their knees is recited or sung, the minister might repeat the Amen or a sentence from the Word, at the close, in order to prevent a sudden break and at the same time to mark a transition. It may be remarked that "The Lord our God hear our prayer," was suggested by a passage in Solomon's prayer at the dedication of the temple (I Kings 8:57, 58).

     When the Commandments are omitted from the morning service, it is a good general rule not to omit the prayers. There is not a sufficiency of prayers in the service if only opening and closing prayers are used. More than one prayer ought also to be introduced at this middle Feint of the service. There is something wanting, something of a gap or hiatus, if there is a sudden passage from the Creed to the third lesson, partly atoned for by the Gloria, but not entirely. But exceptions will naturally suggest themselves.

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     The Heavenly Doctrine as read in the service should not be long, and should be so arranged that it closes with the idea of the Lord. The minister might then add a final sentence such as this, "To Him be glory and dominion for ever and ever." The Amen might then be sung, and the people seated.

     It would add to the efficiency of the service if certain fixed sentences and passages were committed to memory by the minister. Recitation while looking into the faces of the people is more effective than reading from a book. There is in it more of communication and spiritual touch. This may be seen illustrated in certain ritualistic bodies, and some secret orders, where the ritual is recited and not read.

     In all portions of the service where the minister and people recite together, such as the Creed and certain prayers, the minister's voice should be heard by the people, and should be about half a syllable in advance of them; and the recitation, just as in singing, should not drag, but be delivered with a degree of speed, even as is said of those who are being inaugurated into gyres in the other world. (S. D. 1014.)

     Simple English should be used in the human compositions of the service, with a sparing use of adjectives and adverbs. Note the standard given us in the language of the Decalogue, of the Lord's Prayer, of the letter of the Word generally, and of the Writings. What is holy and Divine is not in need of exaggerated emphasis and support. We have suggested in another place that a good general rule to follow in choosing the language of ritual is to select that which is poetic rather than what is didactic, that is, the language of poetry rather than that of prose. In ritual, as elsewhere, that which is most obvious is not always the best. But extremes should be avoided, such as too great a didactic effort in hymns or prayers; and, on the other hand, the excessive use of poetry and rhetoric, especially in the prayers.

     In the general prayer on page 29 of the revised offices, the phrase "by acts of daily repentance" is unnecessary, and should be removed in a future revision; especially as a similar phrase occurs in the corresponding prayer on page 62 of the same offices.

     An ideal service would contain four lessons, with the other portions arranged accordingly.

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The first lesson would be from the Law or the Historical Word; the second would be from the Prophets, or the Psalms; the third from the Gospel, or the Revelation; and the fourth from the Writings. For this marks four distinct divisions of the revelation that has been given to men, and would be a thorough representation of it. There would also be four portions to be read, the people standing. The ideal service, to be complete, would include the Holy Supper, following a homily or short discourse. Or, instead of the Holy Supper, some other feast or rite of the church could be introduced. A little reflection, with a proper arrangement of the parts, will show that such a service would be both feasible and effective. But it should be reserved for unusual occasions.

     In the synagogue, the Prophets were given a distinct place in the service. We have already spoken of the fact that the first lesson was from the Law or Historical Word, and that the second was from the Prophets; that the Christian Church adopted from the synagogue the idea of two lessons, but chose the second lesson from the New Testament; and that in the Academy worship a third lesson was added. In the New Church, there is freedom of choice as to whether we shall take the second lesson of the regular Sunday worship from the Prophets or from the Gospel; or whether we shall follow the Jewish or Christian precedent on any given Sunday. For, as has been indicated, the Prophets are entitled to a distinct place in a ritualistic service, to be used when conditions are favorable and judgment approves.

     Improvements in the Sacraments and Rites.

     The special offices of the Liturgy, such as Baptism, the Holy Supper, Betrothal, etc., were hurriedly prepared, for reasons given In the printed Notes. Further study and experience will bring to light improvements that may be made. For instance, the offices of Betrothal and Marriage are rather short, though it is possible even now for any minister who uses them to add to their length by prefixing a suitable passage from the Word; as, for instance, by reading a portion of Psalm 45, or some similar passage from the Psalms or Prophets. Any portion of a chapter on the marriage of the Lord and the Church, or a Psalm in praise of the Lord, could appropriately precede the betrothal or marriage service. Suitable selections from the Doctrine might also be added or substituted.

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In the Betrothal service, further provision should be made for the giving and receiving of a ring or other present.

     The Confirmation Service needs the addition of more doctrinal matter, other than that on free will, with some reduction in the quantity of the latter. Before the subject of free will is introduced into the service, a minister could even now read from the department of Doctrine some things concerning the Lord, repentance, regeneration, or subjects related thereto.

     At the close of Baptism, Confirmation, and similar offices, there is need of a sentence as a manifest signal of the termination of the service, and as a final benediction of grace and good will, something like this: "And now depart in peace, and may the Lord God of peace be with you (and with this child) always. Amen."

     The first part of the communion office now appears to the writer to be unsatisfactory. Until a new office can be prepared the suggestion is made that one of the general offices be used for the introductory portion of the office for the Holy Supper. It might even be considered whether this would not be the best permanent form for the communion office. In this case, only the second portion of the office would need revision and reconstruction. Under this arrangement, a short sermon or homily could be delivered at a regular place in the service.

     At the close of the communion service, a prayer of humiliation and appeal should precede the Lord's Prayer, and a prayer of glorification should follow it. This would reproduce in miniature the service as a whole. For in the office for the Holy Supper, there is first humiliation and repentance, followed by adoration and glorification of the Lord.

     It may be well to look forward to the preparation of a book of homilies or short discourses for use in the communion, and on other occasions. Homilies were originally books of printed sermons, to be read when no sermon had been prepared.

     When numbers increase, it will become necessary, for economy of time, for each communicant to retire after receiving the wine. The blessing could then be introduced at some point after the administration of the elements, while the people are on their knees, somewhat similar to the Grace be unto you which follows the Commandments. The general benediction could close the service as usual.

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     In the communion of the Lord's Supper, in order to give expression to a unanimity of spirit, it is desirable that all move forward at once when the invitation is given, and take their places in or near the chancel-some sitting, others standing-ready to take their places at the communion rail as they are made vacant. A secondary use of this would be greater speed in the service without introducing anything of haste.

     In the offices of Betrothal and Marriage the minister first speaks to both the contracting parties. He should then address them as Beloved. But when he addresses them singly, he should use their Christian names. Beloved should also be used in addressing the candidate or candidates, or the parents of children, in the baptismal and confirmation services, and in suitable places elsewhere. In the ordination service Brother should be used.

     It may be remarked that it was formerly considered permissible to change the Christian name in the confirmation service, thus taking on a new name on entering a new state of life, as well as giving the person concerned an opportunity to choose the name by which he wishes to be known. (See Blunt, p. 258.)

     The Procession

     In the procession of the clergy into the chancel and out of it, order requires that the junior should proceed first, just as in the spiritual world the junior speaks first; for the order is of time and not of importance. The external is first in the order of time, and when this order is observed in procession, it corresponds with the order of the service itself, which begins in the external or ultimate of the Letter, which is in time, and gradually ascends to the internal, which is represented in the sermon.

     The entrance of the choir and clergy in procession is a signal that the Word is now about to be opened, and the people rise in anticipation and preparation for it, taking thus an expectant attitude. The opening of the Word is a representation of the entrance and presence of the Lord, for which preparation has been made, first by humiliation and then by glorification-humiliation, by the individual worship of the members on entering, and by worship in the choir room and in the vestry; glorification, by the singing of all together. It should be noted that the opening of the Word at the beginning of worship is representative of the spiritual opening which is to follow in the sermon.

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     The choir, in the procession and recession, should make a circuit rather than a reversal of the line. For this purpose, the choir stalls should be open at both ends. The choir should also have a leader bearing a standard. Probably the most appropriate standard would be a combination of the cross and the crown, or perhaps the bow and the crown. (See Rev. 6:2; A. C. 26864.)

     The Prayers.

     In the composition and revisions of the prayers, each prayer will receive added grace and beauty by a proper termination, thus avoiding a sudden and abrupt close. Such a termination will also act as a signal for the response of the Amen, making that response simultaneous and uniform. The termination of the Lord's Prayer in Matthew presents a Divine model in this respect. But there is room for some variety.

     When the Responsives are not used after the Lord's Prayer, as in some of the Sacraments and Rites, the minister should introduce a short prayer, or one should be placed there in the revision of the offices. With a prayer to precede and one to follow the Lord's Prayer, a sudden and abrupt approach and departure from that Prayer, as to and from that which is holy and Divine, is provided against. Introductory prayers, such as those before the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments, should not be long. Let us repeat that prayer ought not to close abruptly, but should have a suitable and recognizable termination.

     In the Liturgy, the Lord's Prayer is preceded by a general prayer and responsive prayers from the Word, and followed in like manner. The Ten Commandments are also preceded and followed by prayers. This is on the principle, already indicated, of preparation and gradual approach to what is holy, and the avoidance of sudden and abrupt departure. The suggestion is here made for the adoption of a similar plan in private devotion, or on any occasion when the Lord's Prayer is used. Let it be preceded by a short prayer from the Liturgy or from the Word, and followed in like manner. For example, something like this:

     Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of Thy name, and deliver us, and purge away our sins, for Thy name's sake. Amen.

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     Follow this with the Lord's Prayer. Then say:

     O Lord, forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. Amen.

     For a final closing, the following words from the Liturgy may be used:

     The Lord our God hear our prayer, and incline our hearts unto Him, that we may live and keep His Word. Amen.

     An appeal for mercy and the prayer, Thy will be done, may be introduced at any point in individual or private worship.

     The Minister.

     The minister sometimes represents the Lard in worship, and sometimes the church, always the one or the other. A knowledge of this fact will determine what the minister is to say, or how he is to act, at certain points in the service.

     In certain portions of the service, the minister should stand with one side to the people and the other to the Sacrarium, the body being slightly turned toward the latter. The members of the choir should do the same.

     It is legitimate for the minister to exhibit in voice, manner, and gesture, a degree of fervor, zeal, warmth, unction, or what is called eloquence; for this awakens or calls forth sympathetic feeling or affection in the hearer, that is, stirs the affection of truth; provided eloquence be not considered an end but a means. The end is the instruction of the understanding, and exciting the affection of truth in the understanding. For it is affection that elevates into spiritual light, and not thought alone. But the eloquence which has as its purpose the mere stirring of the affection of the will, without at the same time instructing the understanding, is severely condemned in the Writings. (See T. C. R. 146, 155, and other numbers.)

     Adaptation of Correspondence and Representation.

     It was said in the printed Notes that when representatives are used in worship they are called rituals, and that all ritual is in some manner representative, and that even speech and writing are but interior forms of representation-painting, picturing, image-making; so that representation or correspondence is the law of worship, because it is the law of the literal sense of the Word, from which all the forms of worship are derived; but accommodated, even as the Word is, to the needs of the simple and children; adapted and applied according to the principles of proportion, artistic taste, and a balance of the related parts.

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There will thus be adaptation to environment-perception having full play-and not the mere scientifics of correspondence in the memory. Whenever, in ritual, a thing is really artistic and beautiful, there is in it a deeper reason, and the reason will be found in the law of correspondence and representation. What is lacking in art and beauty is lacking also in the law of correspondence and relation, and hence has no enduring quality, causing tedium or mental weariness. What is here said, however, must be applied with judgment and discretion; for artistic taste and the sense of the beautiful are variable quantities, and may easily be separated from the law of proportion and of correspondence.

     Right and left in the chancel are fixed from the people as facing the east, not from the minister as facing the people or the west. The left is then to the north and the right to the south. It is the reverse of this on the theatrical stage, where the right and left are determined from the actor as facing the audience.

     A doctrine of ritual should be developed, based upon the Writings, upon the literal sense of the Word, and upon research, study, and experience. Such a doctrine or science of ritual would be the formulation of the general principles that are to govern in the construction and use of all the portions of a Liturgy.

     It should be understood in this connection that ritual cannot be constructed and developed from correspondence alone, that is, without a knowledge of the general laws of ritual.

     Sundry Suggestions.

     Finally, let us close with a few simple suggestions, and at the same time present one or two matters of information on our general subject.

     Mr. Whittington composed the music for fifty-six Psalms in consecutive order. The last six are not included in the Psalmady as published, but they are in print. He also composed music for Psalm 100, and for Micah 6:6-8, for use in an experimental service, which was used in preparation for the Liturgy.

     A short discourse should be inserted in the funeral service for uses that are apparent. The prayers in this service need revising.

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     The department of prayers needs a thorough revision. It is to be hoped that some one will devote special attention to this subject, and that the ministers who are composing prayers will preserve them, and present them for consideration when the time comes for revision.

     The prayers at meals should be revised and improved, with an increase of those of human composition.

     The members of the choir should stand in a uniform order, aligned from the one nearest the altars. We have suggested elsewhere a slight turning of the body towards the Sacrarium.

     The number of pages in the Liturgy should be reduced when the time comes for a thorough revision. This can be done by leaving out matter that can be spared without injury to the work as a whole.

     Bowing, as a gesture in worship at mention of the Lord's name,-for instance, in the opening of the Creed-is an act of acknowledgment of Him as present.

     The Amen should be sung at the close of the chants and short hymns. Sometimes a chant should conclude with the Gloria.

     The final exhortation to the candidate (or to the parents), in the offices of Baptism and Confirmation, might conclude with a passage of Scripture and the Amen, instead of what was proposed above.

     "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." (Psalm 66:18.) This passage was chosen to front the first page of the Liturgy. The plate was made, but by some mistake it was left out of the printing. It was used, however, at the corresponding place in the printed Dedication Service. Trial was thus given of its utility as a sentence at the head of the permanent offices of the Liturgy.

     A plate was made (in 1908) of the Anthem, "He shall come down like rain," by Dudley Buck. But the plate was not used on account of an objection by Ditson & Co., the owners of the copyright. Caldwell investigated, and found that the copyright would expire in 1913. This should not be forgotten when the time comes for revision.

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CHRISTIAN ART AND ARCHITECTURE FOR THE NEW CHURCH 1920

CHRISTIAN ART AND ARCHITECTURE FOR THE NEW CHURCH RAYMOND PITCAIRN 1920

     (An Address delivered at a Public Session of the Council of the Clergy, Bryn Athyn, Pa., June 26, 1920.)

     THE REALM OF ART AND ITS RELATION TO RELIGION.

     What is art? And what is its relation to religion? To many artists, indeed, art avowedly is their religion; but this, no doubt, in the sense that what one loves enough, he worships. It is admitted that the arts are cultural. With the ancients, culture and worship were synonymous-even as kultur and materialism became synonymous in our day.

     In the works of many writers, the virtues and religion are confused with art. Ruskin and the idealists are prone to confusion of this kind. On the other hand, one might gather from the statements of many realist and materialistic critics that if morals in any wise should be connected with a work, art surely would be lacking. But, in the interest of philosophy, let us make this clear distinction,-religion is not art, nor art religion. What, then, is art? And what relation does it bear to worship and religion?

     Art is not art because, inwardly considered, it is moral; nor on the contrary, because it is immoral. The moral import of a work of art-the story it tells-has as little to do with its merely artistic merits as do "ill-dressed food or ill-made clothes with the respectability or piety of the cook or tailor." A man of superlative morals may paint a picture which, viewed symbolically, is sublime; yet as a work of art his picture may woefully transgress the laws of drawing and of color, and may possess not even one artistic virtue.

     Art-or, if you please, art for art's sake-is merely the technique of emotional appeal, the mastery of human expression. The root meaning of art is skill, and in this sense the more artless it appears, the more skillful is the art. For the less conscious we are of technique, the more living is the art, the more powerful the expression. The quality and excellence of art is measured by the power of its appeal, effected through harmonious arrangements in the artistic medium employed, whether this medium be the organs of the human body, words, sounds, or symbols of these, or materials of whatever sort, arranged in varying forms for the purpose of expression.

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In themselves, these forms are neither good nor bad, save for the purpose and the connection in which they are used. So in the letter of Scripture, which is written symbolically, or according to correspondences, symbols taken from all the kingdoms of nature have a significance, good or bad, according to the connection in which they are employed. Money, for example, is used in the Word to denote things both good and evil. Morally considered, a coin is neither good nor bad; but man may make it serve God or the devil. Viewed as a coin, it is good or bad solely according to its powers of purchase. So art may serve the powers of good or evil. A painting, a piece of sculpture, literature, or music, viewed as art, is good or bad according to its ability, through harmony and beauty of expression, to stir emotions in the human heart.

Intrinsically considered, all the mediums of artistic expression are dead. Art is living only by virtue of that which animates and is higher than art, even as speech lives by virtue of thought which is its spirit. So the body of man without the soul is dead. But through the soul the body lives, and without the body the soul cannot exercise its power; for power resides in ultimates, and through correspondence the two are one. The forms of art are ultimates, and they are powerful, although the origin of their power is from a higher or more interior source. The power of art was recognized by the ancients: "If I may write the songs of a nation, I care not who makes its laws." Because of the power that resides in ultimates, the art of an age outlives all else of its civilization. The reason is that art deals with the loves and affections of mankind. These are man's very life; and hence the art of any epoch holds the spirit of the age.

Ritual is the oldest of the arts; The truth is that all the arts are gifts of God, intended primarily to be the hand-maidens of religion, even as the liberal art of printing was given primarily for the preservation and dissemination of the Word of God. The arts are cultural; indeed "culture" is derived directly from a word which, in the Latin tongue, means worship. In worship, art makes one with religion if it express and interpret religious feeling truly, in the sense that thought and speech make one through correspondence.

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     The history of the world is written in the temples of all the ages. Worship is the outward manifestation of religion, and religion rules the life of every age until its fall. When our Puritanic ancestors damned art because it "more frequently appeared in fiddling and dancing than in good deeds," they failed to understand that art was not to blame; but men and women whose religion was no longer of the life.

     Speaking generally, the art of all the nations of the past is symbolic; and human monuments which are symbolically religious have a twofold fascination, felt even by those who do not love religion, save in its relation to art and history. What would be left of archaeology if religion were extracted from it? Doubtless even the infidel would find it stupid.

     Art for the sake of art is vastly better than art for the sake of gain, or art pandering to public opinion, or serving other unworthy and debasing ends. Even so, "art for art's sake" is very poor philosophy.

     The charm of art, the appeal of ritual, may satisfy the esthetic sense, may deeply move a votary of the beautiful, and yet may fail to elevate the mind and heart to God and to His kingdom. Ceremony and religious form may Serve merely to steep the soul in sensual beauty, inspire love for things which in themselves are of this world and earthly. All who love religious art and ritual for art's sake alone are idolaters, whether they realize their idolatry or not. (A. C. 409, 10437.)

     But if humility and the spirit of a living faith in God dwell in the heart and mind, a soul conceived in rapture from on high is born of art, and heaven with all its holiness and power is present in the ministry of art,

     THE HERITAGE OF CHRISTIAN ART.

     In the Apocalyptic prophecy, the Lord says of the New Church, "Behold I make all things new." A new Revelation was given, a new Church founded, and the question is asked: "Why should there not be a New Christian art and architecture? Why should we have a Gothic house of worship, with arts and crafts of medieval inspiration?"

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     In Bryn Athyn Church, indeed, there are significant departures from the traditional Gothic plan, notably the sanctuary, built to surround the altar upon which rests the open Word-symbol of the Lord, the Son of Man, who is the Word,-the central object in our worship. However, we are not here concerned with New Church symbolism, but with the outstanding fact that the first New Church Cathedral is a Gothic structure, and with the reasons that underlie this fact.

     With the fall of every church-and there have been five great churches since the world began, which are the subjects chosen for the five-light western window at Bryn Athyn-"some nucleus of a church remains which those of the vastate church do not acknowledge." (A. C. 407.) A new church is established with this remnant in other words, the new dispensation is accepted first by some of the former church whose heredity, environment and training,-indeed, whose entire disposition-is according to the genius of the church from which they came.

     As provided at the consummation of the churches of all former dispensations, the doctrines and traditions of the dying age are preserved for succeeding generations in the writings, art and architecture of the passing church. In Assyria, Egypt, Greece, and Rome, religion and mythology derived from the Ancient Church were expressed with power and beauty long after those nations had become spiritually decadent. For in the last days of an epoch, an autumnal renaissance transpires; art flourishes, and through art the spirit of the passing age is clothed in ultimate and lasting forms, in which those of the dying Church take more delight than in the spirit.

     Thus the very centering of thought and interest in the natural and material things connected with religion-which marks the fall-is used by Providence to save for future generations truth that otherwise would perish. And so the Ancient Church speaks yet through the mythologic art of Greece and Rome, and Truth Divine revealed in the Ancient Word given before the writing of Hebraic Scripture lies hidden in the monuments of Assyria and ancient Egypt.

     Christian symbolism and the traditions of primitive Christian faith have been preserved in like manner in the great cathedrals of the Middle Ages. And, while it cannot be denied that many things therein bespeak the traditions of men rather than the Word of God, as comprehended by the early Christians, nevertheless it will be found that in these Christian temples there is far more for the New Church than has yet been realized.

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The New Church has in them a heritage of Christian art vast and beautiful, much of which has not yet been explored. Moreover, it must be true of the Lord's new coming, as of His first advent, that He "came not to destroy, but to fulfill" the teachings of the former Revelation, whose worship was solemnized in these cathedrals, whose art portrays in many beautiful and graphic forms the story of the Christian Gospel.

     But, granting all the beauty and significance of this early Christian art, why should the New Church look to the past for its artistic inspiration? That is the question.

     A new art, a new architecture, which is expressive of an age or of a people, is a thing of growth. It must follow, nor is it possible for it to precede the development of the mind which forms the life and thought expressed in the laws and customs and the art and culture of a growing civilization. If this be granted, it is natural that the new Christian Church should take the forms of Christian architecture for its temples; and from this art the architecture of the New Church will grow, until the prophecy, "Behold, I make all things new," will be fulfilled when Christian art will live again in forms more glorious than of old.

     The early Christians based their art, their architecture, and their modes of thought and life, on those of Rome. Life today is so confused, so like a pudding stone in variety of composition, that the problems of a new civilization are more complex than at any previous period in history; and forms of art and ritual will therefore very much. However, a people of Christian stock will naturally select Gothic architecture of the great church-building era as their starting-point. For this Gothic architecture, and the traditional Romanesque and Byzantine from which it sprang, is Christian architecture, the only Christian architecture that has a powerful emotional appeal, preserved to men for the material upbuilding of the Lord's New Church.

     Gothic architecture reached its zenith in the great medieval cathedrals, built five hundred years before the consummation of the former Christian Church. And it is significant that since then religious architecture has lamentably declined until it became uninspired and lifeless; until symbolism-the soul of Christian art-expired in the sixteenth century, and the symbolic quality which was its ruling passion was supplanted by a love of craftsmanship and mere technique expressed in the elaboration of meaningless detail.

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Representative or symbolic art thus perished; and as the spiritual quality of Gothic art gave place to decorative technique, so, too, fidelity to use, expressed in the structural integrity which vitalized the earlier Gothic buildings, became subordinate to prettiness of style.

     Confronted in our Gothic quest by several architectural periods or styles, which, toward the end of medieval glory, bear melancholy evidence of decay, we ask: What sort of Gothic should be the basis of our work? Which is the noblest type of churchly art,-the architecture most expressive of deep religion and truly Christian feeling!

     The most enthusiastic churchmen and architects beyond the borders of the New Church would not argue that inspiration can be found in the dead and ugly Gothic structures of the last century. Victorian Gothic is impossible, as all will admit; for it was a false revival of medieval art. There was no new spirit in it. Seeking to recall the departed soul of medieval architecture, these pseudo-Gothic builders, through the sorry medium of architectural decadence, called up an inane and imposter spirit that revealed false art and architectural trivialities.

     However, if the intention be to appraise the architecture of Gothic times, which ended with the Renaissance, it will be found that tastes and beliefs differ widely, even among architects and artists in matters of religious art. In his work on Church Building, Mr. Cram harps upon the spirit that is returning to the Old Church, and argues for a theological and doctrinal restoration. His aim is to clothe the church in the English perpendicular Gothic of the sixteenth century. To this end he adduces artistic, national and theological arguments in favor of the Gothic art of that decadent period in which Christian architecture, as a noble art, was soon to perish. In addition to the defense of his position from an artistic viewpoint, he is inspired by a conviction that in building upon this late English Gothic "we are restoring a theological and administrative continuity, and we must fitly express this in structural form." The New Church looks for neither a doctrinal nor a theological restoration of the former Church, nor for its administrative continuity.

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     Howbeit, we would approach the subject from both a doctrinal and an artistic viewpoint, as does Mr. Cram. But his ideal is to take up the architectural life of the Church "where it was severed in the sixteenth century." Mr. Cram holds that from William the Conqueror to William of Wykeham there had been a sure and logical growth until, by "what almost seemed divine inspiration, William of Wykeham turned the gropings that had been hitherto into clear seeing." And he maintains that in the sixteenth century architecture of the tombs and reredoses of Oxford and Cambridge were expressed "the highest forms of sensitive beauty,'-the Gothic which is a "free, mobile, all-comprehending expression of a religion and a race." Hence, he concludes, "one style, and one only, is for us; and that is the English perpendicular." With other phases "we have nothing to do." "All before had been experimental essays toward national expression, crude often, and always inadequate." (Church Building, Second Edition, 1914, by Ralph Adams Cram, concluding chapter pp. 261-270.)

     From all this we emphatically dissent, believing that the enthusiasm of Mr. Cram the churchman has unduly influenced the better judgment of Mr. Cram the architect. Wykeham and late English Gothic has been well characterized in a recent editorial in the ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW which declares: "There is much glamour about William of Wykeham. He was a great churchman and an able statesman, but he conferred no benefit upon architecture when he transformed the Norman nave of Winchester Cathedral, which Durham, fly, St. Albans, Southwell, bear testimony must have had great dignity, into the wiry, tenuous, monotonous thinness of that least inspired of English Gothic styles, the perpendicular. . . . The fan vaulting, which is by no means the best in England, gives the decorative quality of its time. The west front is impoverished, and has been mischievous in its suggestions to architects of the Victorian epoch. . . ."

     During the six years thus far devoted to the building of Bryn Athyn Church, the appeal of twelfth and thirteenth century Gothic and the earlier architecture from which this was derived has become increasingly powerful, and the later perpendicular and flamboyant periods have become to me more and more superficial and cloying. I would exclaim with Emile Male: "Fully to appreciate its grandeur we must compare (this) medieval art with the art of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries!"

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For, as Charles Eliot Norton has truly said, "after the fourteenth century, the practice of cathedral architecture of the old kind fell into desuetude." My own strong and growing convictions in this matter led to the elimination of many early features of the church approved by Mr. Cram.

Thus, in the constant change and development that have marked the growth of Bryn Athyn Church-which, fortunately, started in an earlier perpendicular period than the decadent Gothic of the sixteenth century-our efforts have ever tended strongly toward still earlier Gothic forms. The powerful artistic appeal of the earlier Christian art has been the impelling cause and inspiration of our trend in this direction. But, if the beginnings of New Church architecture are in Gothic art, there must be something more than this artistic faith and inspiration to plead for the avoidance of the later types in which our work began. And there are indeed symbolic grounds of vital interest that confirm our affection for the forms and traditions of the Golden Age of Gothic. To these I would briefly call attention; for there is evidence to prove that the early Gothic art, which was the glory of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, was inspired by truths of doctrine of the unperverted Christian Church.

Of all the works of art created by the hands of men, there are none that seem to live, through the human spirit that breathes within their every part, as do the marvelous churches and cathedrals of the Middle Ages. The secret of their deep emotional appeal is that in these temples was enacted the religious drama of the lives of those who built and those who worshiped in them. They are fashioned in the human form-not merely the shape of the human body, which their plan indeed resembles-and there is a human quality in all their parts, and in the varied uses which those parts subserve. Their art comprises all the arts; in them religion makes appeal to all man's senses. Their perfection and their unity arise from the perfection of variety so organized that all things conspire to one end. The varying minds of many men whose labor was inspired by love and joy abounding in their work are written in these monuments of Christian art, which may be likened to great symphonies in which a multitude of voices join in sublime and mighty harmonies, full and rich, and well-nigh infinite in their variety. All other architecture is by comparison inadequate and elementary.

619

     The cathedrals were not mere liturgies in stone; nor was their function solely to give means whereby religion might appeal emotionally through art to all the senses; neither was their soul the spirit of the prayers of men. They are a human telling of the story of the Word, wherein the illiterate could read, in sculptured stone and wood, in glorious windows, metal work and painting, despite the intrusion of perversions, the story of the Word of God.

     The symbolism of the western porch of Chartres Cathedral will illustrate the Biblical character of these ancient churches; for here, as a writer on medieval times has said, "the whole Gospel is revealed to the gaze of the Christian who is about to enter the house of the Lord." The central figure represents the Lord as King of kings, and in a wealth of sculptural detail is told the story of Joseph and Mary and the Nativity of our Lord up to the massacre of the innocents by Herod, and the events leading to the last appearance of the Lord to His disciples on the Mount of Olives. As described by Cecil Headlam, "we have been shown Him expected, prophesied, prefigured, and again, realizing the prophecies and fulfilling all the acts of His divine mission." Here we find the risen Christ triumphant surrounded by the four beasts of the Apocalypse; below, the twelve apostles sent forth to preach the Gospel; and above, the twelve Apocalyptic angels and the four and twenty elders. This is none other than the prophecy of the New Church depicted in sculpture that is among the most treasured art in all the world, in statuary that is more spiritual in feeling than any ever fashioned by the hands of men.

     "Each part of the cathedral," says Headlam in his Story of Chartres, "like the cathedral as a whole, is the superb product of the intimate alliance of nameless architects, nameless sculptors, nameless painters of glass, working with the one object of setting forth the glory of God to the multitudes, illustrating for all unreading eyes the Word of the Lord. The cathedral is a Bible in stone, and the porch a Gospel in relief, a sculptured catechism, a preface and a resume of the Book. Each stone, thus understood, is seen to be a page of a great drama. This drama is the history of humanity from the creation of the world to the day of the last judgment. Within, the same story is repeated. The jeweled windows are there not only for the sake of the holiness of their beauty, not merely to provide the pilgrim with the dim religious light suitable to his mood. . . .

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The five thousand figures in those legendary lights are the commentary and the repetition of the sculptured text without."

This early art was strongly traditional. Emile Male, in his work, Religious Art in France of the XIII Century, has this to say of its traditional nature: "Faithful to the past, the XIII century did not relinquish the old conventions, and deviated little from tradition. By that time the canons of religious art had grown to have almost the weight of articles of faith, and we find theologians consecrating the work of craftsmen to their authority. . . . Art was considered one form of the liturgy,. . . and it was well for the art of the thirteenth century that it did so piously preserve the rudiments of this ancient symbolism, for by that means it attained the grandeur peculiar to works to which successive centuries had contributed.

But what is there in these traditions of peculiar interest to the New Church? "To begin with," says Male, "the whole church is oriented from the rising to the setting sun, a custom dating back to primitive Christian days, for it is found even in the Apostolical Constitutions." Again, we find in these traditions some knowledge of the science of correspondences, particularly as to numbers. Says Male: "The Middle Ages never doubted that numbers were endowed with some occult power. This doctrine came from the Fathers of the Church. . . . St. Augustine considered numbers as thoughts of God. In many passages he lays it down that each number has its divine significance. 'The Divine Wisdom is reflected in the numbers impressed on all things. The construction of the physical and moral worlds alike is based on eternal number. We feel that the charm of the dance lies in rhythm, that is in numbers; but we must go further, beauty is itself a cadence, harmonious number. The science of numbers, then, is the science of the universe, and from numbers we learn its secret. Therefore the numbers met with in the Bible should be considered with reverent attention, for they are sacred and full of mystery. He who can read them enters into the divine plan." Again, "The symbolic meaning of each number is first dogmatically stated, to be subsequently verified by the examination of passages of Scripture in which numbers appear. The interpretations do not vary, and one feels oneself in the presence of a body of doctrine."

621

"The same teaching couched in precisely the same terms was transmitted through the centuries."

     Thus writes Male. It is vague and general, you may say; and so it is. But certain definite correspondences shine forth with brilliance. Let a single instance, quoted again from Male, suffice to illustrate: "From St. Augustine onwards all theologians interpreted the meaning of the number twelve after the same fashion. Twelve is the number of the universal Church, and it was for profound reasons that Jesus willed the number of His apostles should be twelve." How similar to Swedenborg's oft-repeated teaching of the significance of the twelve disciples!

     But what as to the representation of God in this early Gothic art? What faith is there discovered? The following is quoted from the same student of the Middle Ages, and had I myself written the statement, it might well be thought that affection for the early Gothic art colored the vision of the writer, or that he who wrote saw with the eyes of one to whom the doctrine of the New Church was well known. "The artists of the Middle Ages," says Male, "imbued with this doctrine, almost invariably represent the Creator in the likeness of Jesus Christ. The absence in the churches of any likeness of God the Father filled Didron with needless amazement and Michelet with mistaken indignation. For, according to the theologians, God the Father created in principio, which is to say in verbo, that is, by His Son. Jesus Christ is at once Creator and Redeemer." Further Male says: "The world may therefore be defined as 'a thought of God realized through the Word.' If this be so, then in each being is hidden a divine thought; the world is a book written by the hand of God in which every creature is a word charged with meaning. The ignorant see the forms-the mysterious letters-understanding nothing of their meaning, but the wise pass from the visible to the invisible, and in reading nature read the thoughts of God. True knowledge, then, consists not in the study of things in themselves-the outward forms-but in penetrating to the inner meaning intended by God for our instruction. For, in the words of Honorius of Autun, every creature is a shadow of truth and life.

     To quote Male further:

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     "Had medieval artists confined themselves to historical cycles, there would be no reason to dwell on them further; but there was in the thirteenth century another and infinitely more curious reading of the Old Testament. The artists preferred, for the most part, to adhere to the spirit rather than to the letter. To them the Old Testament seemed a vast figure of the New. Following the guidance of the doctors, they chose out a number of Old Testament scenes and placed them in juxtaposition with scenes from the Gospel, in order to impress on men a sense of the deep underlying harmony. While the windows in the Sainte-Chapelle tell a simple story, those at Chartres and Bourges show forth a mystery."

     "God, who sees all things under the aspect of eternity, willed that the Old and New Testaments should form a complete and harmonious whole; the Old is but an adumbration of the New. To use medieval language, that which the Gospel shows men in the light of the sun, the Old Testament showed them in the uncertain light of the moon and stars. In the Old Testament truth is veiled, but the death of Christ rent that mystic veil, and that is why we are told in the Gospel that the veil of the temple was rent in twain at the time of the Crucifixion. Thus it is only in relation to the New Testament that the Old Testament has significance, and the Synagogue that persists in expounding it for its own merits is blindfold."

      "It is in Origen that the allegorical interpretation of the Old Testament first appears as a finished system. He begins by laying down as an axiom that the meaning of Scripture is threefold. For Scripture is a complete whole made, like man, after the image of God. Even as there are in man three components, body, vital principle and soul, so there are in Scripture three meanings, the literal, moral and mystical. . . . Origen challenges the literal sense in particular, for to him the letter seemed to contain absurdities and contradictions which had given rise to every heresy. 'Who is stupid enough,' he says, 'to believe that God like a gardener made plantations in Eden, and really placed there a tree named the tree of life which could be seen by the bodily eye?'"

     "Augustine says in his Confessions: Often did I rejoice to hear Ambrose telling the people in his popular discourses that 'the letter killeth, and the spirit maketh alive,' and interpreting in a spiritual sense passages which, taken literally, seemed to be an exhortation to vice."

623

     "We have here the great divisions of a universal history in which everything speaks of the Christ, and which form the very chapters of Vincent of Beauvais's Speculum Historiale. 'The Bible here presents itself to us as it did to the men of the Middle Ages, a succession of types of Christ whose meaning grew ever clearer. The patriarchs who symbolize the Messiah, and the prophets who proclaim Him, form an unbroken chain from the first to the second Adam."

     The early Christians of northern Europe who built the great cathedrals were net, like the Latin fathers of the heretical councils, highly intellectual men, skilled in sophistry. Religion, as depicted in their art, was a concrete presentation of the Scriptures and their traditional interpretation. They were still primitive; in this respect their religion and their art, although symbolic, was simple and religiously emotional, not abstractly metaphysical.

     And yet, "in those centuries of unquestioning faith, the artists strove above all to demonstrate the great dogmatic significance of the New Testament." The human interest of a sacred scene, the joy and suffering of the human characters portrayed, were entirely subordinate to doctrinal interpretation, the symbolic import of their work. In representing the crucifixion, "the thirteenth-century artist thought less of stirring the emotions than of recalling the dogma of the Fall and the Redemption, the central conception of Christianity."

     The tenderness of mother love for the child Jesus, the human agony of the bereaved mother over the death of her Son, make a strong appeal in the Italian pictures; "but it was an appeal to the heart, in striking contrast to the appeal to the head, made by thirteenth century art. In the fourteenth century, art grows more human, and the Virgin presses her child to her heart, smiles at him and offers him a bird or flowers. . . . In the thirteenth century, before such a mystery even maternal love is stilled. Mary keeps a religious silence and ponders, say the commentators, the words of prophets and angels which had even now come to pass. St. Joseph shares her silence, and motionless, with fixed gaze, the two are wrapt in solemn contemplation. So imposing and entirely theological a conception is far removed from the Picturesque cribs which made their appearance at the beginning of the fifteenth century, and which mark the end of great religious art."

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The later medieval art is human, charming, tender; but that of the golden age which it succeeded is rapt with the solemn grandeur of religion. (The foregoing quotations are from Male's above-mentioned work.)

The cathedrals of that bygone age are filled with deep religious feeling. The life which has departed from the Christian Church still lingers there to stir our hearts with love and admiration for the living Church, doomed then to perish in the melancholy days that followed. For even in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries-the age of Chartres and Rheims, of Paris, and of Amiens-the Christian Church was slowly dying from evils of life and heresies of doctrine. But it had a span of several centuries before its doom was sealed by the Last Judgment, which occurred not until the year 1757, thus five hundred years after the zenith of Gothic art was reached in the thirteenth century. In the great cathedral age, the Christian Church still lived; indeed, our European ancestors were not converted to Christianity in large numbers until long after the councils of heresy had foreshadowed the downfall of the Christian Church. It was not an old Church with them, but a new Church, beautiful and living, and there was yet a long time before the Consummation of the Age.

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CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE 1920

CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE N. D. PENDLETON 1920

     (Remarks following the Address by Mr. Raymond Pitcairn on "Christian Art and Architecture for the New Church.")

     Were you never impressed with the very great contrast between the style and make-up of the Writings and that of the Letter of Scripture,-the Old and New Testaments? The New Testament is very different from the Old, but the Writings are altogether different from both of those former Revelations.

     Now I would like to explain in a few words, and in a somewhat historical way, why it is that the Writings are written in the style in which they are. When the two former Revelations were given, men began to think about the teaching contained in them. By reading a portion here and a portion there, they gathered together the various statements made, and rationalized about them,-formed a rational idea or concept of the whole. They did this in regard to the nature of the Scripture. Hence, in the early days of the Christian Church, they began to form doctrines-interpretive doctrines concerning the Scripture,-the Word-what it was, its quality, its meaning, its import. They did the same with regard to the Lord, as to who He was, what He was. They formed doctrines, they formed creeds, and for century after century this process continued. It began in a very simple and general way, represented by the Apostles' Creed, but afterwards passed through enormous development; and if you have not studied ecclesiastical history, you have little notion of the books written in the form of doctrine-inquiring, explaining, interpreting every phase and aspect of the Scriptures.

     The doctrine thus produced, thus organized, was indeed dominated by certain false concepts-the idea of three Gods, the vicarious atonement, salvation by faith alone, and certain other generals or universals which perverted this stupendous doctrinal structure. But, in spite of this, there were innumerable truths drawn from the Word and interwoven in this doctrinal structure. It was as if there was a constant questioning:-Who was Jesus Christ, and what is the meaning of the Scripture as a whole?

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And they answered these questions over and over again, in this, that, and other ways, under the leading of universal false conceptions; but wonderful truths were involved, and I am willing to venture that if a painstaking New Church student were to go through all the medieval books on doctrine, and extract from them the visions of truth here and there, and put them together, he would form something very similar in external aspect to the Writings of the Church-barring, of course, the great universal truth of the Lord in His Second Advent. But be would have a structure superficially quite analogous to the Doctrines of the New Church.

My point is that that whole doctrinal structure was in the form of inquiry, inquiry, if you please, asking heaven the meaning. And the answer to all those questions through the ages was finally given in the Writings of the New Church. And what is the form of the Writings? It is a form of doctrinal statement similar to that which was developed in the Christian Church; and so they appear superficially to be an evolution of Christian doctrine in all its form and structure. It is simply the doctrinal structure of the Christian Church that has been adopted, even as the philosophy of the ages was adopted in Swedenborg's earlier works.

This comes very close to what Mr. Pitcairn was saying with regard to the cathedral-the Gothic cathedral and its meaning to the Christian Church. The very same thing is true of doctrine itself. The architecture of our doctrine is Christian architecture from beginning to end, and it can never be anything else through all the ages to come. And so we ale following the very best of precedents in the new church building in taking the best forms that Christian architecture has presented to us and molding them to our purpose. And the same is true of ritual, of music. We have a ministry, we have theological training. It is all very similar externally to the work done in the other Churches. The difference lies in the great animating soul.

627

NEW CHURCH AND THE CONSUMMATED CHRISTIAN WORLD 1920

NEW CHURCH AND THE CONSUMMATED CHRISTIAN WORLD SAMUEL ROSCHMAN 1920

     (A paper read at a banquet in Kitchener, Ont., on June 19, 1920.)

     The knowledge of the true state of the Church called Christian is a doctrine given for the use of the New Church. Without a recognition of this doctrine, there is little hope of the establishment of a New Church among a remnant in Christendom. This doctrine is a matter of revelation solely. That is a fundamental truth. Left to his own insight, the judgment of the man of the Church will be erroneous; for he is in the world and of the world, as to his life and as to his affections. His power of discernment is blinded by these affections, and his untaught mind is deceived by appearances We have, perhaps, lived to see a decrease in lawlessness, disorder, and crime on the plane of civil life, and this might be taken to indicate a better world. Revelation has been given to correct our judgment in this, and to warn us into paths of safety. The truth is revealed lest the watchmen of Jerusalem sleep, and permit the enemy to enter the City through the walls he has breached.

     We are taught that a judgment was performed 150 years ago on the Church called Christian, and that this Church is gradually to be vastated of all truth, and thence of all genuine good. This vastation is being consummated. The true knowledge of the One Only God as to His Eternal and Divine Human is lost, and where God is unknown He surely cannot be loved. No genuine good or genuine charity can exist apart from that love. Where the voice of God is not known or heard, there can be no obedience to His Divine Laws. The teaching is clear, and was early recognized by the founders of the Academy. This recognition was the actuating incentive to the formation of that body.

     Let us acknowledge these two truths: (1) That the revelation concerning the state of the Christian world treats of internal states, and (2) that we, of ourselves, cannot judge of those states, any more than we can judge of the internal state of the individual of the world.

628

We are first to accept the revelation as a matter of faith, and then we may seek for the evidences about us. Of these we shall find many. But let us remind ourselves that the place to start these investigations is, so to speak, at home-with ourselves. This will surely prevent bigotry or self-glorification from distorting the judgment.

     The incoherence of the many and various tenets of present-day faith, we view the fulfilling of the prophecy that when the temple shall be destroyed, not one stone shall be left upon another. The endeavor to rear a new tower of Babel, to approach heaven by "another way," has resulted in nought but a confusion of tongues. Truth is unknown-faith is dead. But how about life-the life of regeneration-the life of charity? What evidences here?

     Follow the trend of modern church activities, and you witness the absence of an endeavor to further the cause of salvation by an appeal to the will of the individual. Evil appears to be regarded, not as a state within the mind of the man himself, but as something without and around him. Thus, with brass bands playing, and the tune of "Onward Christian Soldiers" on the lips to break the enchantment of the "evil one," the stronghold of the devil is attacked in "massed formation." The total result is so-called moral reform,-a clean body expected to create its own clean mind, while the soul's cleanliness is left to take care of itself. The zeal of these reformers to become their "'brother's keepers" is doubtful charity. To know evil, to recognize it in oneself, and to combat it interiorly in one's self, is the Lord's appointed way of salvation.

     Yet, see the growth in popularity of such ideas as we might group under Christian Science, which denies the actuality of evil. The world today is under a great wave of Methodism (let us call it), which hopes for salvation by ignoring or side-stepping temptations, believing it can raise itself above temptation by its own bootstraps. Evil is assigned to man's environment rather than to his human nature, which itself creates that environment It is assigned to the bottle-the poor inanimate bottle-instead of to the man himself, who, parched and dry of religion, knows not its proper use.

     It is necessary to review and meditate upon these states from time to time, for they are ours as well. We are unregenerate beings in this world; we are of the world and its sphere. Recognition is a step toward its removal; and this is necessary, because the Church will not grow in such ground.

629

History teaches that, owing to the poor ground in a dying Church, a new Church has always been reared in new soil. It is no different at this day. The Lord reveals that the New Church is again being established among the Gentiles-among some simple souls in Asia and Africa who have been preserved from the sphere and thought of modern Christendom. There is small hope for any but a remnant in Christian countries. And if we believe that we have need to attach ourselves to this remnant, for salvation's sake, and for the preservation of the idea of the sanctity of the Word and its revealed truth, let us not forget the Divine command, "Come out of her, my people."

     The strong men who banded together to form the Academy realized that a New Church, with a new faith, required a distinct organization with a distinctive life,-social, moral, religious and spiritual, in order that it might live. A mixture meant spiritual death-a Church "neither hot nor cold," to be "spewed out of the mouth." Noah was isolated in the ark until the time for a re-establishment was fulfilled. The sons of Israel could not worship their God in Egypt. The disciples of the Christian Gospel shook from their feet the dust of a city that could not receive the truth. We surely must meditate upon this Divine Law at a time when the Lord is establishing a New Church.

     The truth is plain; and if acknowledgment is present, we will recognize the necessity of combating the dangerous spheres and persuasions which are ever pressing in upon us. Inactive against these spheres, we are easily lulled to sleep, or are carried away by the jazz of today which, with a certain emotional exhilaration, forces our feet into strange steps.

     Let us not be misled by the evidences of external order, spurious goodness, and assumed piety round about us. The magicians of Egypt were able for a time to reproduce the very miracles that were performed through the laws of Divine Truth. We have revelation to open our eyes to the true character of the "miracles" performed at this day by the magicians of the dragon, who endeavor to persuade us that we cannot leave the flesh pots without perishing. Let us hearken to the voice of our Moses, and be willing, if necessary, to undertake our journey into the wilderness, for we cannot truly worship our God in the sphere of Egypt.

630

HOPE 1920

HOPE FRANK HODSON ROSE 1920

     Hope is one of the most important factors in life. It is the source of endeavor, of thought, and of action; it is the beacon that shines through the immediate difficulties, and lights the path to the desired result. If hope be extinguished, all effort ceases; for then the mental eye can see no goal for which to strive, no ideal to reach or future to anticipate.

     A common definition of hope is that it is "a desire of some good, accompanied with an expectation of obtaining it or a belief that it is attainable" (Webster); but such a definition is of its dry bones, not of the soul that gives it life. It ignores the possibility that a hope may be evil, or that it may be a state without determination to a subject.

     But when we turn to the Revelation of the Second Advent, we find a more satisfying definition. It is "from love to see the effect in thought, not in the effect, but before it; or not in the present, but in the future." (D. P. 178.) It is also described as the delight of reason in the anticipation of events; and its increase or decrease is in the proportion that reason sees the possibility of the achievement in the desire.

     Judged by the standards of the world, hope is an abstract thing; yet, like all truly abstract things, it is truly substantial. It has within it desire and thought; and in the spiritual world, which is the real world, desire and thought are themselves substantial; for if they exist at all, they exist conjoined and in their ultimate. As such, hope is an ultimate of the Lord's Providence for the salvation of man. It is His presence in temptation. At such a time, man is, as it were, inserted among the hells; the evils and falsities of his proprium assail him, and force him to despair. Evil spirits surround him, press upon him from every side, and act as a barrier against the influx from heaven. Then it is that the Lord gives man hope and the consequent consolation. (See A. C. 8165.)

     There is also a hope given to the wicked, not for their reformation, but as a sedative for their evils. "When they intend and desire any fraud, and have the hope of doing evil, then they have consolation and are quiet." (S. D. 2880.)

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It is in the recurrence of these states of consolation and quietude, inspired by the hope of doing evil, that the evil are prepared for some future use to the Gorand Man.

     In the best sense, however, hope is the presence of the Lord with men in temptation. It is the means by which he is kept in a state of resistance to the evils which oppress him. "All temptations appear evil, because they are anxieties and inward griefs, and, as it were, damnations; for on such occasions man is let into the state of his evils, consequently among evil spirits, who accuse him, and thus torture his conscience; nevertheless the angels defend him, that is, the Lord through the angels, who keep the man in hope and trust, which are the powers of combat from within, whereby man resists." (A. C. 6097.)

     Thus hope and trust are the means by which man fights in temptation. They are, so to speak, his own weapons-those which he consciously possesses. In temptation, it appears as if the Lord and the regenerate life are far distant, but hope and trust remain with the man and enable him to continue the combat. It was hope that sustained the Israelites in their long fight against the oppression of Pharaoh, and it is the same with the men of the spiritual church. "If they have not hope and faith, falsities and evils will drag them down." (A. C. 6939.)

     It has been stated that hope is the Lord's presence with man in temptation. The Lord is then present both mediately and immediately; but whereas faith is His mediate presence, hope is His immediate presence. The truths of faith are present in some degree in the external of man when he is being tempted; but they are not inrooted until the temptation is completed; and in the meantime the truths themselves are sustained by the immediate influx of hope. This influx, like all influx, is felt rather than perceived. It inflows into a more interior plane than that upon which the combat of temptation takes place, and therefore it appears intangible and elusive. Concerning this obscurity of influx in temptation, we have the following teaching:

     "To every falsity which the bells inject, there is an answer from the Divine. The falsities which are from the hells are injected and flow into the external or natural man; but the answer from the Divine flows into the internal or spiritual man.

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This latter influx, which is from the Divine, does not come as fully to man's perception as the falsities do; neither does it excite the singulars of thought, but the generals thereof, so that it is perceived merely as a hope and the consequent consolation. (A. C. 8159.)

     Hope, therefore, is an essential feature of temptation in which man is successful, (and all temptations are permitted for the end that man may be successful), and hence it is that there is always hope when the strain is greatest. It is also the beginning of the end; for it is the immediate influx of the Lord as hope that revivifies the man, refreshes him, and re-establishes him in the faith. There is no victory without hope.

     Temptation is a state of doubt and negation, and it is the intention of evil spirits to keep man in this state. "A man who is in temptation wavers between what is negative and what is affirmative; . . . but still, if he suffers himself to be raised up by hope, he remains steadfast to what is affirmative." (A. C. 2338.)

     Hope is the presence of the Lord in and during the temptation, but as man emerges from temptation, hope becomes comfort and consolation, and when the victory is complete, it becomes peace.

     Hope is of the immediate influx of the Lord, but there must be vessels stored up in the interiors of man to receive it. There must be remains, for without them no victory is achieved, nor can temptation take place. Man is never tempted until there is a basis for resistance; and this basis is constituted by the remains that are with him. In practical experience, it will be found that the "remains" into which hope inflows are the memories of the letter of the Word. In temptations, man may argue with himself from the rational truths of the Second Advent; may, by their help, beat down the falsities which are insinuated into his understanding; but the hope that comes to him, the inarticulate confidence and trust that cheer him in his hour of trial, come to him from the letter of the Word.

     The letter of the Word is all-powerful in temptation, for it is the containant of all Divine Truth. Our Lord Himself, who is the Divine Truth Itself, when He was tempted of the devil, used the letter of the Word to repel the assaults. So with man, when he is reduced to despair, when he walks through the valley of the shadow of death, it is the memories of the letter of the Word that comfort him with the blessing of hope.

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa,
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA.

Editor                    Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager      Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager

     TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION
One Year          $3.00 payable in advance
Single Copy          30 cents
     THE OPTIMISTIC NEW CHURCHMAN.

     While the permeationist is fondly accepting the "enlightenment" and "goodness" of present-day Christianity as a sign of the Second Coming and the descent of the New Jerusalem, the extremist of another type, in his untempered zeal for distinctiveness, is asking the old question in a new form, "Can any good come out of Christendom!" Thus the one, in his optimism, finds so much of good and truth in the world; the other, in his pessimism, finds so much of evil and falsity. The one mistakes natural good for saving good, the "breaking up of the creeds" for the dawn of spiritual intelligence; the other looks with sinister glance upon every appearance of Christian piety and charity, always suspecting the wolf in sheep's clothing. And though neither extremist is rational, we confess to greater sympathy for the zealot. He is usually a repentant sinner-pessimistic about the state of the world because he finds so much evil in himself. And he is more in tune with Revelation than his anti-type, who is optimistic over the spiritual progress of the world because he covertly believes that he is a pretty good sort of fellow himself.

     A rational view requires that we square the evidence with revealed truth, not revealed truth with the evidence-with our own prudent judgment of the appearances.

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It is a fact revealed that genuine spiritual good cannot come down among men by permeation, or by any influx apart from a state prepared to receive,-a state which can only be prepared by intelligent acceptance of the spiritual truths of the Heavenly Doctrines and a life of internal repentance. The Divine operation does not fall into an empty mind (De Verbo 12), nor into a mind occupied with falsity and evil, until these are removed by repentance (T. C. R. 522). To hold that the New Church is being established by permeation,-by an influx into the minds of those who either know nothing of the truths of the New Jerusalem or have already rejected them, or are unwilling to come out openly and accept them,-is to repeat the folly of the Christian Church when it confused redemption with universal salvation, when it made faith alone without the works of repentance the badge of redeeming grace. Is it any different to assume that the world is "becoming better" merely by virtue of the Second Coming, and without a reception of the Lord where alone He comes-in the Writings of the New Church?

But we are told that the "light of the New Age" is permeating the Old Church, and the devotees of this view are forever finding new evidence of it, mistaking the mere after-effects of the Last Judgment for genuine signs of a reception of the Lord,-an error that has taken hold of a large part of present-day New Churchmen, not only retarding the true growth of the Church, but proving as destructive to real New Churchmanship as faith alone was to Christians. For it is contrary to all revealed principles to be persuaded that the New Church can be established by any other means than repentance in the light and power of the Heavenly Doctrines-in the light of an open acceptance and the power exercised in spiritual temptations. Why should we deceive ourselves into believing that this purification is going on among Christians of the Protestant sects who have had ample opportunity to know the Writings only to reject them, and who are frank enough to admit that the organized New Church has no place in a Federation of Christian sects? Would that all New Churchmen were as frank!

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A recognition of the modes of Divine order is the only sound basis for optimism. And this every faithful and repentant New Churchman has. He has faith in the Divine assurance of the eventual establishment of the New Church,-a faith that becomes confidence in the measure that he is doing his own little part in co-operation with the Lord: "It is certain that the New Church, which is the New Jerusalem; will come into existence; and it is also certain that the falsities of the former Church must first be removed" (A. R. 547). This is the way of Divine order. And the New Churchman who is shunning the falsities and evils of his heredity is in the way of this order, in the tide of Divine Providence,-is doing the most essential thing to Promote the growth of the New Church, and has the deepest ground for confidence, for optimism. But you will find him rather pessimistic over the state of the world because he so often despairs of conquering his own evil.
DR. EDWARD CRANCH 1920

DR. EDWARD CRANCH E. T. C 1920

     BORN OCTOBER 16, 1851-DIED MAY 20, 1920.

     Dr. Edward Cranch, the son of John and Charlotte (Dawes Appleton) Cranch, was born in New York City. At the time of his birth, his parents had already become receivers of the Doctrines, and conscientiously brought up their children in the faith of the New Church. His grandfather, Judge William Cranch, was the first official Supreme Court Reporter, and was later appointed by his political opponent, President Jefferson, as Judge in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, shortly afterward becoming Chief Justice of that Court, over which he presided for more than 50 years.

     In 1854, Dr. Cranch's parents moved from New York to Washington, D. C., where his childhood and early youth were spent. During the Civil War, as a boy of It years, he assisted in the work of the United States Sanitary Commission by delivering supplies to the hospitals. A Unitarian Church, used as a hospital at that time, was called "Cranch Hospital." After the war, he was prepared for college by Dr. Thomas F. Moses, his brother-in-law and an active New Churchman; and in 1868 he entered Columbian College (now George Washington University), from which he graduated in 1871 with honors and a degree of Ph. B.

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In the fall of that year he enlisted in the regular army, and was appointed hospital steward in the Surgeon General's office. At the same time he entered the medical department of Georgetown University, which held evening sessions to accommodate the men in the Government Service. He there received the degree of M. D. in 1873, and was valedictorian, having received the highest honors in the class. In June, 1874, he was honorably discharged from the Government Service, and removed to New York City, where he was interne in the Homeopathic Surgical Hospital, now known as Hahnemann Hospital. He attended lectures at the New York Homeopathic Medical College, and in 1875 received his second degree of M. D., this time as a Homeopath.

It was in May, 1875, that the Doctor removed to Erie, Pa., where he opened an office and commenced the practice of medicine and surgery that continued almost to the day of his death, May 20, 1920. In addition to his large practice, he was greatly interested in many and varied activities connected with his profession, being a member of the American Institute of Homeopathy and of the American Medical Association. When the Homeopathic State Board of Medical Examiners was organized in 1894, he was one of the first examiners appointed, serving on this Board respectively as Secretary, Treasurer, and President until its reorganization about 1909. He was President of the Erie County Medical Society during 1919.

Throughout his life, Dr. Cranch was an ardent supporter of the New Church, being an earnest student of the Heavenly Doctrines and the Letter of the Word in the original tongues, Hebrew, Greek and Latin. In the NEW CHURCH LIFE from 1883 to 1911 may be found a number of articles from his pen on a variety of subjects, both scientific and religious. Among these we may note the following:-A Review of Swedenborg's work on The Brain; papers on "Prohibition," "Hypnotism," "The Vermiform Appendix," "Valid Evidence and Sound Reason," "Evolution," "The Word of the Lord in His Second Coming," "Prayer," "Promoting the Organic Uses of the Church," and "The Laws of Cure." In 1898, he delivered an address on "Intellectual Culture" at the Academy Schools Commencement.

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     Dr. Cranch was one of the very early members of the Academy, and has consistently espoused its cause from the beginning, firmly upholding the Divine Authority of the Writings as the very Word of the Lord in His Second Coming. He was an active member of the General Church from its inception.

     A firm believer in New Church education, he employed a competent and sincere New Church governess and teacher, Miss Bertha Fales, of Norfolk, Mass., to instruct his children in their early years, and later sent nearly all of them to the Schools of the Academy at Bryn Athyn.

     He was always most active in his endeavors to build up the small Circle of receivers in Erie, inviting the members to join his own family worship on Sunday mornings, that he might provide the much desired regular Sunday worship such as is held in the larger societies. He did this as long as he was well enough to officiate as leader. His presence and help in this small Circie will be missed in many ways.

     Dr. Cranch was married in 1875 to Miss Rouette F. Hunt, who was of New Church parentage. The ceremony was performed by the Rev. Jabez Fox in the New Church house of worship on North Capitol street, Washington, D. C. He is survived by his wife, six sons, a daughter, and fifteen grandchildren, also an invalid sister who resides at Cambridge, Massachusetts.
     E. T. C.
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

THE SOUTH AFRICAN NEW CHURCH OPEN LETTER, NO. 23, for July, 1920, now edited by Miss E. Cockerell, comes to hand somewhat delayed by the illness of the former Editor, Mr. W. M. Buss, who has found it necessary to relinquish the office for the present. The contents of this interesting number of the OPEN LETTER include an Anshutz Fable, a doctrinal article on "The Removal of Hereditary Evils," the Diary of a missionary's "Life among the Basutos," and the news of the Durban Society.

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EVIDENCE ON RE-BAPTISM 1920

EVIDENCE ON RE-BAPTISM SAMUEL SIMONS 1920

     Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     Though one spake with the tongue of an angel, the use of re-baptism could not be seen by New Churchmen who do not accept the Writings as the Word of the Lord to the New Church. They do not see the clear teaching that the New Church is distinct from the past Christian Church, and so to baptize again seems to them useless. They see, but do not understand, just as the Jews heard the Lord speak of His kingdom, but so presupposed a natural kingdom that they could not see a spiritual.

     But there are some who stand in the gate and sincerely seek for clear evidence that baptism into the New Church is the orderly sign of entrance regardless of previous experiences. To these the following evidence is offered: Study of the internal sense of the Word and the general doctrine of truth has developed the following proportion into an axiom:

     FIRST CHRISTIAN CHURCH : JEWISH CHURCH : : NEW CHURCH : FIRST CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

     By applying the idea that this relation is the same, direct evidence on being baptized again is seen in the Acts of the Apostles 19:1-6. At Ephesus Paul found certain disciples who had been instructed by Apollos, knowing only the baptism of John. "Paul said unto them, Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost. And he said unto them, Unto what then were ye baptized? And they said, Unto John's baptism. Then said Paul, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people that they should believe on Him which should come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus. When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus; And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them; and they spake with tongues, and prophesied."

     The baptism of John, while not a Jewish rite, is here recognized as something distinct from the later Christian baptism.

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By it the Jews were indeed prepared and "introduced into the future church of the Lord, and in heaven were inserted among those there who expected and desired the Messiah, and were thus guarded by the angels lest the devils of hell should break forth and destroy them." (T. C. R. 689.) But because it, is the idea or doctrine within baptism that qualifies it, so the baptism by Apollos, though evidently occurring after the Lord's ministry, was "John's baptism," having within it the idea of the coming of the Messiah,-an idea by which they were associated with the good Jewish spirits, which association was severed, and a new consociation formed, when Paul re-baptized the disciples of Apollos into the name of the Lord Jesus. They were now consociated with the nascent Christian heaven, or the new communities of Christians in the spiritual world, which inflowed with the miracles that were the characteristic sign of the establishment of that Church, "when Paul had laid his hands upon them, and the Holy Ghost came upon them, and they spake with tongues, and prophesied."

     An illuminating reference to this is found in T. C. K. 690 (italics mine): "That they who were baptized with John's baptism became internal men when they received faith in Christ, and were then baptized in the name of Jesus, may be seen in the Acts of the Apostles 19:3-6."

     Now, pursuing the proportion, the questions arise: With what spirits is one associated who is coming out of the past Christian Church? And into what consociation will he be brought by baptism into the New Church?

     As to the first, the dead and past Christian Church has no specific heaven with which it is associated other than the New Heaven established at the Lord's Second Coming; for "the first heaven and the first earth are passed away." But this association is through societies of Christian spirits in the world of spirits who are moving on to their judgment, and whose faith is more or less fixed in the idea of three gods and the illogical vicarious atonement. It is this association that an Old Churchman brings with him to the gate of the New Jerusalem. If it is his desire to flee from such an association the Lord will give influx from the New Heaven by a direct way. He has but to obey the mandate, "Come out of her, my people."

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It may even be that he has accepted many of the doctrines of the New Church, and so has come into temporary association with New Church societies in the world of spirits; but to make this a fixed consociation, entrance into a society of the New Church on earth by the appointed door of baptism is necessary. The reason for this is that New Church baptism is distinct, in that true externals here have with them true internals; for within this sacrament dwells the idea that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only God of heaven and earth. SAMUEL SIMONS. Bryn Athyn, Pa.
TWOFOLD MESSAGE OF THE DISCIPLES IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD 1920

TWOFOLD MESSAGE OF THE DISCIPLES IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

     Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     May I call attention through the pages of the LIFE to an idea which seems of importance in connection with the preaching of the disciples when they were sent forth into the spiritual world?

     It is a notable thing that the preaching of the disciples was twofold. First, they were commissioned to preach the doctrine that "The Lord God Jesus Christ reigns," and secondly, they were commissioned to add to this general evangel that "Blessed are they that are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb." Why did their message consist of these two things?

     It occurs to me that these two things are universals of doctrine. They must involve two essentials of religion. The first is the acknowledgment of the Lord as God, and the second is the acknowledgment that the Commandments, as they are to be understood in the New Church, are the means of conjunction with Him. The second part of their evangel is of peculiar interest, for the signification of the words is "that they have eternal life who receive what is of the New Church."

     It is the New Church that is signified by the "marriage of the Lamb," and they who receive the blessings of the New Church are said to be "called to the supper" of that marriage. The New Church is called the "marriage of the Lamb" because a marriage signifies conjunction with the Lord, and because that conjunction is the Church itself. The New Church is also called a marriage because of conjugial love, around which all the doctrine and life of the Church must center.

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The New Church is also compared to a supper because a supper comes at the end of a day. The New Church arises in the end of the Old.

     For us in Christian lands there are two principles that must be followed until the time of the Gentiles is full. We must acknowledge the two principles involved in the twofold message of the disciples in the spiritual world; namely, the direct approach to the Lord, in worship and in life, and also that other vital principle, that the Christian life and worship, as it is today, must be wholly rejected; in other words, that there must be a New Church, and that its life and teachings must be held distinct from the common thought and the common practices of the world.

     That the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns, is the message that contains the true doctrine of the Lord, to whom all are to look; and the message of the disciples which shows that the New Church must be kept distinct-with a new ministry, a distinctive worship, and a distinctive life from the New Revelation-is contained in the other part of their evangel, "Blessed are they that are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb."

     Without the recognition of these two principles, the New Church cannot be established among civilized peoples. Even though men accept the general teachings of the New Church involved in the first part of the disciples' message, "that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns," if they fail to acknowledge the other part, that "blessed are they that are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb," the New Church will lack a true foundation, will lack barriers and fortifications against the falsities of the evening into which Christianity has descended.
     GILBERT H. SMITH.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA,-For the first time in Sydney, and I believe in Australia, the anniversary of the 19th day of June, 1770, has been celebrated in a public place, viz., the Workmen's Institute, Hurstville, the hall rented for our Sunday School. For the past twelve years Miss Taylor has given her home for this use as well as for the services and Church meetings. But this year the Society had outgrown the accommodation of a private house. Several visitors were present, those from the country being Mr. Jones, of Lithgow,-an earnest member of the General Church, who was accompanied by his daughter and little grandson, also Mrs. Wyld, of Dora Creek.

     Another departure from the usual custom was having adults and children together, the result proving it a happy arrangement. The children assembled at 3 p. m. and had outside games, and at 4:45 they formed a procession and marched into the hall, each carrying a symbol and singing, "Holy, Holy, Holy Lord" (Lit. 100). Each child in turn gave the spiritual significance of its symbol, and then they sang, "Lead us Heavenly Father" (Hymnal 10). The idea of the symbols was borrowed from the Bryn Athyn Charter Day celebration.

     After all were seated for supper, the song, "Joy to this meeting fair," was sung very heartily. The toasts were three:-"The Church," "The Day we Celebrate," and "Friends Across the Sea." All regretted that Mr. Morgan, our toastmaster for three years past, was prevented through illness from being with us that evening. Our Pastor took his place. The toasts were responded to by several speakers. Mr. Jones and Mr. Ferran in their speeches said that without the spiritual support they had received through the Church, they would not have been able to bear the trials they had and were passing through. Mr. Ferran also told the children to remember that it was the Lord alone who could help them throughout their lives, and counseled them always to look to Him. At the conclusion, our Pastor said that this year's gathering had reminded him of the Feasts of Charity of the ancients, who, while nourishing their bodies, also nourished their minds by conversations on spiritual things. So ended another happy gathering.

     Every person and consequently every Society of persons have their vicissitudes. It is well that it is so, for the natural inclinations of men are to remain comfortable and placid, and it is only when events occur that disturb and rouse us that we reflect, both upon evils within, and also upon the blessings we receive through the mercy of the Lord. The Sydney Society experienced one of these states during a few weeks of this year. Our Pastor was taken ill and had to give up all duties for nine weeks from April 29th. The services and doctrinal meetings were not held during that time, but the Sunday School was kept going under the conductorship of Mr. Morgan. The services were resumed on June 6th, the Holy Supper being administered. All were glad to have our Pastor back again and to see him restored to health.

     There is talk of the possibility of moving to another place of worship. The idea is to be more public, with the hope of increasing our numbers from outside. Some think it wise to keep the services in the city; others think it best to move to the suburb of Hurstville, where the Sunday School is held, as, counting the children, most of the people live there. It is thought that we would be able to erect a small building if we went to the latter place, which it would not be possible for us to do in the city.

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The exponents of this idea point to the fact that all the children but two reside at Hurstville, and that the hope of the Church is in the young. I hope to be able to give in my next report the definite decision of the members on this matter.
     M. M. W.

     ERIE, PA.-The Erie Circle feels that it owes a tribute to the Weekly Sermons. If it had not been for the inspiration of these little pamphlets it is doubtful if the past months would have seen so great activity in the Erie Circle. Services have been held every Sunday at the homes of the various members, with an average attendance of 16. Each householder conducts the services in the manner best suited to his taste. This serves to bring up many points for discussion, and gives us all a greater interest in the ritual.

     In July the Circle sent an urgent invitation to the Rev. Homer Synnestvedt to visit us for a Sunday. Usually while Mr. Waelchli makes his trip to the Canadian Northwest we are for a long period without a pastor. But this year Mr. Synnestvedt kindly consented to visit us during his "vacation" in August. On the 8th of August he conducted communion service. There were 26 present for the service and 17 communicants. Immediately after the services the congregation adjourned to Water Works Park where we ate a picnic dinner and spent the afternoon in swimming; but owing to the overcrowded boat service it was late at night before we all got back to the city.

     On Monday afternoon, August 9th, a class was held by Mr. Synnestvedt for the children. At this class there were 7 children present, with ages running from three to fifteen. In the evening a doctrinal class was held. This class was well attended and so many questions asked that it was after 10 o'clock when we adjourned. Another meeting had been set for Tuesday night but unfortunately Mr. Synnestvedt had to leave us on Tuesday afternoon to attend to important business of his own society. We greatly appreciated his visit, short as it was, and only hope that the Pittsburgh Society will be willing in future to spare their Pastor for occasional visits to the Erie Circle.

     The following Sunday, August 15th, the circle met in the afternoon for the weekly service and then adjourned to Four Mile Park for a picnic supper.

     In addition to a secretary, the Erie Circle has now chosen a treasurer. On August 1st, Miss Alma Johnson was unanimously selected for this important office. This is the first time in its history that the Erie Circle has attempted to establish a treasury, and it is hoped that the fund now started will in time serve to expand the usefulness of the Circle.
     E. T. C.

     COLCHESTER, ENG.-On Whitmonday a good number of the friends, including several visitors from London, spent the day at Stamway Green. The weather was ideal, and a very enjoyable time resulted.

     The 19th of June celebration was held in the Studio, Head Street, and was somewhat impromptu in character. Mr. Raymond Cranch rendered useful aid by arranging suitable passages from the Doctrines, which were read by several members. Mr. Cranch also contributed some excellent remarks upon "The Application of the Doctrines to Life." Other speeches and toasts followed, and a strong and mutual sphere prevailed.

     On June 27th the Rev. Albert Bjorck, of Bath, visited Colchester for the first time and officiated in Divine Worship, the congregation numbering 42. On July 11th, he again conducted our service, and in the afternoon performed the wedding ceremony for Mr. Raymond G. Cranch and Miss Florence Cooper, which was followed by a reception attended by about 50 of the friends, including several from London.

     A public lecture was given by Mr. Cranch in the Colchester Town Hall on June 27th, being an answer from the Doctrines to a lecture upon the subject, "Where are the Dead?" This was done by Mr. Cranch entirely on his own initiative, nearly 200 attending. At the close, he replied to several questions that were asked by persons present.

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The occasion made evident the fact that the old doctrines, when squarely faced, can be very actively defended; for after the lecture, Mr. Cranch was cornered by some hostile ones, while other groups were engaged in very animated conversation for a considerable time, and general excitement prevailed. The attendance at this lecture is certainly encouraging to missionary effort.

     We have just received the welcome news that the Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal is on his way to England and is expected to preach in Colchester on September 5th. We deeply appreciate the fact that our Bishop has been successful in appointing him to the work of the General Church in this country.

     The British Assembly of 1920 will long be remembered as one of the best it has been our privilege to attend. The stress of war, and an interval of six years, left our spiritual appetites keen, and certainly a great and rich repast was in store for us. Our old and beloved friend, the Rev. Alfred Acton, was surely an ideal president, and we trust we may see his address in the Life. The Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom's address on "Missionary Work in Sweden" was characteristic of the man, and appealed most strongly to us. Mr. J. S. Pryke read a splendid paper on "The Relation between the Clergy and the Laity in the New Church." Also, the Rev. Albert Bjorck made many excellent speeches which contributed materially to the deliberations. Our old friend, Mr. Wilfred Howard, we gladly welcomed, and it was good to hear his voice again. The ladies very greatly enjoyed an account of the work and procedure of the Schools at Bryn Athyn given them by Miss Venita Pendleton.

     On Sunday, the Rev. Alfred Acton administered the sacrament of the Holy Supper to 64 communicants. There were short lessons and a sermon, and a strong sphere of affection and unity prevailed. Doubtless our newly appointed Secretary of the Assembly, Mr. Frederick W. Elphick, of London, will send you a full and detailed report of the proceedings.
     F. R. C.

     GLENVIEW.-Our Pastor has recently been setting forth the profound spiritual truths contained in the story of "Joseph and his Brethren" in a wonderful series of sermons,-wonderful because of their practical application to the states of the Church, as may be seen by the following quotation from the introduction to one of these sermons:

     "In conducting a further search into the spiritual meaning of Joseph and his brethren, we wish it to be noted that the interest taken in the spiritual meaning of this story is a thing by which we may test ourselves as to whether our love of angelic wisdom is strong or weak. For we find this said in the Doctrines: 'Let everyone examine himself as to whether the things contained in the internal sense of the verses which follow are worthless and distasteful to him; for they are such things as the angelic societies take the greatest delight in.' (A. C. 5648.) It is also said that what men hold in aversion, or think worthless, is the angel's wisdom; and what is wisdom to men, angels do not care for at all. If we do not find the internal sense of this story of Joseph distasteful, but can find something in it that delights us, it may be that the things of angelic wisdom are not beyond our ability to enjoy. Let us at least hope that this is the case with us. For we may be assured of this, that if anyone will study this part of the Heavenly Doctrines for himself, he cannot but see some of the angelic wisdom shining forth from it, and he cannot but be impressed by the marvelous manner in which every single phrase contributes to the meaning of the whole. And while the spiritual sense of the Word is chiefly for the angels, and the things of that sense revealed in the Writings are but few, still, the spiritual ideas we may derive from the story are certainly those which the Lord would have us receive and reflect upon."
     G. A. McQ.

645

ACADEMY LIBRARY 1920

ACADEMY LIBRARY AMENA PENDLETON 1920

     SWEDENBORG COLLECTION.

     To the NEW CHURCH PUBLIC:

     The Library of the Academy has for many years been collecting the works of Swedenborg in many editions and languages. From this collection has evolved what we call the Star Collection, which is an attempt to bring together every edition of Swedenborg's works in every language. In other words, to represent on the shelves either by the book itself, or by a wooden dummy when the book is lacking a complete bibliography of Swedenborg. It is obvious that a collection of this sort will be of great use to translators and students and unique as a permanent exhibit; it will also preserve for the interest and use of future generations a copy of each edition of the works of Swedenborg, for this collection is in a fire-proof building, and may only be used for reference.

     Within the last year the Library has put a great deal of work upon this collection, getting it in order, binding, labeling, cataloging, and bringing it up to date. But we lack a number of editions which are necessary to make the collection complete. It is essential to try to get these books now, as it becomes more and more difficult, as time goes on, to procure certain editions. The Library would be very much indebted to the New Church Public if it would co-operate with us in this important work. If the owners of any of the editions listed below are willing to present them to the Library to be kept permanently in the Star Collection, or to sell them to us, we should appreciate it very much.

     The following list gives the title, the place published, the date, and the language of the book desired. In listing, we have chosen one title for each work even when a different title appears on the title-page For instance, "Arcana Coelestia," and not "Heavenly Mysteries," or "Heavenly Secrets," although in some editions the two latter titles are used. Also "Heaven and Hell," and not "The. Future Life," as it Is called in some editions. Any book listed can be identified by the place and date of publication.
          (Signed.) AMENA PENDLETON,
               Assistant Librarian in Charge.

646

LIST OF SWEDENBORG'S WORKS DESIRED BY THE ACADEMY LIBRARY 1920

IN LATIN.

Ludus Heliconius. Holmiae, 1826.
Itineraria. Upsala, 1910. (Academy Library has Upsala, 1911.)
De Ultimo Judicio. New York, London, 1889.
Apocalypsis Explicata. New York, London, 1889. vols. 1-6.
Continuatio de Ultimo Judicio; New York, London, 1889.
Apocalypsis Revelata. New York, London, 1889, 2 vols.
Doctrina Novae Hierosolymae de Charitate. New York, 1885.
Indices rerum in opere desiderato Sapientia Angelica de Conjugio. New York, 1886.
Coronis. New York, London, 1884.
Continuatio. De Divino Amore et De Divina Sapientia. The Divine Love and Wisdom. (No imprint; Latin-English Edition.)

IN ENGLISH.

The motion and position of the earths and planets. London, 1915.

The introduction to an anatomical, physical, and philosophical investigation of the economy of the animal kingdom. London, 1861.

Arcana Coelestia. London, 1783, vol. I. Same, London, 1825, vol. I. Same Manchester, 1820, vols. 11 and 12. Same, London, 1851, vol. 10. Same, London: William Newbery, 6, Kingstreet Holborn. (Without date, issued about 1845.) vol. 3. Same, London Edit of 1840, vol. 4. Same, New York, 1857, vol. 3. Same, New York, 1859, vol. 5. Same, London, 1881, vol. 5. Same, New York, 1862-1863, vols. 1-10. Same, New York, 1868-1869, vols. 1-10. Same, New York, 1870-71, vols. 1-10. Same, New York, 1873-74, vols. 1-10. Same, New York, 1877-29, vols. 1-10.

Extracts from the Arcana Coelestia.
Genesis, chapter I explained, according to its internal or spiritual sense. London, 1820.
The Doctrine of Charity and Faith. Manchester, 1821.
A brief exposition of the first three chapters of Genesis. London: F. Pitman, 20 Paternoster Row, E. C. (without date; issued about 1665).
The Doctrine of Charity and Faith. Boston, 1866.
Signs of the times: explanations applicable and necessary for the present time. Extracted from the works of E. Swedenborg. London, 1872.

Earths in the Universe. London, 1828. Same, Boston, 1851. Same, Boston, 1848. Same, Boston, 1851. Same, London, 1855. Same, New York, 1857. Same, London, 1875.
Heaven and Hell. Boston, 1849. Same, Boston, 1849. Same, Bellast, etc., 1853. (Called "The Future Life.") Same, New York, 1854. Same, Boston, 1854. Same, London: F. Pitman, 20, Paternoster Row, etc. (Without date; issued about 1861.) Same, London, 1863. Same, New York, 1863.

647

Same, New York, 1866. Same, London, l866. Same, New York, 1866. Same, London, 1868. Same, New York, 1868. Same, New York, 1869. Same, Philadelphia, 1869. Same, London, Swedenborg Society, 36 Bloomsbury St. (Without date, issued in 1870.) Same, London, 1872. Same, New York, 1872. Same, New York, 1873 Same, London, 1874. Same, London, 1875 Same, Philadelphia, 1876. Same, London, 18?7. Same, London, 1878. Same, London, l879. Same, London, 1880. Same, Philadelphia, 1880. Same, Philadelphia, 1881. Same, London, 1882. Same, London, l883. Same, Boston, 1883. Same, London, 1884. Same, London, l885. Same, London, 1886. Same, London, 1888. Same, London, 1890. Same, London, l892. Same, London, 1893. Same, New York, 1893. Same, London, 1895. Same, Philadelphia, 1897. Same, London, 1898. Same, London, 1899. Same, Cleveland, O., 1899. Same, New York, 1900. Same, Philadelphia, 1900. Same, London, 1901.

The Last Judgment. Boston, 1828. Same, London, 1830. Same, London, 1839. Same, London, 1841. Same, London, 1846. Same, Boston, 1849. Same, Boston, 1851. Same, London Edit. of 1846. Same, New York, 1857 Same, New York, 1866. Same, New York, 1868, Same, Boston, 1899.

The Heavenly Doctrine of the Mew Jerusalem. London, 1780. Same, London: Printed for a society of Gentlemen. Sold by J. Deighton Holborn; and R. Hindmarsh, Clerkenwell-Close. (Without date, issued in 1781.) Same, London, 1787. Same, Boston, 1794. Same, Salford, 1805. Same, Cork, 1813. Same, Cincinnati, 1820. Same, London, 1826. Same, Boston, 1829. Same, London, 1829. Same, London, 1834. Same, Boston, 1835 Same, Hampton, Middlesex, 1837. Same, Boston, 1849. Manchester, 1851. Same, New York, 1854 Same, London Edit. of 1841. Same, New York, 1857 Same, New York, 1866. Same, London, 1873. Same, London, 1876. Same, New York: Boston: Chicago: Philadelphia. (Without date, issued in 1876.) Same, London, 1880. Same, Philadelphia: New Church Tract and Publication Society, etc. (Without date, issued in 1881.) Same, London, 1883. Same, London, 1888. Same, New York, 1890. Same, London, 1892.

The White Horse. London, 1841. Same, London, 1860.

The Apocalypse Explained. London: Edit. of 1836. Vol. 2. Same, London: Edit. of 1838. Vol. l.

Extracts from Apocalypse Explained. A Sketch of the Chaste Delights of Conjugial Love, etc., London, 1789. The Athanasian Creed corrected. (London, about 1810, without imprint.) Concerning the Word and its Sanctity, Manchester. (Without date.) A general explication of the precepts of the Decalogue. New York, London, 1856. Same, New York, Boston, 1856. Exposition of the Ten Commandments, New York, 1858. The Laws of the Divine Providence, New York, Boston, Philadelphia. (Without date, issued in 1887.)

(To be continued.)

648

PITTSBURGH DISTRICT ASSEMBLY 1920

PITTSBURGH DISTRICT ASSEMBLY HOMER SYNNESTVEDT 1920

     Announcements.

     The Eleventh Pittsburgh District Assembly will be held in the House of Worship of the Pittsburgh Society from October 8th to 11th inclusive. All members and friends of the General Church are cordially invited to attend.
          HOMER SYNNESTVEDT,
               Pastor.
Address:
     4928 Wallingford Street,
          Pittsburgh, Pa.
CHICAGO DISTRICT ASSEMBLY 1920

CHICAGO DISTRICT ASSEMBLY GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

The Seventeenth Chicago District Assembly of the General Church of the New Jerusalem will be held in the Immanuel Church, Glenview, Ill., from October 15th to 18th, inclusive. All members and friends of the General Church are cordially invited to attend.
GILBERT H. SMITH, Pastor.
Glenview, Ill.

649

ADDRESS TO THE BRITISH ASSEMBLY 1920

ADDRESS TO THE BRITISH ASSEMBLY Rev. ALFRED ACTON 1920

NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL NOVEMBER, 1920          No. 11
     Since the last British Assembly, the world has been visited by the calamities of a great war, the dreadful consequences of which are yet Painfully present with us. The last Assembly, indeed, was held on the very eve of this Great War, and many of our young men left the meetings of the Church to put on the uniform of the country. Some of these young men have since laid down their lives in their country's cause. To them our thoughts will revert on this occasion. Their early training, their activity in the life and worship of the Church, their interest and participation in the deeper arcana of her theology, gave bright promise of a life of great usefulness in our midst. With many others of our members, they cheerfully and with devotion offered their lives to the cause of their country; and now that they have paid the utmost price, and made the last sacrifice on the altar of national duty-nay, and of duty that was more than national-we can utter no nobler sentiment as a tribute to their memory than the words of the inspired Writings, "It is honorable for a man to die in his country's cause; and for a soldier, it is glorious to shed his blood in her defense."

     They laid down their lives that freedom might be established and extended upon the earth. For in freedom alone-freedom, not of unrestricted word and action, (for neither in the natural world nor in the spiritual can such license be allowed), but in the freedom of the thought and will unfettered by the bonds of traditional dogmatism, and given wider range of liberty by an extension and communication of the thoughts of mankind-in this freedom alone can a genuine church be established,-a church whose roots are planted in the hearts of men, and not merely in a traditional belief and a conventional and long-accustomed mode of conduct.

650

In the cause of such freedom these, our young men, have laid down their lives. In the Divine Providence, they have left the scene of our labors, that those labors may bear greater fruit, if so be that we remain steadfast. They have left us that we may be strengthened, and strengthened by their nearer presence. For of a truth they have not left us. They are still with us in the spiritual world, and their love for the New Church continues as an instrument and means whereby the Lord can more fully inspire the love and thought and devotion of those whose work yet lies upon the earth. The work on earth is still the duty that lies before us,-a duty that is to be performed with faithfulness, diligence and sincerity, with content in the dispensations of Divine Providence, strengthened by confidence in the Lord's mercy, and inspired by the knowledge that, while the days of our earthly work are as but a moment of time, the work itself is a, spiritual work, shared in by those who have gone before, and which we shall continue in the Lord's heavenly kingdom, according as we have faithfully done our part in His earthly vineyard.

The War has justly been named the "Great War," and the very simplicity of the name expresses the difficulty of more definitely characterizing the momentous conflict from which we have just emerged. It was a struggle between nations in whom alike the Christian Church is devastated and come to its end. And yet it was a conflict between two fundamentally different spiritual states. In all wars, each nation represents some spiritual quality; indeed, a nation may represent a spiritual virtue when many and even most of its citizens are interiorly opposed to that virtue and active in their opposition to it. This we know to be the case in the wars of the Israelites. And it is not different at this day, nor in the great struggle through which we have just passed.

That struggle was a deadly conflict between two opposed spiritual forces struggling for the possession of men's spirits. It was a conflict between nations representing spiritual powers, rather than a fight between the individual men of the nations. And in all such conflicts, victory does not stand on the side of human prudence or depend on the plans of men. Many in the world recognize this fact when they see the infinitude of individual motives and circumstances that influence the conduct of statesmen and commanders, the multitude of apparently trivial happenings that may determine the most momentous events, the varying springs from which men are inspired to patriotism or to treachery, to bravery or to cowardice.

651

When we reflect on these things, must we not see that there is one Counsel that alone determines the issues of war?-that the Divine Wisdom rules its most trivial details? And that victory lies not on the side of prudence or of bravery-though men must use enlightened prudence, and exercise true bravery; but the victory is according to the justice of the cause in heaven, that is to say, it is for the sake of the prevalence of a spiritual state represented by one or other of the nations engaged in the conflict.

     The cause that has now prevailed, we are firmly assured, is the cause of liberty of thought and will. The mighty struggle has been between two different states of mind, two different spiritual attitudes with respect to political and religious freedom; and, as New Churchmen, we must inmostly ascribe the victory, not to the prowess, the wisdom, the wealth of any nation or nations, but to the "justice of the cause in heaven," to the ruling of the Divine Providence, which regards the spiritual freedom of men as the means for the establishment of the New Church and the New Heaven.

     The conflict has been essentially a struggle between two opposite spiritual forces; and its effects are fundamental, world-wide, incalculable. This is known in greater or less degree to all men; but not even the wisest can say what those effects will be. That the Great War has already produced a profound influence on the world is evident. Men and nations are disturbed, unsettled, uneasy, expecting they know not what. The struggle so tragically concluded with the weapons of war still continues, though on a more interior plane. The outcome seems at times uncertain, and men's minds are troubled and distressed. Yet we may be certain that the justice of the cause will prevail in this conflict also, and that the conflict itself is permitted solely for the end that states may be established in which the New Church may grow upon the earth.

     Profound changes in the Church also will doubtless be consequent on the great world-war, though here again we can little foresee what the changes will be, and must content ourselves with noting them from time to time. We see some indication of change in our own body of the Church in a wider extension of its sphere of thought.

652

A Society of the General Church has now been organized in Durban, Natal. There is an active movement among the natives of Basutoland, where two of our ministers are working, and teaching them in their native tongue. The General Church has now an ordained priest ministering to its members in Australia. Missionary work is being zealously carried on in Stockholm, where large audiences have been addressed; and steps are being taken for the better caring for our French-speaking members in Brussels and Paris. While these activities are not the result of the Great War, they indicate the extent of the field in the General Church where the new conditions brought about by the War will bear their fruit; and while we cannot know what these fruits will be, we are assured that they will make for the further spread of the Church.

     Our duty lies not in striving to pierce the future, but rather in maintaining pure the Doctrine now revealed, on which alone the Church can rest. Changes, many changes, will and must come as the membership of our body increases; but those changes will be nothing more than accommodations and applications to new conditions if the spirit on which the General Church is founded remains essentially unchanged,-the spirit, I mean, of loyalty to the Revelation now made by the Lord for the establishment of the New Jerusalem.

     And here comes to my mind, and must also come to yours, the thought of your beloved Pastor, the Rev. Andrew Czerny, who for so many years maintained the work of our Church among you. He was taken away suddenly, and in the very midst of his activities, but he has left behind him loving remembrances of his labors and the enduring fruits of the labors themselves.

     We have the teaching that a church derives its quality according to its understanding of the Word, or, what amounts to the same thing, according to the purity of its doctrine as drawn from the Word. Divine Revelation, which with us is the written Word, is ever given in a form adapted to all manner of men, wise and simple; that is to say, it is always given in the language of appearances, or of Divine Truth clothed with appearances adapted to the natural mind. It does not come in the form of doctrines, or of ordinances, specifically laying down the teachings on this or that subject or the regulation of this or that ceremony or rite.

653

The Revelation is the Heavenly Doctrine itself, or the Lord Himself, clothed in a form adapted to the peoples to whom He is revealed. It is for the Church to receive this Revelation, to approach it worthily, to study and compare its teachings, that the men of the Church may thus understand that teaching in its adaptation to their own states. It is this understanding of the Divine Revelation that is meant by the understanding of the Word which makes the purity of a Church; and it is this that is meant by the doctrines of a Church which make its quality, according as they are genuine and true or perverted and false. If the doctrines drawn from the Revelation are false, and if these doctrines are confirmed, that Church will come to an end, and a new Revelation will be given, wherein the genuine doctrines which the men of the former Church might have drawn forth from the Word are set forth as in clear day.

So has it been with the Churches of former dispensations. To the Israelitish Church was revealed the Old Testament. This was their Word,-the foundation-stone on which a genuine church might have been built up. This Word did indeed contain minute instructions as to sacrifices and rituals. But sacrifices and rituals can never make a church. They are of the mouth and body, while the church is of the thought and will. And the Revelation of the Old Testament was a Revelation of Divine Truth addressed to the minds, the will and understanding, of men for their spiritual reformation and regeneration, to the end that they might draw forth genuine doctrines from this Revelation for their enlightenment and guidance. The genuine doctrines which the wise among the Israelites might thus have drawn from the Word by study and comparison were the doctrine of the acknowledgment of one God whose laws are laws of charity to the neighbor; the doctrine that the stranger was equally to be loved as the Israelite; that the neighbor was to be dealt with in sincerity and justice; that the wife was to be loved; that men would be rewarded in the other life, not according to their speech and action, but according to their thoughts and intentions; that evils were to be put away as sins against God; not to mention a multitude of like doctrines which the Israelitish leaders might have drawn forth from the revealed Word by study and comparison.

But what was the fact? Instead of genuine doctrine drawn from the Word, they read into the Word their own traditions; they made more ado about the ritual of sacrifice than the spirit of humble worship; about eating with unwashen hands, and the minute observance of external ordinances amplified by themselves, than of the observance of the law of justice, so plainly revealed in their Word.

654

Thus did they make the commandment of God of none effect by their tradition.

A new Revelation was therefore given, and by the Lord's own mouth. In this Revelation,-the New Testament,-the Lord Himself plainly revealed those genuine doctrines which the men of the former Church might have drawn from the Old Testament, but alas! did not, because they did not approach the Lord. And this Revelation of genuine doctrine the Lord summed up in the words: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength; and thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets;" namely, the whole of the Old Testament.

But though the genuine doctrines of the former Revelation were thus openly revealed in the new Revelation, the letter of it, like former Revelations, being adapted both to the wise and to the simple, was of such a character that it behooved the men of the Christian Church to approach it by enlightened study, and thus to enter into an interior understanding of its teachings, that thus might arise a body of doctrine expressive of a genuine understanding of the Divine Truth revealed. The men of the Christian Church were soon in practical unanimity as to the truth that the Jewish dispensation had passed away, that circumcision of the heart, and not of the flesh, is what is pleasing in the sight of God; that sacrifices are of no avail for the establishment of a genuine Church; that the prophecies of the Old Testament were fulfilled in the coming of the Lord, and that the supreme law of the Church is love to the Lord and charity to the neighbor. These teachings were generally accepted, because they were plainly set forth in the New Testament. But it behooved the men of the Christian Church to advance their steps, and to enter more interiorly into the understanding of the Divine Revelation; to study the New Testament with devout heart, and, by study and comparison, to draw therefrom a genuine understanding of the Divine Truth,-genuine doctrine adapted and accommodated to their needs.

655

But here the Christian Church also failed. Instead of genuine doctrine, drawn from their Word as revealed in the natural letter, they perverted and destroyed that Word by falsification and vain imagination. They concocted the doctrine of three Divine Persons, i. e., of three Gods, of a material last judgment, of non-marriage in heaven, of faith alone, of predestination to hell, and a host of like doctrines which soon split the Church into countless sects, qualified by their diverse understanding of the Word. But even so, the Church might have endured if there had been charity, or a spirit of desiring to learn from the Lord alone in His Word. The dogmas of Nice and Athanasius need never have destroyed the Christian Church, if there had still prevailed a desire to go to the Word direct as the sole source of the doctrines of the Church. But this desire, though preserved with some, was not the characteristic of the leaders of the Church; and so the creeds of the ecclesiastical councils were substituted for the Word; that is to say, the Word was read solely in the light of these creeds. And though, from time to time, a man arose who went to the Word immediately, that he might draw therefrom the doctrine of the Church, his voice was not heard, and still less heeded, in the clash of creeds and the anathemas of worldly priests.

Thus the Christian Church, which had commenced with such bright promise, came to its darkness and end, when a new Revelation was given, on which might be founded a new and genuine Christian Church,-the Revelation, namely, that is now made in the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. In this Revelation, the genuine doctrines of the New Testament are clearly and unequivocally revealed,-doctrines which the man of the Church might have drawn forth from the Letter of the Word, but did not, and which are now revealed as drawn forth by the Lord Himself through His Servant, Emanuel Swedenborg. And on these doctrines,-the doctrine that the Lord is the one and only God, one in essence and in person, that life and faith is what saves, that the Last Judgment is not a physical but a spiritual event, that there is a world of spirits, a heaven and a hell, that there is marriage in heaven, that there is no predestined damnation,-on these and other similar doctrines thus drawn out of the Old and New Testaments, and plainly set forth in the Writings, there is practical unanimity in the New Church.

656

     But like former Revelations, the Revelation to the New Church is given in a form of appearances, as it were, so as to be adapted to the apprehension of all manner of men. And, as in the case of former Revelations, it behooves the men of the New Church humbly to approach this new Word of the Lord, to the end that, by study of its letter and comparison of its teachings, they may enter into a more interior understanding of it. And here, as in former Churches, have arisen differences and divergences in the New Church itself; and various bodies have been formed, each based on a distinct understanding of the revealed Doctrine; that is to say, each based on a set of doctrines or teachings expressive of its understanding of the Word or Writings as revealed in literal form to the New Church. For, as in former Churches, so in the New, the doctrines of the Church must be drawn from the Word in its letter, and confirmed thereby. And to the New Church, this Word includes the Writings of the Church, as given to us in literal form.

     And here let me note that the term descriptive of the Revelation now made is not "The Heavenly Doctrines," but "The Heavenly Doctrine," as in the title, The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine; and this, because the Doctrine is one, while the doctrines of the Church are many, and are according to men's understanding of the Heavenly Doctrine.

     I do not propose to detail the various and conflicting doctrines that have sprung up in the New Church as the expression of men's understanding of the Writings, but I shall merely note the distinctive doctrines upon which the General Body of the New Church, of which this Assembly is a part, is founded. These doctrines, commonly known as the "Academy Doctrines," are well known to you, and it will be sufficient for my purpose to sum them up as the doctrine that the Revelation now given to the New Church is the Word of the Lord to the New Church, and the only source of the law and order of the Church; that the former Christian Church is utterly consummated, and thus has come to an end; that the New Church is to be raised up anew from the remnant and gentiles, and is to be entered into by distinctive baptism; that the Word is to be taught, and the ecclesiastical things of the Church administered, by the priesthood; and that in the priesthood itself, order is to be maintained by degrees of offices; that marriage is to be entered into by those who are one in religion, and that all other marriages are heinous in the sight of heaven; and that the New Church is to have distinctive education and a distinctive social life.

657

     These doctrines are what distinguish our body from all other bodies of the New Church; they are the expression of our understanding of the Writings of the New Church; they are the doctrines that have been drawn from those Writings and confirmed thereby. And it is according to the genuineness of these doctrines, i. e., according as they agree with Divine Revelation, that this Body will endure.

     But here let us note with care the warning given in True Christian Religion (489) not to rely upon councils, but to approach the Lord in His Word, and thus to be instructed from the Word itself. The Academy doctrines, it is true, are not the doctrines of a council. They are the fruits of the study of men prepared by education, set apart by ordination for the work of the priesthood, and inspired, we may truly believe, by the spiritual love of truth; and they have been freely accepted by our members as the genuine understanding of the Heavenly Doctrine. But they are not the Word; they are not the Heavenly Doctrine itself. They are the doctrines of the Church drawn from the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Jerusalem, by men in enlightenment, and confirmed by the Heavenly Doctrine itself, as it is literally revealed to us. They are the fruits of the human understanding of Divine Revelation, and of the Word. And every general body must necessarily be founded upon the understanding of the Word. For what is the Word, if it merely remain upon a table unread? Is it not the Lord with man only so far as it is received in his mind, and as by the light of heaven he sees and understands the truth therein?

     The Academy Doctrines are the setting forth of our understanding of the Word; of our perception and comprehension of the truths revealed in the Heavenly Doctrine. This perception and comprehension must come anew to each generation, and to each man. For each generation must see for itself, must as it were form for itself the doctrines to be drawn from the Heavenly Doctrine. It must not and can not be hound by the conclusions of a former generation, but must itself approach the Lord in His Word, and be enlightened by Him.

658

And in a living Church, increasing in the light of heaven, each generation will form its own understanding of the Word, its own doctrines drawn from the Word. Just so far as the Academy doctrines are the genuine understanding of the Word will they be confirmed by future generations of the living Church, though modified and accommodated to the needs of each generation, and more clearly perceived, more ably expounded.

     This, I take it, is what is meant by the exhortation to approach the Lord alone in His Word. And the members of the Church do thus approach the Lord, and are taught immediately by Him in His Word, so far as they read the Word, in which term I include also the Writings. It is this reading of the Word with the desire to be instructed by the Lord that will alone vivify the Church and enlighten her priests to teach and her members to see and understand and love the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Jerusalem.

     And so, in the last analysis, this body of the General Church is founded upon but one doctrine,- -the Doctrine that the Lord has made His Second Coming in the Writings of Swedenborg, that in those Writings alone is contained the Heavenly Doctrine,-the Lord's Word as it is spoken to the New Church. The Academy doctrines are but the expression of our common understanding of that Heavenly Doctrine. That understanding may grow-nay, in a living Church it must grow-it may be enlarged, or modified, or accommodated to varying states and needs; but the rock an which our General Church is founded must remain the acknowledgment of the Writings as the sole law of the New Church given by the Lord out of heaven.

     This, then, is the broad and strong foundation upon which the General Church rests. It is not national or linguistic, for it has no dependence upon the natural tastes or the national habits of men. It is a spiritual foundation, and is above the differences and varieties caused by national customs and differences of tongues. So far as it is a living Church, it is a spiritual society and speaks a spiritual language which is or may be common to all nations and tongues. It is not a national church, because its essential quality, its conjoining bond, is independent of national distinction. On this spiritual foundation of the acknowledgment of the Lord in His Word, we stand, as a Church, united in spiritual thought, and establishing a common sphere of thought and affection and work, to which each contributes, and from which each is enriched and strengthened.

659

And here let us note the happy circumstance of the enlarging of the borders of the Church in the country which this Present Assembly represents. In the past there has been misunderstanding and consequent separation. Yet it is clear that there has been no fundamental separation. For though separated externally by misunderstanding, and it may be by personalities, yet in each of the separate bodies the one fundamental doctrine of the Divine Authority of the Writings has ever been proclaimed and fearlessly defended. And now, if there is promise of closer approach and the removal of separating causes, it is a matter of rejoicing.

And this brings to our minds a still larger aspect of the union of brethren in the Church. Differences of doctrine, differences in the understanding of the Heavenly Doctrine, will not divide Churches, that is, will not fundamentally separate men from each other as brethren in the Lord's New Church, so long as there is charity. Different general bodies of the Church will necessarily arise if there is fundamental difference in the understanding of the Word revealed to the New Church. But they will remain differences of doctrine only, differences of understanding only, and not differences that separate wills, if there be charity. And so it should be our will, and our actual and active endeavor to cultivate charity in the New Church,-the willingness, where possible, to attribute good motives and to excuse faults, whether our brethren belong to the same general body of the Church or not. Not, indeed, to sacrifice and compromise our understanding of the Divine Truth; but sincerely to recognize that every man must be free to approach the Lord and to learn from Him and not from men. If this spirit prevails in the New Church, and so far as it prevails, the Church will be one in will, even though divided in organization. The realization of this end, however, is not a thing to be left vaguely to others, but is a result of the individual effort, the individual combat, of each member of the Church. And this effort, as well as the maintenance of purity of doctrine, is also the work that lies ever before us to do.

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RELATION BETWEEN CLERGY AND LAITY IN THE NEW CHURCH 1920

RELATION BETWEEN CLERGY AND LAITY IN THE NEW CHURCH J. S. PRYKE 1920

     (A paper read at the British Assembly, August 2, 1920.)

     It may quite probably be objected that the subject of this paper is one which calls for no discussion in the Church, that it is one of a series which was examined and settled many years ago. To such objection I would reply that the subject has presented itself before my mind during the last few days persistently and, as it were, uninvited; and next, that although it may have been already explored, yet to glance at it anew during the present Assembly may after all prove to be not unprofitable.

     We know that the story of man's mental growth is a story of constant change. As he travels through life, he accumulates fresh stores of knowledge, learns to take more comprehensive views, and acquires entirely new perspectives. What he sees today was unknown to him yesterday-although, if his habit of thought be true, each day's experience but amplifies and refines what preceded it. So it is with the larger man-the Societies of the Church-the very conditions of whose progress make for continual change. Members come and go; new interests are awakened; advance is made into the more interior understanding of faith. It would, then, seem desirable occasionally to re-examine the fundamentals of belief, to re-establish our ancient landmarks.

     For these reasons, I venture to offer what follows. It will be understood from the outset that my remarks are addressed only to New Churchmen-that is to say, to those who acknowledge the Lord in His Divine Human and accept the Revelation of His Second Advent as their guide in life.

     The subject before us divides very naturally-one might almost say obviously-into four leading parts: The Lord, the Church, the Clergy, and the Laity. Concerning each of these, ample teaching is given.

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     THE LORD AND THE CHURCH.

     The Lord is the sole God of heaven and earth. In Him is the Divine Trinity. He is now manifesting Himself in the splendors of His Divine Human. He accommodates Himself to the varying degrees of human perception and reception. He is at once the Creator, the Redeemer, the Savior, and the only Revelator; and in His Revelation He makes known His Divine ends. He it was who, God from eternity, became man in time; who, step by step, fought and conquered the malignity of the hells and, by the glorification of His Human, forever opened up the way of man's salvation. It is written, moreover, that two universal spheres continually emanate from Him,-the sphere of the love of creating and the sphere of the love of protecting that which is created. In this teaching we catch our first glimpse of the Divine purpose towards mankind. We are further taught that He who wills the end also wills the means, and that these are: an acknowledgment of Himself, a knowledge of His Word, the establishment of a Church amongst men, and the preservation of human freedom.

     That, in outline, is the Divine part. In its contemplation we come face to face with the Lord's love of saving souls, and by it we are led to consider the church as one of the appointed instrumentalities for bringing that love into effect. It is not necessary to remind New Churchmen at any length of the twofold aspect of the Church,-of its Divine and unchanging quality, and of its apparent mutations, which are consequent upon its reception by human agencies. In its latter character, and for our immediate purpose, we may define the Church as being a group of men who take as their sole object of worship the One Only God-the essential of all heavenly doctrine being the acknowledgment of the Divine Human of the Lord;-who receive Him in His Second Advent, who confess the holiness of His Word and desire to draw thence laws to govern the whole range of their activities.

     In its other aspect, the Church, founded alike as to doctrine and order upon the Divine, furnishes a veritable sanctuary in which man may enter the presence of His Maker,-a corner of holy ground where, walking in the cool of the evening, he may find refreshment and learn of the Divine compassion.

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It is of God's mercy that the New Church provides this blessed retreat. With this image before us, let us recall what to my mind is one of the most lovely and poetical prayers in our Liturgy: "Lord, be with us all the day long of this troublous life, until the shadows lengthen and the evening comes, until the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then, in Thy mercy, grant a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace with Thee at the last."

     Having thus recapitulated this elementary teaching concerning the Lord and His Church, we are free to examine the third and fourth parts of our subject.

     THE CLERGY.

     The Priesthood, we are told, is the first of the Church. It stands for the Lord as to the Divine Good of His Divine Love. It represents every office which the Lord performs as a Savior. Can any use be more vital, more exalted, yet, at the same time, of more terrible import?-official participation in one of the prime uses of creation itself! What wonder that men called to the exercise of such an office are regarded as men set apart, receiving their ordination at the hands of God, with peculiar gifts and graces, specially trained, and, be it added, with peculiar temptations. "Ye shall be called the priests of Jehovah, the ministers of our God." The doctrines tell us that the clergy are particularly gifted with the graces of illustration and instruction because those graces have particular relation to their ministerial office, and their ordination to the ministry conveys those graces. They also believe that while they are preaching in the heat of zeal they are inspired like the disciples of the Lord, on whom He breathed, saying: "Receive ye the Holy Spirit."

     The clergy of the New Church, then, are a body of men called by the Lord, gifted in an especial manner by Him, and representative of Him as to His work of Salvation. Moreover, they are a body constituted according to heavenly order, in three degrees of dignity and use, having over them governors skilled in the laws and God-fearing, whose special duty is to guard lest evils enter the Church either by reason of caprice or of ignorance. (N. 313.) Without such a priesthood, there can be no church; and its ministry is to Provide for the existence of things Divine amongst the people, whom they are to teach the way to heaven and lead there according to doctrine.

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     Divinely ordained, and with teaching drawn from the very Word of God, the priest of the New Church will speak with an authority which in turn will be derived from his own obedience to Divine precepts. "Thus saith the Lord" will be the basis of his message; but enforced acceptance by his hearers, or application to them, will be allowed no place in his intentions. "This is what I find in the Divine law," will be his declaration. "In your freedom, search ye therein, and find for yourselves," will be his exhortation. If a recognition of this authority be absent-an authority, be It repeated, which is not proper to man, but belongs to God alone-there can be no really vital teaching or leading. If we reflect but a single moment, we cab see that, unless this authority comes from God, it is human in its origin and merely the product of human conceit.

     Filled with a holy zeal for the due performance of his duties, the true priest will ever seek to enlarge his own capacity for use. He will try to discern the spiritual needs of those committed to his care, and provide that their souls be fed. What a richness of opportunity is his! Gifted with the grace of illustration, he can, in the light of the new Revelation, see something of Divine law, both in its natural and spiritual applications; he may learn of the beneficent purposes of the Creator. Dowered, also, with the grace of instruction, there is with him the ability so to mold and form and represent the heavenly doctrine that the reasonableness of its appeal may reach the simple in their simplicity and the learned in their intelligence.

     To the foregoing graces are added the virtues of perception and disposition. We read: "Perception has place in man according to the state of his mind as formed by doctrinals, and where these are true, the perception is rendered clear by the light of illustration." "Disposition arises from the affection of love in the will, and it is the delight springing from that love which effects it. Instruction follows." (T. 155.)

     So we see that the clergy of the Church will be concerned for the spiritual welfare of their flocks; solicitous that they grow in the knowledge as well as in the fear of the Lord; that their minds be enriched by an increasing appreciation of the wonders of creation and its universal harmonies. They will constantly desire active response on the part of the laity, who in turn should feel that no branch of human knowledge is too deep for them to attempt.

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The wise priest is indeed a guide, philosopher, and friend: He baptizes us, he instructs and confirms us, he blesses our marriages, at his hands we receive the Holy Supper, and in our last moments he fortifies us with words of encouragement and hope. According to the means at his disposal, he also provides for orderly public worship; suggesting the commencement or discontinuance of this or that practice, refining and enriching so that all may have the opportunity of storing up those states of external worship which are of use in the next life.

     Here we would offer a word of appreciation for what is being done in this direction at Bryn Athyn. Ritual which is beautiful, stately, and correspondential, will grow in importance with the growth of the Church; but if it be preceded by such teaching as that recently given by the Bishop Emeritus in his masterly series of papers on the subject,-which, by the way, we trust will he republished in book form,-we need have no fear lest the external rite should outstrip internal humility and devotion.

     Our whole conception of the clergy is that of men who, from a love of co-operating in the Divine work of salvation, ceaselessly labor for the existence of what is Divine in the Church, and ardently desire the intelligent and active response of the laity.

     THE LAITY.

     What then of the laity? Surely we may at once answer that they are to cultivate an attitude of understanding, of sympathy, of appreciation, and of reciprocity towards the work of the priesthood. The laity also confess the Lord as the supreme head of the Church; they also acknowledge the priesthood as of Divine establishment; they also recognize its office as being one connected with human salvation; they witness the work of the clergy, and so, too, do they desire to play their part. Theirs it is, according to the measure of their ability, to further the good work by taking care that there be a state of reception, a willingness to be led, a desire for instruction and amendment. An enlightened laity makes effectual the efforts of a devoted clergy; mutuality brings the use round full circle.

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     It is within the province of the layman to furnish the temporalities of the Church, to take care that there be vessels fitting for the reception of the blessings which flow down through the clergy. This can be done in many ways: by individual study of the Writings; by reading church literature; by attendance at Public worship and observing a devout deportment there; by the cultivation of church music; by attendance at doctrinal classes; by sharing in the social life of the church; by constructing the whole outlook upon the teachings of the church; by conversing in season upon spiritual matters; by furthering education within the church;-no less than by the more external way of contributing wealth.

     Let us not forget that, while it is true there can be no church without a priesthood, it is equally true that there can be none without a laity. The one presupposes the other. It should also be kept in mind that to us the terms "clergy" and "laity" connote distinction of office and not necessarily superiority or inferiority of person. We have said that the Lord is the only Governor of His Church. Before Him, all men are equal, since all stand in need of His salvation. Men only differ essentially in quality according as they differ in their willingness to receive this salvation.

     Again, there is somewhat of the Lord's priestly and regal adjoined to all. In his own home, every man is prophet, priest, and king; and a perception of this wonderful truth will lead to a better understanding of the distinctiveness of the offices in their public aspect. To his own family, we think, the layman should perform priestly functions; that it to say, he should invoke the Divine blessing at meals, and lead in worship, irrespective of whether a priest be present or no. Who will attempt to count the blessings, to estimate the benefits, the withholdings from evil and the leadings towards good, that have come to members of the church as the result of daily family worship?-the simple acts of reverently placing the opened Word upon the family altar, and of restoring it to the repository?

     Truly the responsibilities and privileges of the laity are great! "In the life of the body the end of all human thought and all human action should be for the sake of the life after death." (D. 2809.) Our whole conception of the laity is that of a body of earnest men, as to their spiritual life and interests segregated, indeed, from the world around them, devout followers of the Lord, thankful for the ministrations of their clergy, and desirous to follow in freedom and open-eyed along the path of enlightenment to the Holy City.

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     The offices of the clergy and laity are distinct. The Divine exists amongst men through the ministry; Justice through magistrates and judges, thus through the laity; and Morality through what is Divine and Just. Thus, in this light again we see that priests and people are interdependent; The relationship between them is based upon a realization of God's purposes towards the human race, and is strengthened by mutual recognition of uses, sympathy, toleration, patience, confidence, and respect for individual liberty.

     The priest in his office is representative of the Lord. Yes, he also is a respecter of the lay place and use. The layman is to be perfectly free on his own plane and in his own work. Quite,-but he is to leave the priest untrammeled in working out the illustration given to him in his use. Neither should even so much as wish to impair the freedom of the other. Even in public worship, the priest does not stand in place of the Lord; rather he makes the Lord known, and leads to Him. The priest most successful in public worship is that one who can lead his congregation and at the same time so sink his own personality that it is not interposed between them and the Lord. On his part, the layman is to accept the instruction as coming from the Lord, and only so far as he sees it to be so can it be accepted rationally.

     Dignity and honor are to be paid to the clergy by reason of the sanctity of their office, but these the wise clergy ascribe to the Lord. Those who claim them to themselves are faithless shepherds. The clergy are to instruct, and lead by truths to the good of life; on the other hand, it is incumbent upon the laity to follow. At the same time, he who believes otherwise than the priest, and makes no disturbance, is to be left in peace. We conceive of the relationship as one of freedom, vital to the regeneration of priest and layman alike, and to the upbuilding of the Church.

     There may be some who hold that the priestly office, as here defined, is too high, too sacred, too fraught with possibilities for any mortal to be entrusted to administer it; who feel that safeguards should be provided; who fear that, in the end, human passions will prevail and a state of spiritual Babylon come upon the Church. These are but natural anxieties,-the outstretching of Uzzah's hands.

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The one all-sufficient answer to doubts of this character is that the Priesthood has been established by Divine command, and that men have, in fact, been called to its ministry.

     We are well aware that page after page of history is fouled with the records of crimes committed by the priests of former Churches, that in the name of religion acts have been done, the recital of which goes beyond human credibility. Men have not hesitated to conspire to obtain the entire wealth of the world, have robbed the people of the Word of God, and have even claimed domination over heaven itself. All this is only too true; and yet, side by side with these awful impieties, there are also records of noble lives, lived in the fear of the Lord and in the furtherance of His Kingdom. Again, it is a fundamental of truth that abuse does not take away use. There can be no real growth where there is no real freedom, and the latter implies the ability to turn either to the right or to the left. The responsibility is individual.

     LESSONS FROM THE FORMER CHURCH.

     And now pardon what may appear to be a digression, while one indulges in a little reflection. It often seems to one that the position of the present-day New Churchman is in many respects analogous to that of the adherents of the first Christian Church during the centuries which immediately followed its introduction into our native land. Like they were, we are isolated, and pioneers. We imagine them waiting for news of the missions which they had sent out, scanning with anxious eyes for results, and only seeing small detached groups of the faithful, here and there struggling to hold aloft the banner of a new faith amidst a world sunk in darkness, indifference and sin.

     So we today, though engaged in the affairs of the natural world, are nevertheless spiritually isolated, few and scattered. We, too, search the horizon, and see but a few families or units up and down the country, with all the rest intervening blanks; though, to be sure, we are cheered by the prospect of that great metropolis which is slowly shaping itself across the Atlantic. Yet, few and scattered as we are, we, too, are doing necessary work, holding high the torch of truth which shall one day burst into a dazzling blaze to the illumination of the whole universe.

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     It seems to me that in the pages of history are to be found many lessons of warning and encouragement for New Churchmen; for, after all, history is no less than the writing of the finger of God, wherein is much which might be emulated with profit. But while the beliefs of the Christian Church are dead, and while much of its method may not be worth copying, we may turn for an example to its single-mindedness, its unwavering fidelity to principle, its devotion to the service of God. For instance, that Church grew, and the ideal of community life became established; but before its degradation and corruption set in, "two great and fruitful ideas," the historian says, "were kept constantly before the mind of the nation by the existence of the monastic houses,-the life of perpetual praise, and the life of associated labor. Laborare est orare was the familiar principle which animated the course of every well-directed monastic house."

     Monachism, or any counterpart of it, can never exist within the borders of the New Church-at least if we are to be anchorites, all the world shall be one cell-but the passion for consecrated work, the order and self-discipline which it inculcated may very well be imitated. The New Churchman in a more excellent degree may realize that "to work is to pray," and that the daily round of use can be transmuted into a daily round of praise. "In heaven, Divine worship itself does not consist in frequenting temples and in hearing preaching, but in a life of love and charity, or in the performance of uses."

     In conclusion, let us glance at the last moments of one, into the fruits of whose labors even New Churchmen enter. I name the Venerable Bede, because of his pioneer work in translating the Scriptures. The story is familiar to all. It is Ascension Day in the year 735, and the scene is the monastery at Jarrow on the Tyne. Bede, at the age of 62 years, is translating the Gospel according to John. He works untiringly, but his scribe, careful for the master's strength, and himself wearied by the toil of a long day, asks that the task may be laid aside. "Let us work on," he is admonished. Later, the youth again looks up, but this time with the glad cry on his lips: "Master, it is finished!" Bede gently answered: "Thou hast well said, my son, it is indeed finished." And, turning his face so as to catch the last rays of the sun, he passed into the world beyond.

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His life was simple, zealous, and strenuous, and he was permitted to accomplish much of his desire.

Few of us can hope to achieve any work of distinction in the Church. It will not be the privilege of many hereto grave one single enduring line upon its pages. Yet no genuine endeavor falls to the ground. We can all, priest or layman, quietly carry-on with the work nearest to hand, resolved that at least no evil impulse from the hells shall find its ultimation through us. If we so act consistently, then when the time of our passing is reached, we shall of a surety know that our efforts here were but the roots of the tree which comes to full fruition in the broad spaces of Eternity.
SELF-EXAMINATION AND THE MEANS OF REFORMATION 1920

SELF-EXAMINATION AND THE MEANS OF REFORMATION RAYMOND G. CRANCH 1920

     (A paper read at the British Assembly, August 1, 1920.)

     In the Writings of the New Church, we find a constant emphasis of the necessity of shunning evils in order that the Lord's life may flow in and bring with it the countless blessings of heaven; while the Old Church constantly exhorts us to "be good," without much insistence that evils must first be removed. The practical value of the New Church Doctrines is nowhere more evident than in their careful analysis of evil, and of the means by which evil may be overcome.

     In the Writings we find a division of all human loves into four great classes: The love of the Lord, the love of the neighbor, the love of self, and the love of the world. The loves of self and of the world are really hatreds, and not loves, as will be seen by the following brief passage from A. C. 33: "Self-love and the love of the world have in them some resemblance to life and to joy; but because they are altogether contrary to true love, which consists in a man's loving the Lord above all things and his neighbor as himself, it must be evident that they are not loves, but hatreds; for in proportion as anyone loves himself and the world, in the same proportion he hates his neighbor, and thus the Lord. Wherefore, true love is love to the Lord; and true life is the life of love from Him; and true joy is the joy of that life."

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     As the church progresses, our knowledge of what is involved in the love of the Lord and the love of the neighbor will become clearer to us, but the first and most urgent duty of each and all of us is to shun the two opposite loves,-the loves of self and the world. When we have accomplished the mastery over these two loves, by putting them in their proper place, we shall find that, without the conscious effort to acquire love to the Lord and to the neighbor, both of these loves have already been given to us by the Lord in direct proportion to the success of our efforts in driving out the corresponding evil loves.

     But how can we determine the direction in which we are moving? This can be done only by self-examination in the light of the truths of the New Church and of the Word of God. The greatest difficulty with which we are faced in attempting to make the self-examination called for by the doctrines of the New Church is in learning our true motives. We all know that the motive behind the deed is more important than the deed itself; and yet how hard it is to get at the true motives from which our actions spring, and how often we find the good and worthy motives mixed with those which are very selfish and sensual.

     We are taught that we can see evils only in the light of good, and that those who are wholly immersed in their evils cannot see what their evils are, or even that they have any evil, except when it is given them to reflect upon their evils from some light of truth. This shows us the absolute necessity for our learning the truths of the Church; for without their light we will surely fall into the conceit of our own intelligence, in which evils appear to us as though they were good.

     By learning some of the truths of the Church, a conscience is gradually formed, from which, by reflection, we can control our actions. Even then, we are of ourselves largely blind to our own evils; but by seeing ourselves as others see us, through the mutual love of friendship, we gradually recognize in ourselves one evil after another; and if we make a determined effort to overcome only one or two evils at a time, the Lord will lead us to see others, and give us the strength to turn away from them.

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     According to worldly philosophy, "self-preservation is the first law of nature:" but the Divine law tells us that "love is the life of man." History is full of wonderful confirmations of this truth. That which man loves he will make sacrifices for, and we know of many who, like Joan of Are, have cheerfully given their lives for their faith in God. Countless thousands have laid down their lives for their country and for the defense of those they love, while millions have lived out their lives in patient, loving self-denial, and in the constant effort to realize an ideal.

     The New Church doctrines teach us that, so long as our spirits inhabit this natural body, we are held by the Lord in a perpetual equilibrium between good and evil, and, therefore, that no matter how bad we may be, there is opportunity for reform; and no matter how good we may have become, there is danger of a fall. So it becomes extremely important to each and every one of us to know where we stand, and which way we are moving.

     If, in all our work and play, we regard ourselves in the first place; and if our regard for the good of the church, of our country, of our local community, and of our neighbor, is measured primarily by how much they do or can do for us, then it is time for us to take ourselves seriously in hand, with an effort to put first those things which have relation to the Lord and the neighbor.

     If, however, our chief delights are in promoting the good of the church, of the country, and of our neighbor, we must not simply rest in a feeling of self-satisfied self-righteousness, but must dig down as deep as possible to see if those delights are genuine, if we would still retain those delights, provided there was in them no feeling of merit, no feeling of self-gratification through pride of accomplishment, and no feelings of personal superiority and contempt of others.

     The merciful Providence of the Lord has ordained that our evils may not all appear to us at once, else we might be completely discouraged in our fight against them; but, as fast as we overcome external evils, we come into a knowledge and acknowledgment of more interior evils, such as pride in our own power, the love of rule and dominion over others, and a tendency to rebel at the dispensations of Providence. So the further we progress in the conquering of self-love, the more humble we become, and the more willing to be led by the Lord.

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In nearly all earthly failures and calamities we can see the blighting effects of self-love. Great nations have been wrecked by the self-love and greed of their leaders. The devastation of war is usually the result of unsatisfied national ambitions, or of class hatreds. The wrecked homes that we see on every side are usually the result of selfishness on the part of husband or wife, or the love of rule without a perception of the blessedness which comes when love to the Lord and to the neighbor is permitted to rule both husband and wife in their mutual effort to perform the uses which have been given from heaven.

Churches and church societies have prospered in direct proportion to the love of the neighbor and the spirit of self-sacrifice possessed by their members. And they have been torn by dissension and strife, and have fallen victims to disintegration, just in proportion to the lack of true charity among their members. Also, the love for spiritual things which has been developed has measured the enthusiasm, the success, and the length of life, of every church organization which has ever been founded. The Lord, in His Providence, has furnished many means by which self-love may be recognized and overcome, and true heavenly love received in its place. One of the most important means of freeing men and women from the blight of the love of self is the gift of conjugial love, which, if received from the Lord, helps us to forget ourselves in love for wife or husband. Nearly all mothers love their children better than themselves. In this love we see a faint image of the mutual love of heaven. With those who are striving to live according to the truths of the church, this love is an important means of helping to overcome self-love; but with those who are in evil, the love of children is simply a refined love of self in the children. Love of country is of great value in helping to overcome the love of self, as can be clearly seen from the self-sacrificing manner in which millions devoted themselves, heart and soul, to securing the success of their country's armies in the late war. Lastly, and most important, we have the love of the church and of the Lord's kingdom. Love of the Lord consists in loving obedience to His Commandments, so marvelously set before us in His own words spoken while He was on this earth. These teachings are so clear and simple that nothing could be more simple, both in words and deeds.

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No one can fail to understand the Golden Rule of "doing unto others as we would that they should do unto us;" and all can clearly see the lesson of loving service to the neighbor as shown by the example which the Lord gave us when He washed the feet of His disciples.

So when we are tempted to feel imposed upon, tempted to leave to others the uses which we have been given to do, or tempted to feel contempt for the way others see the truth, (or perhaps, in our opinion, fail to see the truth), let us ask ourselves if we have removed every element of self-love from our judgment, and let us pray the Lord for help to see the good in others and the evil in ourselves, in order that the uses of His glorious New Church may prosper and move steadily forward.
WHY THE PAPISTS SEPARATED THE BREAD AND WINE IN THE HOLY SUPPER 1920

WHY THE PAPISTS SEPARATED THE BREAD AND WINE IN THE HOLY SUPPER 1920

"There was a conversation with the Papists about the Sacrament of the Supper, as to why they have separated the bread from the wine, giving the bread to the people but drinking the wine themselves, seeing that it was differently instituted by the Lord; and seeing that it has not been done of necessity on account of the lack of wine, because in Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, the interior part of Germany, and in Hungary, there is wine; and where wine is not produced, as in England, Holland, Sweden, Denmark, and in that part of Germany where the Reformed are, it is nevertheless employed in the Sacrament of the Supper. The Papists could not state any reason for it, except the secret one that when the monks are saying masses for the souls of the dead, or at other times, they should not be fatigued by their continuous labor, because they are restored by the wine. But it was said to them that it had been done of the Providence of the Lord when they had devastated the Church of all good and truth, which they had separated; because good is not good when it is separated from truth. Good is in truth; nor is truth ever truth except from good." (Spiritual Diary 6059; A. E. 1054e; A. C. 10040.)

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA
Editor               Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
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     OLD ISSUES REVIVED.

     As many of our readers, lacking access to other New Church periodicals, depend upon the pages of the LIFE for information concerning the trend of opinion and the progress of events in the New Church at large, we bring together in our present number some of the outstanding matters of interest that have appeared in contemporary publications during recent months. As will be seen, they indicate something of a revival of the doctrinal issues which have been so fully discussed in the LIFE in past years,-the Authority of the Writings, the Distinctiveness of the New Church, Priestly Government, and so on. The question of the status of the New Revelation and the New Church in the world will doubtless agitate every rising generation, and must be met by every newcomer. In reality it will never be an "old issue;" except with those who have confirmed their conclusions in regard to such fundamentals, and have passed on to other things; and even these must find interest in every sign of the intellectual progress of the Church, though its expression be but a "voice crying in the wilderness" of doubt, hesitation, and denial.

     The late Mr. Odhner used to say that "one generation of New Churchmen knows very little about what the previous generation said and did."

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Striking confirmation of this comes to view in the arguments that are now being brought against the position that the Writings are the Word of the Lord to His New Church. All of these arguments have been answered over and over again in the pages of NEW CHURCH LIFE and other Academy publications. It would seem that every conceivable phase of the question has been dealt with, and that the difficulties in accepting the position have thus been removed with many who have come rationally to see the truth of our stand in the matter. Yet, in spite of this rational process, we are accused of "literalism" when we assemble the confirming statements of the Writings,-an accusation that is brought, either by those who have not canvassed our voluminous exposition of the view that "the Writings are the Word," by those who have done this without being convinced, or by those who have long opposed it and "are of the same opinion still." We think, however, that counsels of patience are in order,-the patient meeting of every reasonable approach. The view must be seen rationally, if at all.
STATUS OF THE WRITINGS 1920

STATUS OF THE WRITINGS 1920

The new edition of The Testimony of the Writings has called forth several reviews. Two of these are discussed elsewhere in this number, and a third is cited below. We also present, with little comment, a digest of the views of other writers on the same general subject. (Italics theirs.)

Reviewing The Testimony of the Writings in THE NEW AGE (Australia) for July, 1920, W. J. S. says in part: "Obviously our friends of the Academy are thoroughly satisfied of the soundness of this chain of reasoning, and they have founded their teaching upon it. But it certainly presents difficulties to others. The last statement especially sets forth a stupendous conclusion." This refers to No. XI of the Resume: "That these Writings are the Lord Himself in His Second Advent, revealed in His Divine Human to the men of the New Church." But is this such a "stupendous conclusion" when we consider only that Swedenborg was commanded to write upon the volumes of the Brief Exposition: Hic Liber est Adventus Domini?

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     W. J. S. goes on to say: "If the Revelation given by Swedenborg was 'complete,' one naturally inquires, How is it that he omitted to state this declaration which is of such supreme and transcendent importance? The only conclusion is that the declaration, not being a direct statement from the Writings, is an inference of human students. Can the fallible mind of man be trusted to draw such inferences? . . . Hence, for the confirmation of any doctrinal postulate, the spiritual man requires the 'Thus saith the Lord We would ask W. J. S. whether he considers "Scriptum ex mandato" equivalent to a "Thus saith the Lord" in respect to the above-mentioned inscription.

     In closing his review, W. J. S. remarks: "For these reasons, and many others which could be cited, it appears to the present writer that the Academy thesis needs reconsideration. None the less, the self-sacrificing efforts of its exponents to secure due recognition of the most valuable revelation, next to the Word itself, ever given to the human race, deserve the most unstinted appreciation." With due acknowledgments, we still must ask the friendly reviewer why he describes the Writings as "the most valuable revelation, next to the Word itself," when Swedenborg expressly declares that "The spiritual sense of the Word has been disclosed by the Lord through me. . . . This excels all revelations which have been hitherto from the creation of the world." (Invitation 44.)

     In an article entitled "Parallelisms between the Writings of Swedenborg and the Writings of the Apostles," published in THE NEW CHURCH WEEKLY for May 29, 1920, Mr. Francis Black again calls to mind Swedenborg's statement that he did not quote from the writings of the Apostles and Paul in the Arcana Coelestia "because they are doctrinal writings, and consequently are not written in the style of the Word. . . which consists altogether of correspondences. . . ." (Documents 224.) Like others before him, Mr. Black, placing the Writings of Swedenborg in the same category as the Epistles, concludes: "Hence, any claim that they are correspondential, or a New Word, is foolish, and based on ignorance of the Writings."

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And in closing his argument, he states: "While censuring the former Christian Church for giving equal importance to the Epistles as to the Word, there is a tendency to commit the same fault in respect to the Writings of Swedenborg. This latter fallacy arises, I feel sure, from an honest desire not to underestimate the new Revelation; but, if persisted in by us, must endanger the spread of the Writings."

In the WEEKLY for July 17 and 24, 1920, Mr. A. E. Friend writes a very able reply, the nature of which our readers may gather from these closing remarks: "Enough has been said, perhaps, to show that the parallels drawn by Mr. Black are, if they exist at all, of appearance only; but, as I said earlier, the question of the place and the authority of the Writings, raised by the article, is of vital importance to the Church. If the Church values the Heavenly Doctrines revealed through Swedenborg, as the Word of God to the Church, it will result in arousing in the men and women of the Church a living and real affection; but here let me say I do not wish to make the repetition of a phrase a test of New Churchmanship, for time will undoubtedly reveal those of whom the New Church will consist. I would remind all that, in the earliest days of the First Christian Church, similar questions agitated them; but the Church was established and grew only among those who accepted the new revelation given in the New Testament as the Word of God. With those who accepted the Old Testament as the Word, and the New Testament as doctrinal writings only, it waned and died. No organization can thrive on the negative; so neither can a Church be built on 'The Writings are not the Word, but they are-well, it is difficult to say what they are.' Every true member of the Church has sooner or later to face this question if he is honest; and to endeavor to pretend that no such issue exists is to bury one's head in the sand. Still, remember that progress lies only in accepting the manifest conclusion that the Doctrines are Divine Doctrines, which are the Word. I am aware of the difficulties; they are innate. They must needs be so, when we remember our environment and upbringing; but once the Lord in the Writings is seen-the Divine Human-the joy, the firmness, the peace, the satisfaction, can never be banished."

Mr. Black answers in a letter published in the WEEKLY for July 31, 1920, the sum of which is contained in the following paragraph: "In the multitude of Mr. Friend's quotations, one fact stands out plainly, viz., that his attempt to prove that "The Writings of Swedenborg are the Word" can only be made by implication, not by any definite and direct statement by Swedenborg.

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The Divine character ascribed to the Writings is Doctrinal and as such is only the appearance of Divine Truth. The Word alone is the Pure Divine Truth of Jehovah God Himself; and this can only be communicated to mankind by correspondences,"

IN THE YOUNG NEW CHURCH MAN for July, 1920, we find a very good article, entitled "A Divine Revelation," from the pen of Mr. G. E. Holman. It is intended as a help in answering the question often asked by strangers: "By what authority do New Churchmen believe in these books?" As far as it goes, the argument is convincingly put, and proves in simple and straight forward language how the Writings are accepted, not on the word of a man, but as an appeal to the rational minds of men. "This revelation of the internal sense of the Divine Word is indeed the greatest of all miracles, and affords us rational proof of the Divinity of the Writings." "All the truths given us in the Writings are of universal application, and they all dovetail into a Perfect whole. This would not be the case unless they were truths. If they were merely a man's speculations, there would certainly be some hitch, some discord, to show the artificiality of the whole thing." And more to the same effect.

Mr. A. W. Manning, writing in the NEW-CHURCH MESSENGER for August 11, 1920, comments favorably upon the reading of the Writings in connection with the sermon in the worship of the San Francisco Society. "Our people hunger for the straight doctrines, and they cannot defend the Church if they are not given them." In the MESSENGER for September 1, 1920, the Rev. H. C. Small goes a step further and advocates the reading of the Writings in worship in place of the second lesson, "which is really a third reading from the Word, since we also read from the Psalter." He favors this, not because he regards the Writings as a third form of the Word, but because they are "the Lord's own inspired interpretation of the Word." "We need them to accompany the letter of the Word, which is not understood without doctrine. Why divorce in the hour of worship that which God has joined together?" "Above every other writing the world contains, the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg are deserving of a place in closest association with the Divine Word.

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Why, then, bar out those writings from the sanctuary in which we allow other men's utterances full play? Why let false sentiment cause us to frame a church service in practical denial of the God-given message of the Writings? While not a Part of the correspondential Word itself, the Writings are of a similar quality and spirit as the Word, and are the Divinely prepared attendant of the Word." Thus all of his arguments just fall short of convincing reasons why the Writings should be read as a third lesson in worship. If they are a Divine Revelation, they are the Lord's Word to His New Church, and this alone warrants their use as part of the series of lessons from the Lord's Word.

THE NEW AGE (Australia) for August, 1920, briefly reviews the recently published book by Mr. Wm. McGeorge, Jr., entitled How Long Halt Ye Between Two Opinions, and referring to that portion of the work which expounds the supposed significance of the capitalized common nouns in the Latin editions of the Writings, expresses the opinion that the author "has proved his case," and says further: "If that is so, his service to the Writings will be second only to that achieved by Emanuel Swedenborg, who was himself a layman, but whose works in many most important points, for want of such solicitous and careful research as that which has been bestowed by Mr. McGeorge, have been very superficially understood, and very inadequately, and at times Positively erroneously, rendered into English. It may yet prove that what, by Divine enlightenment, Swedenborg has done for the understanding of the Holy Word, has been done by Mr. McGeorge for the understanding of Swedenborg. We possess the Writings. But it is not the possession of truth which makes the Church, but the understanding of it."

It has already been shown that the capitalized common nouns in the Latin editions of the Writings were placed there by the printer, according to a custom prevailing largely at the time. The capitals in question are not in the original manuscripts. We must declare our astonishment that THE NEW AGE, or anyone else in the Church, should be misled by the preposterous claim that any deep significance attaches to these capitals, or by the notion that an exposition of their supposed cryptic meaning is essential to an understanding of the Writings.

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DISTINCTIVENESS OF THE NEW CHURCH. 1920

     Answering the question, "Has the time come to make the New Church Message more distinctive?" the Rev. George Henry Dole addressed the Council of Ministers of the General Convention on June 2, 1920, in a paper which has doubtless been widely read in the church. In bold and incisive terms, he points the remedy for declining numbers, and marshals the teachings of the Writings which indicate the need for "soundness and purity of doctrine," if the New Church is to be maintained "in its particular form." A few extracts from the address, as outlined in the NEW-CHURCH MESSENGER for June 16, 1920, must suffice:

     At this time, a vital subject, showing that some one is thinking rightly toward the happy solution of our rapidly declining numbers. The cause of our decline seems certainly to be in the present polity of indistinctiveness, indirectness, upon which emphasis has been placed and more widely applied with commensurate failure. . . . The principles that seem dominant are those of indistinctiveness, the secreting of doctrine, making "the New Church in its particular form" (T. C. R. 3) to appear just like the denominations of the First Christian Church and the church universal, and becoming identical with the "inhabitants of the land." This polity produces results exactly the opposite of the intention. Our people, particularly the young, are being swept away in the clisintegrating sphere of indistinctiveness, and argue, "If the New Church is everywhere, and just like the others, if one can be saved as well in the Church of his birth as in the New, why is the New-Church organization necessary?" They are led to conclude that it is better for them to leave the New and join organizations where there are greater social and business advantages. It should be most obvious that this polity is suicidal.

     The unbalanced desire for numbers and external things, rather than for "soundness and purity of doctrine," enters into the effort to make the Old Church appear like the New. . . . We fall into the fatal error of desiring to join the Federation of Churches, and like Protestant unions.

     Make our secular and theological schools, wherein is the promise of the most efficient New-Church women, men, and clergymen, fundamentally, avowedly, thoroughly, openly, distinctively, really New Church, from the kindergarten to the finishing of university training. This is the only reason for New Church educational institutions. We cannot, in the beginning, compete with the larger schools in outward show and equipment in technical branches; but they cannot approach the New Church in the interpretation of science, nor in history, philosophy, and spiritual instruction, a mere fraction of which surpasses all the universities in the world where the New Church is not.

     While we have decreased in every item of membership, another branch of the Church, standing loyally on the doctrines and distinctive New-Church education, though impeded by a painful error in doctrine, has increased in every item. . . .

681

The tree of indistinctiveness may be known by its fruits.

     Surely there is but one way in which the Church can possibly be built up, and that is from the center of sound and pure doctrine, which is the Lord. We do not increase or get more milk by adding water. Abandon the destructive, negative polity of indistinctiveness; adopt the affirmative, progressive, and constructive polity of openness, frankness, loyalty, and faith in the power of the Lord as doctrine to accomplish that whereunto it is sent. Build from this center, which is the Lord. There is no other way of climbing up. "Return O Israel, saith the Lord, return unto me.

     The polity which Mr. Dole so powerfully arraigns is indicated in the following from the NEW-CHURCH REVIEW, July, 1920 (P. 344):

     In an account of "The Ninety-ninth Convention," the Rev. E. M. Lawrence Gould thus reverts to the Council of Ministers: "Reluctant honesty forces the admission that the meetings of the Council of Ministers did not meet the level of interest or of importance attained by the meetings of Convention itself. It almost makes one wonder whether we are arriving at a time when the ministry is playing the role of brakes rather than that of motive power in the church machine. Perhaps the Council also needs outside speakers to get it out of its rut. There were some excellent papers delivered, but the discussion as a whole tended to become theological and abstract, if not to degenerate into mere hair-splitting. This was especially manifest in the discussion of the old question of 'distinctiveness.' We confess we cannot understand the choice of such a topic, since it almost invariably results in a mere argument about terms which no two people seem to use or understand in just the same way. And it seems pertinent to ask at this point: 'From just what do we want to be distinct-from the solifidian spirit which reached its flower in the eighteenth century and is now dying fast; or from some millions of our Christian brethren who happen to belong to organizations different from our own?' This spirit of the New Age is as distinct from that of the Old as day is from night, yes, or as heaven is from hell. The line dividing them can be plainly seen, by anyone who wishes to look for it, running not between but through all the sects and religious bodies, ours included. The thing to do is to be very sure we keep on the right side of the line; and the way to do it is not by making the acknowledgment of a doctrinal formula the test of New Churchmanship."

     Mr. Dole returns to the subject in the MESSENGER for July 14, 1920, in an article entitled "Who are of the New Church?" Here he clears up the much-obscured question of the Church Specific and the Church Universal in its application to the New Church of this day. To quote:

     The terms Church and New Church are so frequently used in the Writings in the broadest and most universal sense that, without very careful comparison of statements, the inference may be drawn that all who are in any degree of charity are alike in and of the New Church.

682

This persuasion leads one to overlook doctrine altogether, to wipe out all doctrinal distinction, and to desire to become one with and affiliate with other denominations as though there were no difference. And some have gone so far as to maintain that there should be no specific New-Church organization, but that New Churchmen should remain with and work in the Church of their first affiliation. Still others have concluded that the specific organization of the New Church is eventually to be absorbed, swallowed up by surrounding and more numerous denominations through their becoming New-Church. Such beliefs are most harmful to the New Church and detrimental to its growth, for they not only destroy its doctrine, but nullify the specific uses of the New Church.

     Passages from the Writings on the subject of the universal and specific church are then cited, with this conclusion: If the specific New Church is the few persecuted by those in falsities; if in the New Church there will be no falsities; if in the New Church the Lord alone is worshiped; and if it is the heart and lungs; then those in the organs other than the heart and lungs, those who think of God as three persons, those having falsity and truth mixed, and the large body other than the few in the New Jerusalem, while they are such, constitute another division. Though they are in the church, they are not yet of it; or if they are of it, they are not in it. They are in and of the specific New Church who acknowledge the new revelation of truth as the Second Advent of the Lord, for such is the doctrine in heaven, which makes one with the specific New Church on earth.

     The same stand is taken by Mr. James A. Young in an article entitled "Affiliate and Distinctive" printed in the MESSENGER for July 21, 1920. He says in part:

     Affiliation of the Church of the Second Coming of the Lord with the Christian Church of the present day cannot result successfully for the New Church. All of the Christian denominations are today interiorly dead, or, as Swedenborg puts it, consummated. Exteriorly they are kept in form by those members of them who are naturally good-minded and intellectually of correct moral character, but who nevertheless have not regenerated their rationality to the spiritual degree taught in the New Church and are therefore only natural organs. They are kept in form only by past traditions, but are acting from their proprium. Strange to say, that is nearly the same condition into which the New Church has allowed itself to be formed.

     We have received in Pamphlet form the Sermon preached by the Rev. W. T. Lardge at the English Conference, Manchester, June 15, 1920. The text is from Matthew 2:11-"And they worshiped Him."

683

A strong tone of distinctiveness runs through it, as evidenced in the following paragraphs:

     "It is sometimes urged that the state of the world when Swedenborg lived is not now such, and that the evils then rampant do not now prevail. But surely those who assume this attitude fail to recognize, in the light which the Church now happily possesses, that, as a matter of fact, today evil and the love of evil, while it may not exhibit so gross and course an aspect as then obtained, is yet far more complex, subtle, insinuating and soul-destroying than ever, while on the surface it may certainly appear far otherwise." "Generally regarded, we are to-day little better than a race of respectable savages or refined pagans."

     "Again, it is surely by no means the function of the New Church to endeavor to permeate with what is new and true what doctrinally, and thence largely in life, has become old and false. For there is nothing to permeate. It is for this reason that the early Christian Church never seriously attempted to permeate the Old Church of its day with its teachings. . . . Precisely the same attitude applies to the Church of the Lord's Second Advent." "Would it not be wise of us to look more closely and thoroughly to the Church in its specific form at the present day? Let us see to it that its lungs breathe more freely, and that its heart beats more soundly. The Church Specific is not here to stand gaping, like a religious imbecile in spiritual impotence, while its own 'flesh and blood' drift to other fields and pastures, which lead no one knows where. Its granaries are filled with wheat and its water-pots are full of wine. The question is, what are we doing with it all? Are our own needing it, and are we wasting their precious contents?"

     "Not as Swedenborg's, therefore, but as the Lord's Message;-this must be the supreme and dominant note of all our propagandist efforts, if the Church is to retain its true position among the religions of the world today. But it must begin from Jerusalem, thus from within the Church itself, in clear, sound and definite teachings."

     The following is from the address of the President of the English Conference, the Rev. E. J. Pulsford, as printed in THE NEW-CHURCH WEEKLY for June 26, 1920:

     "In number we are but few; but with us are the hosts of the New Heaven, which stands in a causal relation to the Church on earth, and makes one with it. Not only should the thought of this fill us with good courage; it should urge upon us the prime importance of so ordering our doings that our organized Church life may receive in full measure the Lord's influx through the New Heaven, which is the one source of our strength, our progress, and our blessing. To this end our aim should be true New-Church distinctiveness, each society connected with the Conference being made to bear unmistakable witness to the Lord in His Second Advent by the vigorous preaching and teaching of the Heavenly Doctrines in their purity and power, and the consequent distinctive life of charity and use in which the New Church actually consists. . . .

684

Towards achieving this, we shall recognize the paramount need of a trained, equipped, and sustained ministry. . . . The greatest promise of the Church's growth, in numbers and in quality, is in our children; and beyond the immediate need of an adequate ministry is the further need of a distinctive and comprehensive New-Church education, in which all our children may participate."
TWO PAMPHLETS ON GOVERNMENT IN THE CHURCH 1920

TWO PAMPHLETS ON GOVERNMENT IN THE CHURCH 1920

     GOVERNMENT IN THE NEW CHURCH. Rev. E. J. Pulsford. A Sermon preached in the New Church, Henry Street, Bath, England, on Sunday, April 18th, 1920. Herald Press, North Gate. Pp. 12.

     In the brief form of this sermon pamphlet, which was widely circulated among New Churchmen in England, Mr. Pulsford offers his view as to the principles that should guide in the ecclesiastical organizations of the New Church. Specifically, it is a contribution to the consideration of the question of organization in the English Conference, and a reply to the Committee appointed in 1919, which invited suggestions from societies and ministers. His leading idea is thus expressed: "We want to find, and adopt, the form of church government that most fully realizes the rule of the Lord alone by His Divine Truth. In so important a matter, has the Lord left us without guidance, or has He given us in the Writings the principles of Divine order that should govern the organization of the Church?"

     The text is taken from Revelation 22:3: "And there shall be no more curse; but the throne of God and the Lamb shall be in it; and His servants shall serve Him." This is shown to teach that "in the New Church the Lord is to be the only Ruler; His law, His truth, is to be supreme. . . . In yielding to the supreme authority of the Lord's truth, we shall find release from the evils and falsities that are the cause of weakness and failure in our organization. In the New Jerusalem the Lord is to rule by His Divine Truth, 'and there shall be no more curse.)"

     In the course of the sermon, Mr. Pulsford answers the above question in the affirmative: "Let me emphasize that there is no New Church in the world apart from the Writings; in them alone is the Lord's revelation of the internal sense of the Word.

685

This bears upon the subject before us in two very important ways. The rule of the Lord alone in the New Church must mean the Divine authority of the Writings; if it does not mean this, it will mean nothing. And if this is granted-and surely it cannot be questioned!-it follows that, if the Writings clearly indicate one form of church government to be according to order, we shall receive what the Writings teach on this, as on all subjects, as from the Lord; it is our duty to try to understand it-until we understand it, we cannot hope to make use of it-but, even if we do not understand it, we shall not deny or reject it."

As to the power and effect of such an acknowledgment, we find the following trenchant paragraph:

"From these books, which we call the Writings of the New Church, we gel all our knowledge of the New Church, of what is meant by the New Jerusalem and its descent from God out of heaven. In them, and nowhere else, we find the internal sense of the Word revealed; the new truths thus revealed are the doctrines of the New Church. The fact that in the New Church we have a very exalted sense of the holiness and value of the written Word is entirely due to the Writings, in which the internal sense is revealed. Indeed, everything distinctive about the New Church, everything that causes it to be a New Church, we owe to the Writings. Apart from the distinctive teachings of the Writings, the New Church could have no existence in the world. Sometimes we hear it suggested that the New Jerusalem also descends from heaven independently of the Writings, in the form of new heavenly impulses quickening men's hearts, and new spiritual light illuminating their minds. It is true that mankind in this age are recipient of new vivifying spiritual forces; to these we may attribute the spirit of this new age; but these forces do not impart knowledge; knowledge does not how into men's minds from heaven; what flows into the mind is capacity to know, to see truth when presented; knowledge comes through the bodily senses from things heard and seen, read in books or heard with the ear. And while mankind generally are at this day the subjects of more direct and more powerful spiritual influences than in past ages, these influences can never bring about the Lord's New Church in the world, except in minds furnished with knowledge of the doctrines of the New Church, derived from the Writings. The New Jerusalem is in the world in the Writings, and nowhere else-in the Writings, not merely as printed books, but in the truths revealed in the Writings, acknowledged in men's hearts as the Lord's, and therefore lived."

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     Realizing that this may lead in a direction contrary to the "democratic" tendencies of the Church organization hitherto, Mr. Pulsford observes that, since so many New Churchmen "have been content with an organization similar to those of other Churches,. . . it is perhaps not surprising that the Church was organized on democratic lines, governed by the majority votes of all the members, either directly, as in general meetings, or through committees and councils, appointed by general meetings. . . . Democracy is commonly accepted as the last word in the perfection of government; many people find it hard to conceive that there can be anything better. The history of the organized New Church, as a democratic body, however, and its condition today, do not give cause for unqualified satisfaction, although it does not necessarily follow that the form of government is the cause of the feebleness we lament. But we may usefully consider whether any other form of government holds out the promise of enabling the Church to cope more successfully with the causes of feebleness and failure, which lie deeper than in forms of government-in the loves of self and the world, which turn us away from whole-hearted allegiance to the Lord in the truths He has revealed."

     To provide for this "rule of the Lord alone," Mr. Pulsford would have a "Divinely ordered and ordained ministry, or priesthood," which he finds existing in theory at present, but "nullified, when the word of the priest or minister can be overruled by a vote of the majority of the members." He does not say in particular how he would provide for this priestly government, but rightly holds that the principle of a trine in the priesthood for the sake of order is clearly taught in the Writings, as in N. J. H. D. 313, and the Coronis 17. "This is the episcopal form of government," he says, and the "guarantee of order in the New Church, ruled by the Lord alone, by means of His ordained priesthood, in which there is a threefold order of rank, is that all within the Church, laymen and ministers alike, recognize no authority but that of the Lord alone, in the truths revealed in the Writings."

     That the writer is animated solely by a desire to shed the light of the Heavenly Doctrines upon the subject of order and organization in the New Church, is clearly evident from the closing words of the discourse:

     "I commend this, earnestly and affectionately, to your best consideration.

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Think about it, carefully and deeply, in the light of all the information you can get, and do not come to a hasty or premature decision. Understand, it is not claimed that the Writings offer Is a ready-made Church organization; they indicate certain principles of Divine order; it is for the Church to frame a constitution which shall embody these principles; so long as they are observed, it is allowable to organize the Church along such lines as are deemed most practically suited to its circumstances and needs. We all love the Church, in varying degree; we all want to see the Lord's throne established; we love to remember that "freedom consists in being led by the Lord" (N. J. H. D. 142); we want to realize freedom in our Church life, by the elimination of every suggestion of domination on the part of any class, or party, or individual, over others, by the absence of any rule save that of the Lord Himself."
REPLY TO MR. PULSFORD'S SERMON 1920

REPLY TO MR. PULSFORD'S SERMON 1920

     THEOCRACY, DEMOCRACY, AND THE MINISTRY. A REPLY TO "GOVERNMENT IN THE CHURCH." By an Un-Mitred Minister. A. C. Lindley, Printer, It Albert Street, Manchester.

     As a "Reply" to Mr. Pulsford's grave and dignified sermon, this anonymous pamphlet is hardly to be taken seriously. Couched in flippant and contemptuous language, unworthy of the sacred subject dealt with, it is only a disjointed commentary, pervaded with anti-clerical feeling and a lack of respect for the Writings as a Divine Revelation. Significant, however, of one kind of opposition that is aroused when the truths of the Writings on the subject of government are presented, we think it well to indicate the gist of the argument by quoting the following paragraphs, shorn as far as possible of the cheap persiflage which abounds in the pamphlet. (Italics in the original):

     "The subject matter of the sermon, if not its sole concern, is the establishment of a Trine in the Ministry within the borders of our Church organization; in other words, the substitution of the episcopalian form of Church government in place of the plastic, semi-congregational system now prevailing. . . . To my mind it is a somewhat flabby, bloodless quest, little likely to reward pursuit. . . ."

688

     "Mr. Pulsford's plea is penned in his usual clear and persuasive manner, and may, for all I know, make converts. The fact, moreover, that the author is President of the Conference this year, though presumably only a coincidence, may, in the minds of some at least, associate authority with his words. That would surely be an unfortunate effect, inasmuch as no authority whatever attaches to them-as, indeed, their author would be the first to admit.

     "I personally-probably also the great majority of New Church people-disapprove of and repudiate practically everything in the pamphlet, and it seems necessary to say so plainly, and to give the reasons. Perhaps 'practically everything' requires qualification. Mr. Pulsford's earnest purpose, for instance, to remedy certain spiritual defects in our midst leaves no room for disagreement. That, however, I take it, is not the essence of his treatise, but rather the proposals he advances as remedial. It is to them I object. . . .

     "It is democracy in the Church, rather than in the State, concerning which Mr. Pulsford hints distrust, if not dislike. He approaches it in a gingerly fashion, turning it over with his foot, so to speak, as though it were an unexploded shell. . . . He had better let it alone, and leave the handling of the thing to an expert. . . . He presses his impeachment of Demos to a practical issue by complaining that `the history of the organized New Church, as a democratic body, and its condition today, do not give cause for unqualified satisfaction.' No, there need be no controversy on that score; the sunniest optimist amongst us will concede the justice of this rather trite and obvious charge. . . .

     "He piles Pelion upon Ossa by declaring that 'so long as we have an organization exposed to the possibility of self-love and self-intelligence, we have no right to the name, New Jerusalem.' It is exceedingly probable, in my judgment certain, that we have no right whatever to the name, and have exhibited a presumption almost incredible in ever laying claim to it. It is that presumption, indeed, that lies behind nearly all the fallacies in the tract under review. I assert, and could easily prove if there were space for it, that Swedenborg, in referring to the New Church, never means the organization, either the present one, or another, and never shows sign of foreseeing such a
development."

     Referring to No. 313 of the New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine, the anonymous reviewer makes the astonishing assertion: "Any reader, by turning up that and preceding numbers, may see for himself that it has no bearing on ecclesiastical affairs, but refers exclusively to civil governors. Did this escape the President's attention, and is his misinterpretation an instance of 'order in the New Church,' such as we might expect under the proposed new regime? . . . The entire chapter (N. J. H. D. 311-325) is simply a citation of civil and religious institutions existing In the Mriter's time, and known to everyone-which he enumerates rather than legislates upon. They were there, ready to hand, and he takes them for granted.

     "That the Swedish seer may have had a personal preference for a hierarchy in the Church is likely enough. His own father was a hierarch, and he himself was reared in the atmosphere of Lutheran episcopacy.

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For him the only alternative to that and the Roman ritual would be the autocracy established by Calvin; and the 'Reformed' or Genevan rule was certainly no improvement, and could not have appealed to him. Of Nonconformity, English or continental, he probably knew nothing.

     "All this notwithstanding, Mr. Pulsford-are there others behind him?-is persuaded that in Swedenborg's works are to be found the most minute instructions for banishing spiritual disorders by means of mechanism or right 'order.' Hence he urges that 'the safeguard against disorders is to be found, not in the votes of the members, but in an orderly or graded ministry.' He labors further to buttress up his hypothesis, not this time by an admittedly canonical book like the Heavenly Doctrine, but by calling in the Coronis as an additional witness. Now the Coronis (as also the often-quoted Canons) is a posthumous production, which is to say it was published, not by its author, but by his followers in after years, who must carry a share of the responsibility.

     "I venture to suggest that, having come out of the Great War, we are in no mood for classifying men into priests and laymen. Moses was a layman,. . . . most of the Old Testament prophets were laymen. Swedenborg himself was a layman. The urgent need today is for prophets, not priests, who will cry, 'Here am I, send me!'-men willing to face poverty, discouragement and desertion, if so, or by any means, they may snatch the Lamb out of the lion's mouth.

     "Our President has put forth in a Paper Boat on as choppy a sea as we have ever had to navigate, and will be capsized unless he gets back to harbor without delay. That, for him, is the counsel of perfection."
CRITERION OF DIVINE AUTHORSHIP 1920

CRITERION OF DIVINE AUTHORSHIP 1920

     THE CRITERION OF DIVINE AUTHORSHIP. By the Rev. James Frederick Buss. London: The New Church Press, Ltd., 1920. Pp. 324. Cloth, 8vo. Price, 6 sh. 6d. (Academy Book Room, $2.50.)

     The attempt to rescue the Word of the Lord from the materialistic atheism of the time must be regarded as laudable. In his Prefatory Note, Mr. Buss well says: "Apart from the Holy Word, . . . carrying with it Divine authority over the faith, consciences and lives of men, all true religion, and supremely the Christian religion, must sooner or later perish from the earth, and then nothing can avert, first, the spiritual and moral corruption, and then the disintegration, of human society."

     Beginning with a discussion of the "Present Biblical Situation," and arguing for the "Necessity of Divine Revelation," the book before us attempts, by a gradual approach, to unfold to the reader the "new criterion" and the "new view" of the Scriptures,-the "rational" interpretation which the author eventually shows to be possible now in the light of the spiritual sense as revealed through Swedenborg.

690

He "earnestly invites everyone who loves the Scriptures for their spiritual worth to a patient consideration of this new view." As such, the book is addressed to those in the Christian world who may be favorably disposed, and there is warrant for such an attempt in the passage from the Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture, no. 4, quoted at the end, wherein Swedenborg declares that the spiritual sense of the Word was revealed to him by the Lord to the end that this may "convince even the natural man, if he is willing to be convinced." This being the end and aim, we wish The Criterion of Divine Authorship every success in its avowed mission, though we shall be obliged to question the method of "gradual approach," as we have termed it, believing that a more direct method would be more effective with minds sufficiently open to accept the light of the Second Coming.

At the outset, Mr. Buss clearly sets forth the two contrasting positions respecting the Bible held in the present-day Christian world; one, the traditional belief that the Bible is literally inspired, and therefore verbally inerrant; the other, the modern view, held by the higher critics and their disciples, that the Bible is a collection of books written by men in different ages, telling of God's dealing with them, and reporting what they conceived to be God's revelations to them. He shows that the first-mentioned belief, though still affectionately cherished by many of simple mind, cannot maintain itself among those of more thoughtful disposition; while, on the other hand, the view of the higher critic discredits the Divine origin of the Word, and leaves men wholly to thoughts concerning God that are formulated by their own self-intelligence.

But when Mr. Buss offers a remedy for this condition of things, and proposes a criterion of Divine authority that will stand, we cannot but think that he adopts the same wrong postulates for which he would condemn the rationalists who lead modern thought. Like them, he proposes a thesis deduced from reason, and then seeks to establish its truth by evidence. It is true that his thesis is not their thesis; his test for the Word of God is that of neither the old nor the new school of theology. But his ostensible method of arriving at it is no less faulty.

691

He himself did not arrive at his criterion by any process of reasoning, but received it by means of the new Revelation from the Lord given in the Writings. This he states, indeed, after he has, by his process of logic, laboriously brought forth the conclusion that such a Revelation must exist in the world. Yet he knows very well that no man can attain to any spiritual truth or principle by any process of reasoning. A spiritual truth may be confirmed but never discovered by such means. If that were possible, a knowledge of God, of His Divine laws, of the spiritual world, could have been acquired by human reason, and there would have been no need for Divine Revelation, which, in fact, is the claim of Natural Theology.

And Mr. Buss, after all his reasoning, is forced at last to the dogmatic statement that "viewed from the standpoint of this now revealed Spiritual Sense of the Word, therefore, the Lord's Second Coming, which He foretold at His First, Proves to be the very Revelation of the Spiritual Sense of the Word which He promised at the close of His earthly ministry." (p. 160.) This, we may remark in passing, emphasizes the vital fact for which the Academy has contended, that the Writings are the Second Coming of the Lord, not merely a telling about it; that they are not from Swedenborg, nor from any angel, but from the Lord alone.

But, while this important affirmation is made, our author does not see that his position necessitates the further affirmation that the Writings, which constitute the internal sense of the Word, which are from the Lord alone, which are the Lord revealing Himself at His Second Coming, are therefore the very Word of the Lord in a higher and more essential sense than the Word in its Previously revealed forms, on which account this Revelation excels all that have been given from the creation of the world. (Invitation 44.) On the contrary, he finds a great difference between the method of giving the earlier revelations and that employed with Swedenborg. "Swedenborg's works are not the product of the direct Divine Authorship that gave the Word, but of an indirect one; . . .it is only the products of direct Divine Authorship, or of Divine Authorship strictly so called, that are necessarily parabolic in character." (Italics his.) And yet he adds "that the character of 'Revelation' may equally pertain to books that are the product of indirect and of direct Divine Authorship."

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He is then at Pains to show how an "indirect" revelation is still "from the Lord alone." He does not round out his argument by explaining how such an "indirect Revelation" excels all former ones.

The distinction he here seeks to make seems not only needless hair-splitting, but a Positive danger-introducing the mind of the reader to the suggestion of imperfection in the Revelation given through Swedenborg, giving excuse for the rejection of this or that of its content, if it antagonizes the reader's conception of what Divine Revelation ought to be. At this Point in the book, the author might well have established the greater excellence of a Divine Revelation given through a "rational" instrument over the former "dictated" Revelations; he rather invalidates such a claim by the use of the unfortunate term "indirect." The mischiefs that have followed this kind of quibbling in the New Church need not be particularized; they are patent to every student of the state of the Church, for they have split the nominal New Church into two factions, the gulf between which can never be bridged until all unite in the common acknowledgment, without reservation or modification, that the Writings are from the Lord alone, His very Word to the New Church.

It is this attitude of mind which is responsible for the laborious reasoning by which the author of the Criterion seeks to establish things which can be known only by Revelation, which he himself received only so. The method is not new, either in or out of the New Church. However well meant, the effort to lead men to the light of the New Church by reasoning up to that light,-by the inverted, forbidden way,-has proven well-nigh fruitless; and it is not the pattern set by the Lord Himself in the Writings, where we find, in every part and portion, the statements of revealed truth which are afterwards demonstrated. Mr. Buss himself notes this reverse attitude of mind among those who find a "genius for religion" among the Jews which enabled them to "discover" and give to the world the notion of one God-and this, although their history, as preserved by themselves, shows them to have sprung from idolatry, and to have retained a proneness to return thither. A similar attitude of mind has misled so many in the New Church in their vain endeavor to demonstrate the truths of the New Church without reference to that Revelation by which alone those truths could be known to men.

693

     Mr. Buss, however, does not ignore the Revelation through Swedenborg, as so many others have done. He does fully acknowledge that Revelation and the essential use of it, with the reservation above referred to, that he does not admit this Revelation to be the Word of the Lord. And it is manifestly his aim to lead others to the faith that is his. Our objection is to the painstaking process of "reasoning up" to the truths of the Revelation, so that when he finally declares the fact of the Revelation, it is as if he said: "Here you see the thing which my reasoning has demanded, which in my reasoning I looked for, and which that reasoning enabled me to recognize when found." We venture to submit that this is not the process by which Mr. Buss himself arrived at his own acknowledgment of the Writings, nor the process by which he can hope to lead many others. It is possible that his book will reach some of the "remnant" in the Old Church who "love the Scriptures for their spiritual worth." We believe that there are such, even in the Old Church ministry. And if they are sufficiently dissatisfied with the former errors, thus sufficiently ready to accept the new light, this book may be of help in dispersing their doubts.

     We have been frank in our criticism of the scheme or plan adopted in the Criterion of Divine Authorship. We think there is something of over-adaptation and over-accommodation in the method employed, and prefer less "indirect" methods, believing them more effective in the end. It seems to us, therefore, that the better mode of treating the subject Mr. Buss has undertaken in this volume would be, first to set forth the truth as revealed-dogmatically, if you please, but as a "bearing witness to the truth." After that, bring forward the confirming reasons as amply as space permits. Reason may and should confirm Revelation; reason itself can never reveal.

     There is much that it interesting and instructive in Mr. Buss's book, and it might be read with profit by all New Churchmen.

694

BRAZILIAN CONTEMPORARY 1920

BRAZILIAN CONTEMPORARY E. E. IUNGERICH 1920

     A NOVA JERUSALEM, Rio de Janeiro, April to June, 1920. This, the 69th number during the 21 years of the journal's life, contains several matters of interest that deserve special notice.

     First, as to the New Church Society at Rio de Janeiro, we are told on the cover that its Sunday services are held at rua Visconde de Itaborahy, no. 35, and that there is a book-room at the same address where the Writings and collateral literature are to be had. Doctrinally, the society is still held staunchly to the belief in an absolute separation from all forms of Old Church Christianity, and from such modern perversities as spiritism and materialism, as we judge from the militant declaration of principles on the cover.

     Of historical value is the following excerpt from the Rev. Henry Leonardos's eulogy of the late Rev. M. C. de S. Bandeira, a brief notice of whose death appeared in the LIFE for August: "Bandeira was the last of the three whom the Princeps ordained. . . . Reading his character well, and in spite of his being the last, Senhor de La Fayette saw no reason for keeping him in the last place. Manuel Bandeira was at once ordained into the second degree of the priesthood, even though the two who had preceded him still bore the insignia of the first degree. But our President did well in thus acting. Bandeira was not only the oldest of the three as to baptism, but also the oldest as Director of the General Association of the New Church in Brazil, of which he had been Secretary for so many years, and finally Vice President. Moreover, by his profound acquaintance with the doctrine, and his studies of many living and dead languages, he was lifted to a higher level, and even worthy of being ordained into the third degree, with the office of which, as we know, Senhor de La Fayette had shortly intended to invest him." The third member of the priesthood, not mentioned by the Rev. Henry Leonardos is the Rev. Mendenca Lima.

695

     The Rev. de La Fayette, who instituted this priesthood, affirms that he was commissioned by the Lord, whom he saw in a vision, to inaugurate the New Church in Brazil. He has two titles, one secular and one clerical, viz., Presidente and Princeps. The latter corresponds to that of our Bishop. It is an unusual title for a clerical position. In fact, as the account in Conjugial Love shows, it is the chief layman of a heavenly society who is called "Princeps," or "Prince," and the priesthood is under another who is specially dedicated to that calling.

     Twelve of the sixteen pages of this issue of A NOVA JERUSALEM are from the Rev. de La Fayette's pen. Of special excellence are two articles which I shall here briefly review.

     The article on "Spheres" is a veritable storehouse of information, and contains a fine classification of the various phases of the doctrine on that subject. Of chief interest to me is the way he sets forth the effect of the spheres from natural objects and men upon spirits. As to natural objects, Swedenborg's eating of butter and tea is cited from the Spiritual Diary, no. 3894. The writer seems to consider that the spheres of such substances affect spirits sensorially, and do not in any way depend upon the mental pictures in an individual's mind. I am convinced his article needs amendment on this point. In fact, in S. D. 3894, the function of the mental image as an initiator of the sensation is set forth in the very first sentence: "It was observed, as when the dung of horses was seen, that certain spirits could not endure the sphere thence arising." Therefore, in A. E. 6595, which teaches that evil spirits are physically present in unclean places, it is significantly added: "But of this they are unaware." Even the teaching of C. L. 171, that the sphere of a wife who is tenderly loved affects spirits agreeably, must presuppose an active thought in the minds of the consorts, if the spirits are to have more than a vague sensation of well-being; just as, conversely, men on earth have only a vague sense of discomfort when the combats of temptation are raging about their internal man.

     Spheres on earth are the basic resting-place of angels and spirits; but since the fall, it is a basis that affects their involuntary, unconscious, cerebellar plane, without any manifest sensation to themselves. They instinctively shun a sphere that is uncongenial, and instinctively move to one that is suited to them. This is what is meant, in S. D. 5646, by the "actual walking from the man's will," as opposed to those walkings which are apparent to him, or affect his intellectual sense,-a distinction which I regard as very important.

696

Indeed, it enters into subjects of a transcendent character; as for instance, (a) the effect of the Holy Supper after its Spiritual Institution has been read, and (b) the effect of the Prior Divine Human, which was a transflux through the heavens "when He spoke the Word." (A. C. 6280.)

With this amendment or reservation, it is possible to appreciate the following citation from the article, treating of human spheres: "The thoughts and imaginations of men still living here as to their bodies form a plane necessary for the resting of our invisible neighbors. In fact, each individual, while living here, is, so to say, a little generator of spheres for such a use; just as, analogously, each single plant is a small laboratory for the manufacture of oxygen, helping to make a natural atmosphere suited to the physical breathing of human beings. Such atmospheres or spheres, prepared by the man, must then supply the spirits with their nourishment, [and are] a means of exciting their thoughts and thus of forming the proper basis of their conscious existence. Each spirit must find here the type of sphere peculiarly congenial to his life, or all his cheerfulness of life will perish."

The article, entitled "Why was Christ crucified?" is an excellent sermon that should be translated and made accessible to English readers. It teems with valuable thoughts in regard to the Lord's temptations and His spiritual environment while undergoing them. Thus the temptation to "turn stones into bread" involved regarding the acknowledgment of the Divine authority of truths as being itself saving. It was the Pharisaic conceit and the Jewish formalism of His environment that subjected Him to it. The temptation to "cast Himself down from the pinnacle of the temple" was an assault upon the pride of self-intelligence, as "pride always goeth before a fall." He had to resist those who would make Him king, and put aside any effort to compel acceptance by means of miraculous exhibitions of power. More interiorly, this was a temptation to leave the "temple of His body," that is, to reject the Divinity it had acquired, and go back to the angels as the basis for His influx with men; "for they will bear thee up, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone." The writer associates this interestingly with the temptation to descend from the cross, and with the law of Deut. 22:8, to "build it parapet about the roof."

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The temptation to bow before Satan in order to receive the kingdoms of the earth was a temptation to use evil means willingly for a good end, i. e., for the salvation of the perverse world. It is illustrated with man by the attempt to do good from the proprial will without a prior shunning of evils. The Lord recognizing this, said: "Get thee behind me, Satan!" He never permits evil as one who concurs in it. Had the Lord succumbed in any of these three vital issues, His labors would have come to naught, and the human race would have been surrendered to the over-weening influence of the hells.
E. E. IUNGERICH.
NEW EDITION OF THE HOSANNA 1920

NEW EDITION OF THE HOSANNA BESSE E. SMITH 1920

     THE HOSANNA. (Revised and Enlarged.) A Song and Service Book for the Sunday School and Home. New York: New Church Press, 1920. Cloth, pp. 346. Price, $1.00.

     This volume is intended for the use of the Sunday Schools and homes of the General Convention, and contains many hymns that will be enjoyed by our children, both in school and at home. To hold it in the hand and turn its pages will bring a thrill of recollection to many, for in size and general appearance it is the same as the old Hosanna, so dear to many childish hearts only a few years ago, and we find many of the old songs between its covers. By turning these pages and conning the favorites of youthful days, a few decades may be rolled away as we renew happy childhood states.

     The book contains a good collection of hymns and spiritual songs suitable for children and young people. There are many more songs than were contained in the first Hosanna, or in the New Hosanna. But the best songs in this new volume are taken from those two books; the newer material is below the standard of the old. The hymns in the Hosanna of 1878 excel in child-like quality and in harmony of music and text. The New Hosanna, published in 1902, is of a higher artistic quality, but has much less appeal to children and young people. In the Hosanna we are reviewing, we find these two types well represented. Some of the new hymns are pleasing, both in child-like quality and artistry.

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     This new volume should find a place in our school libraries, to be used in addition to our Hymnal, as it contains many hymns which may be taught to children by rote. We especially recommend the fine selection of Christmas hymns. Some of the old English carols-such as "What Child is This?"-are interesting, and children will sing them with spirit. Others that we may add to the dear, familiar Christmas songs are: "Noel; Noel, the Christ is Born," "O Little Town of Bethlehem," "Clear upon the Night Air Sounding," "It Came upon the Midnight Clear," and "Once in Royal David's City." For the very little children, in the kindergarten and the home, there are "Shine out, O Blessed Star," "A Carol of Christmas Bells," and "Away in a Manger."

     The part of the book which is least commendable is the section entitled "Sacred Songs" (p. 205-266). Here we find "Help Somebody Just Now," "Brighten the Corner," "Anywhere, with Jesus." Surely these are neither musical nor spiritual; and they convey a doctrinal suggestion of instantaneous regeneration and the vicarious atonement.

     Among the hymns for little children is one from our Hymnal, but so changed as to be scarcely recognizable. It is "Little Lamb, who made Thee?"-the music being adapted from that by the Rev. W. B. Caldwell. I can see no reason for the alterations, save that it is now in a key better suited to children's voices. The character of Blake's poem calls for simple, child-like music such as we have in our Hymnal, and the elaboration of it makes it less expressive of the text and less suitable to little children. Putting the melody in an inner voice is an error, for children usually sing the soprano in unison.

     The chants, grouped as "Songs from the Word," are welcomed in a book of this character. The selections contain the finest passages from the Word for singing purposes, and the music is among the best of our historical store of chant material. It is well that the young people of the Church should be taught to chant, as an expression of the Word in its letter, and as a preparation for adult worship.

     The book is well arranged and well printed, and of a convenient size for children's hands. It should be useful for New Church Sunday Schools, and our General Church teachers and parents will find it a valuable addition to our own Hymnal, both in the schools and in the homes.
     BESSE E. SMITH.

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OUR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 1920

OUR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS G. A. MCQUEEN 1920

     Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

     The statement has recently been published that at the present time there are only five elementary schools in the General Church. This small number of schools would seem to suggest a lack of understanding as to the importance and necessity of providing such schools. If the work of New Church Education is to grow, and the Church is to prosper by this means, we must look forward to the time when every New Church family will constitute a nucleus of a New Church Elementary School.

     It may well be asked how it is that our schools have not increased in number as the General Church has increased in membership; and the question is one which should engage the serious attention of all of its members. The subject was recently dealt with in a masterly address, delivered at the meeting of the Sons of the Academy by the Rev. George de Charms, when he referred to New Church education as the "Building of the Great House." It is a good thing that this subject is engaging the attention of the Church, and especially gratifying that the younger generation is showing signs of an appreciation of their responsibility for carrying on this work in the future. If those who have already reaped the benefits of the efforts made by the fathers of the movement should fail to continue the building of the edifice, our hope for future success would be small indeed.

     It is to be presumed that all who join our body are acquainted with the origin and history of the great educational work now being carried on at Bryn Athyn. If so, they will know that the movement, like all great movements, had very small beginnings-that schools were started when there were fewer children, less means, and greater obstacles to be overcome than exist at the present time. If the principles underlying the action taken so many years ago were true, then they apply with even greater force today.

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The public schools of the world are not any more suitable places for the formative period of the minds of our children than were the schools of thirty years ago. The means at the disposal of the average family are not less than in former years, and the children are not fewer in numbers.

What, then, is the cause of the apparent hesitation in starting New Church Schools for the younger children of New Church families? Is it because the parents are not convinced of the injuriousness of the spheres of the schools of the world? Or do they feel helpless in the matter, and think there is nothing to be done but to wait until an up-to-date day-school is provided by some organization of the New Church? The pioneers of the Academy Schools did not wait, and they did not expect to compete with the outside schools as to external advantages. They had seen a light which opened their eyes to the state of the Old Church world, and having themselves separated from its organizations, then saw the further necessity of keeping the children separate, and commenced to build the "Great House." Once the real reason for separate schools is seen by our parents, there will be an increased endeavor to establish elementary education, whether it be in the isolated family, the combined effort of several families, or with the families of a New Church society.
G. A. MCQUEEN.
TWO REVIEWS OF "THE TESTIMONY OF THE WRITINGS." 1920

TWO REVIEWS OF "THE TESTIMONY OF THE WRITINGS." GILBERT H. SMITH 1920

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:

Two reviews of the little booklet, The Testimony of the Writings Concerning Themselves, (Second Edition, The Academy Book Room, 1920), have come to my notice, as doubtless they have to yours. The one appeared in the NEW-CHURCH REVIEW for July, 1920, over the name of the Rev. Walter B. Murray; and the other in the NEW-CHURCH MESSENGER of September 15th, from the pen of the Rev. John Whitehead. I wish to offer the following comments in reply to these two reviews:

701

     ARTICLE IN NEW-CHURCH MESSENGER.

     This article under "Current Literature," is entitled "The Word and the Heavenly Doctrines." The argument of the writer is one that has been made frequently. Briefly it is this: Swedenborg tells us specifically just which books of the Bible are the real Word of the Lord (A. C. 10325); his list does not include his own works; moreover, if his Writings were part of the Word, they would have been written by correspondences, would have an internal sense, and thus would require a subsequent Divine revelation to explain them; therefore the Academy is wrong in calling the Writings "Books of the Word."

     This review is satisfactory in considering the quotations from the Writings squarely, although the writer does not agree with the Academy conclusion drawn from them. When one brings quotations from the Writings in support of a certain proposition, it is always a satisfaction when an opponent takes those quotations and attempts to show what their real meaning is. This Mr. Whitehead does. He says that the passages quoted in the Testimony mean to him that "all the Theological Writings of Swedenborg are the Doctrine of the New Church hitherto concealed within the books enumerated in A. C. 10325." He also says that "the Doctrine is the Truth of the Word,. . . divested of its correspondences," These are the reviewer's own words, and it is good Academy teaching. The only unnecessary phrase he has used is "divested of its correspondences." For every Academician understands perfectly that there are no correspondences in the Writings like those composing the Letter of the Word.

     Mr. Whitehead's own definitions may be recast thus: The Theological Works of Swedenborg are the Doctrines of the Word-"the Truth of the Word"-unfolded out of the Word, presented in rational forms, etc. But at this point he leaves the Academy view. He says that "to call these books" (admittedly revealing the Divine Truth of the Word) "Books of the Word, inevitably leads the mind to ascribe similar qualities to them which the enumerated 'Books of the Word' possess, and also to lose sight of the different qualities possessed by Doctrine." But we beg to submit that it does not inevitably lead the mind in this direction. Certainly not an Academy mind.

702

For let us consider: The Books enumerated by Swedenborg as the "Books of the Word" are made up, for the greater part, of things historical or biographical; and we know that nothing of history or of personality appears in the Word as it exists in heaven,-in fact, nothing whatever of the literal sense. Therefore, the Word in heaven must also be divested of its correspondences. For if Divine truth of Doctrine, "divested of its correspondences," cannot rightly be called the Word, then we reach the absurd conclusion that there is no Word in heaven! And consider this further: The Lord Himself is rightly called the Word. But does this "inevitably lead the mind" to ascribe to Him similar qualities to those which the "Books of the Word" possess? That is to say, is it improper to call the Lord the Word, because Swedenborg did not mention Him as a part of the Word, or one of the "Books of the Word"?

     Does this writer really believe that when Swedenborg enumerates the Books of the Word that he meant to do anything more than to define what constitutes the true Word in its Letter? When an Academician affirms that the Lord is the Word, who can think that he means that the Lord is one of the Books of the Sacred Scripture? So, then, when the Academician utters the belief of his heart that the Writings are the Word, certainly no one should think that he means by it that they are the same in external form and structure as what Swedenborg defines as the Letter of the Word.

     The quotations brought forward in the Testimony of the Writings are not intended so much as proofs of the Academy position in regard to the Writings,-that they are part of the Lord's Word,-as confirmations of that position. One who, from a knowledge of the Writings as a whole, has reached the conclusion that they are not a whit less Divine, in origin and in substance, than the Word in its letter, finds in such quotations powerful confirmation of this idea; but these quotations cannot serve as proofs unless one has come to perceive that the Writings are in substance the holy truth of the Word, drawn out of its letter and presented by the Lord alone in a
rational form.

     But Mr. Whitehead asserts that "the Academy theory muddles the question," and that the founders of the Academy, in their first publication, "very clearly show that they [the Writings] are not the Word;" referring the reader to sections X and XI of the first volume of Words for the New Church, under the subject of "The Advent of the Lord." We will quote from those same references.

703

(Italics in the original):

     "There is this difference between the Word and the Writings: the Word is written by mere correspondences; the Writings are a rational unfolding of the arcana involved in these correspondences." (P. 39.)

     "The Word itself, as it stands, is like inexhaustible mines of gold, silver, copper, iron, and precious stones. The New Church truths are brought forth by exposition and by formulation into doctrine, and so are like the same gold, silver, copper, iron, and precious stones, and common stone, brought forth from the mine, purified, molded, wrought and made into ornaments, utensils, coin, and other useful forms. And because the Lord, in purifying and formulating these precious principles, has used a human instrument, is it therefore any less the Lord's doing?" (p. 40.)

     Why, then, should one think that the Letter of the Word is more Divine than the spiritual sense which sanctifies the Letter? But the writer of this review says: "There is no need of a new 'Word,' or of additional 'Books of the Word.' These all remain." Does he mean that the books of the Writings were not necessary? What good would it have done the world to Possess the "Books of the Word" in its Letter, unless the books of Swedenborg had also been given?

     ARTICLE IN THE NEW-CHURCH REVIEW.

     This review of the Testimony of the Writings is entitled "A New Bible?" In the only part of the review which deals directly with the booklet in question, the writer says:

     "By a long process of deductions from certain statements taken from Swedenborg, they arrive at a result which ought to be alarming even to themselves, for it is perfectly evident to one who reads Swedenborg that he did not make their claim. . . . So many things follow from their claim, that it is not at all strange that Swedenborg himself did not make it. . . .The writer feels that he is not prejudiced in approaching this matter. He was not born in the New Church. He accepted the New-Church teachings purely upon their merits. He has considered the arguments advanced by our Academy friends with interest and profound respect. But he is confronted by certain difficulties in accepting their conclusion. First of all it would seem, that, if Swedenborg's writings are the Word, they either constitute a new Bible, or an addition to the Bible. Are they willing to think of his writings as constituting a new Bible, or, let us say, a new Word?

704

Since the idea of a new Word would in a measure supersede the old, they surely are not willing to think of, Swedenborg's writings as a new Bible, or a new Word." (pp. 374, 375)

     The "Academy people," I believe, are willing to regard his writings so, though without any fear of their ever superseding the Word of the Two Testaments. They are not "alarmed" in considering the Writings an addition to previous forms of the Word-indeed, as a "new Bible,"-not liable to supersede the old, but truly fulfilling it, in the same way that the New Testament did the Old, as the Lord said. Note the sequence of revelations, as in A. E. 948: "Inmost Divine truths were revealed to those who were of the Most Ancient Church, but exterior Divine truths to those of the Ancient Church; and outermost truths to the Hebrew, and lastly to the Israelitish Church. . . . But after the end of that Church, interior Divine truths were revealed by the Lord for the Christian Church, and now truths still more interior for the Church which is to come."

     A friend has called my attention to this number in the Spiritual Diary, which certainly seems to show that the Doctrines were given to certain ones in the other life in the form of "new Bibles!" "I was next led from thence towards the right, where I also heard them speaking and expecting revelations, with whom angels spoke, and instructed them concerning the Lord, and that they were about to receive the whole doctrine of the Church out of heaven, and also that they would receive Bibles, but new Bibles, from the Lord." (Italics Ours.) (No. 4775.)

     It is evident that many people, from their Christian inheritance, have great difficulty in realizing that an addition could be made to the Bible. They cling, through very reverence, it may be, to the old as being complete. With them it may be remotely similar to the case of children reared in the New Church, who usually suffer from infestations when passing from their childlike faith in the Letter of the Word to the truths of the internal sense. On the brink of rationality, they are a little loath to leave behind some appearances of the Letter to which they can no longer cling.

     If the Writings of the Church are in reality the works of the Lord, then it is no more improper to think of them as the Word of the Lord, in a broader sense, than it is to think of the Lord as being the Word in the broadest sense.

705

The Academy of the present day is boldly standing on new ground;-but without alarm at the magnitude of its vision. Far from lessening our veneration for the Word in its Letter, this vision magnifies it increasingly.
GILBERT H. SMITH.
Glenview, Ill.
FRIENDSHIP OF EVIL MEN IS HATRED 1920

FRIENDSHIP OF EVIL MEN IS HATRED 1920

"A man who has not openly attached himself to evil doers and committed robberies, but has led a civil moral life for the sake of various uses as ends, and yet has not curbed the lusts residing in his internal man, may believe that his friendship is not of this character. But, from many examples in the spiritual world, it is certain that the case is such in varying degree with all who have rejected faith and despised the holy things of the church, regarding them as of no account to themselves, but only for the common people. With some of them the delights of infernal love have lain hidden like fire in smouldering logs covered with bark; with others, like live coals under ashes; and with others like waxen torches that blaze up when fire is applied to them. Such is every man who has rejected from his heart the things of religion. The internal man of such is in hell, though they are ignorant of it so long as they live in the world, because of their pretended morality in externals. They acknowledge no one as the neighbor except themselves and their own children; they regard others either with contempt, and are then like cats lying in wait for birds on their nests, or with hatred, and then they are like wolves when they see dogs to devour." (T. C. R. 455.)
AMBITION 1920

AMBITION 1920

"Since the love of the neighbor no longer exists in the world, in its place has succeeded the ambition to become eminent in various ways. What ought to excite man to do good is love of the neighbor, but because there is no longer any, the ambition to do great things is in the place of this love, and by means of this ambition a man is bent by the Lord to do good to the neighbor, to
society, and to the commonwealth." (Spiritual Diary 2796.)
PAUL AND PETER 1920

PAUL AND PETER 1920

"I spoke with Paul about his wanting to be the introducer [into heaven], and that the Lord should receive those whom he might introduce, which is ridiculous, since introduction is not from arbitrary pleasure, but from the life, which no one knows but the Lord. I said to him that if he had understood the Word according to the letter, this should be the office of Peter, to whom were given the keys of the kingdom of the heavens, which he would thus snatch away from him. He said that he wants to snatch this from him, and claim it for himself, because he has labored more. Paul is altogether averse to Peter, and says that Peter understands nothing, and so can do nothing." (Spiritual Diary 4631m.)

706

FOURTEENTH BRITISH ASSEMBLY 1920

FOURTEENTH BRITISH ASSEMBLY FREDERICK W. ELPHICK 1920

     After an interval of six years, the British Assembly met at Colchester on July 31st and August 1st and 2nd, the Rev. Alfred Acton-The Bishop's representative-presiding. The sessions were held in the pleasant and now historic "Gill studio" at Head Street, and were marked throughout by the reviving and warming sphere of unity in promoting the great cause of the growth and development of the New Church. Fifty-seven members and twenty-five friends signed the Assembly Roll.

     FIRST SESSION.

     On Saturday evening at 7:30, the Chairman called the Assembly to order, and opened the meeting with the Lord's Prayer and reading from the Word.

     After the election of a Secretary, the following resolution was proposed by Mr. Cooper, seconded by Mr. J. Pryke, and reverently passed by the Assembly, all rising:

     Resolved, That this Assembly record on its minutes our deep and heartfelt appreciation of the faithful services of Mr. Rey Gill, who for many years has served as Secretary of the Assembly, and who by his active thought on spiritual things has signally contributed to the spiritual uses of the Church. He gave up all for the service of his country, and in that service he bravely died. But in our memory, and in the fruits of his work, he still lives. His love of spiritual things continues in the other world, and though unseen by our natural eyes, that love is still with us, exercising its influence for the promotion of the interior uses of the Church.

     The Minutes of the Assembly held in 1914 were confirmed, after which the Secretary read letters of greeting from Mr. Samuel Lewin, of Bath, Mr. Stanley Parker, of Deal, and the Rev. R. J. Tilson, of London. All these communications were much appreciated. Referring to the last mentioned letter, Mr. Acton stated that he had been present at a recent meeting of the Burton Road Society, and could confirm the message of good will from that Society to the Assembly.

707

     The Reports from the London and Colchester Societies were then read, giving an interesting summary of the activities in these centers since the memorable August of 1914.

     The Rev. Alfred Acton then delivered his Address,* after which the following discussion took place:
     * See elsewhere in this issue.

     Mr. Pryke, after expressing gratitude to the Bishop for sending so able a representative, thanked Mr. Acton for his masterly paper. It was an address rich in subjects. Like a landscape, there were a few mountain peaks which stood out prominently. Reference was made to the war. Though this is past, it still leaves anxious thought for the future. "When the foundations are overturned, the just, what shall he do?" The bells are still raging and still have to be fought. But internal calmness can reign in the Church, and the gates of hell can never prevail against her. The failure of previous Churches was not due to the Lord, but to men-they had not been faithful, and charity was not. But now the New Church has been given-a Church of freedom. A true Church can only grow in freedom, and as growth and change are synonymous, so particular doctrines, such as those of the Academy, will change.

     Rev. A. Bjorck: The address has presented some very important points. Unless the Heavenly Doctrine is acknowledged as the Word of God, we have little to stand on. Without this, there cannot be a true feeling of fraternity. There are two kinds of charity,-a right and just charity, and a sentimental charity. This latter could lead us astray. There can be no just charity where there is antagonism to the conviction that the Writings are the Word, nor where there is a denial of their teaching. Note was made of the clear distinction the address made between the Doctrine of the New Jerusalem and the Doctrines as formulated by New Church organizations.

     Mr. Ball praised the able and instructive paper. True doctrine cannot be drawn from the Word except through possession of the Doctrines as given to the New Jerusalem. If this be so, the speaker asked, how was it to be understood that the Jewish Church could have drawn true Doctrine from the Word without a further Revelation?

     Note was made of the reference to the various sections within the organized New Church. This is always a very interesting subject. All men are not alike and will not choose the same leaders. Like thoughts bring us together. With some we feel stunted owing to differences of temperament. The question is, how can we foster charity with those who differ on fundamental principles? But in this we are not left: without teaching, for it is involved in the text in Deuteronomy, concerning the eating of grapes in the neighbor's vineyard. We can appreciate their aspect of truth, but we are not at liberty to mix their "goods" with our "truths."

708

It should be remembered that the Lord establishes the Church which will last forever, not man-made organizations.

     Mr. Wilfred Howard also expressed appreciation of the address. He coupled with this his appreciation of being once again in Colchester. (Applause.) Part of the address dealt with unity. We should strive for unity wherever possible, especially with those who accept the Divine Authority, etc. For all who in heart accept such principles are as it were united by an interior or spiritual bond. For this reason, when there is with us a genuine desire to obtain a clear perception of truth from the Writings, and thence to fight against the spirit of self-love, the essential spirit of unity comes forth, true charity prevails, and we are led to forget differences of an external character.

     Rev. G. Baeckstrom: In these matters we are heart to heart. There must be disturbances on the earth; yet our affection must trust in the Lord's Providence, which guides everything and prepares the way. We trust in the statements of the Writings. When we have faith in these, this is what joins us, and we can wage the big fight. There will be changes, and still more changes, and much is expected from us. This is a great responsibility, and we must not rest with our hands folded. If we read the Word with affection, this produces a sphere, the effects of which we do not fully know. The strength of Gideon and his few chosen men was due to their affection for the truth. We should compel ourselves to study the Word and the Writings each day. It is a duty, not only for ourselves, but for the neighbor, for mankind, and this influence in time will become more and more a blessing to our fellow men.

     Mr. Waters: We have listened to a paper full of interest and instruction. In general it is a sound exposition of the Doctrine of Freedom. Freedom in the Church, freedom to the individual, is not possible without charity. From the Lord alone is this possible. Even Swedenborg stated, "My friend, go to the Word, apply its teaching to life, and you will have illustration." How true it is that even "when two or three are gathered together," there is also our enemy,-that evil which we all experience. And so the Lord says: "Come unto me, and I will give you rest"-the rest from struggle, for of ourselves we shall always be in turmoil.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: In reply to Mr. Ball's question, it is stated in the Coronis that the Jewish Church was in obedience to the Letter of the Word. But Isaiah was a man who discerned more than its literal sense, e. g., his exhortation to "put away the evil of their doings from before His eyes." But the Jews did not listen. Habakkuk also wrote: "What are sacrifices?" These were utterances of genuine doctrine; but the Church, i. e., the clergy and the learned of the laity, did not listen. The text already quoted this evening, "When the foundations are overturned, the just what shall he do?" is a further instance. And so in later times, men like Luther, Servetus, Erasmus and Wycliffe have been raised by Providence to bring the Church back to a truer perception of the Word. But it is also true that the internal sense of the Word cannot be seen without the Revelation as given to the New Church. In illustration of this, there is the Doctrine of the Lord. This can now be seen theologically and scientifically-even anatomically-as never before, not even at the time of the Most Ancient Church.

709

     On Sunday morning at 11 o'clock, Divine Service was held at the Church of the Colchester Society in Priory Street. The Rev. Alfred Acton officiated, and after his impressive discourse on the text, "Do this in remembrance of me," the Communion was administered to 63 communicants. A remarkable sphere of rest and peace characterized the whole of the Service.

     SECOND SESSION.

     At 6:30 on Sunday evening, the Rev. Albert Bjorck opened the meeting with the Lord's Prayer and a reading from the Word.

     The Rev. Gustaf Baeckstrom was then asked to give his address on "Missionary Work with special reference to Sweden."

     Partly from notes and partly impromptu, the speaker referred to the recently revived interest in missionary work in the General Church. Hitherto many attempts had been made by other bodies in the Church, but mainly on national grounds. As particularly emphasized at the recent Council of Ministers at Bryn Athyn, the General Church was to be an international Church.

     While fully in agreement with the missionary work among the children-a great truth which the Academy stands for-yet now this nucleus has been formed, it is strong enough to develop. It is not said in the Writings that the angels had no hope for the Christians, but little hope. Preparation may have been made by the Lord to bring the Church to many on account of the great changes in the world. Missionary efforts are only in their beginning. A lecture can be compared to a net thrown into the sea. It does not matter how many are drawn in so much as the quality of those who may be introduced to the Church by such means. Previous missionary efforts have failed in many instances, because of too much compromise.

     In citing the interesting particulars of the recent lectures in Sweden, the speaker noted that if the lecture commences with the statement that it refers to a Divine Revelation, such a method, though frightening some, will give confidence to others who feel they have lost everything. Sweden still has remnants of faith in the Lord, and there is an old National song which preserves the truth that the Lord is one God. In many ways it is possible to accommodate without compromise. We should not be frightened by disappointment at results. The main thing is to believe ourselves, and the means will be given for the New Church to be established among all the nations of the earth.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: Mr. Baeckstrom appeals for your continued support. In the Coronis there is an exhortation to the whole Christian Church to enter the New Church. This involves the whole Christian world. It is a duty to make this exhortation known. He noted that this subject was repeatedly brought up at Assemblies.

710

     Mr. Ball: We should always be anxious to bring another to the knowledge of the New Church. But there are difficulties. There is no royal road to missionary work. Often it happens that missionary efforts are of greater use to the lecturer than to those to whom he lectures. (Laughter.) It does the lecturer good. It is an outlet for his energies. But we should conserve our energies for the work nearest to us. The speaker gave instances of the apparent uselessness of missionary efforts in the past.

     Mr. Raymond Cranch pointed out that previous missionary efforts had failed because there was no center to back the efforts. Mr. Baeckstrom has a center to support him. (Applause.) The Divine Providence always uses human instrumentalities.

     Rev. A. Bjorck: We have heard an optimist and a pessimist on missionary work. (Laughter.) We must not forget the differences of national character and language, and that this is a use which will always change according to the needs of place add time. The fact of Sweden being the birthplace of Swedenborg and the country in which he was reared and educated, will be an important influence in the North. There will always be waves of interest, rising one year and dropping another. Recently there has been a revived interest in the fate of man after death, primarily due to the war. We should not forget that the New Church began in all countries as a result of missionary effort. Only the Lord knows the remnant, and it should be our privilege to draw men into the Church; yet we should never lose sight of the work of keeping societies together. The children and young people are essential. This use must not slide, or we shall be no better off than other bodies in the New Church which seem to be slowly dying.

     Mr. Appleton: It is a pleasure to hear the two presentations of this subject. We must, however, realize the present state of the Christian world. The Writings state that the Old Church is dead, and there is the injunction to "Come out of her, my people." Although we should seek the remnant, yet the effective missionary work clearly relates to the children already born into the Church. It is important that New Church parents should bring them to church services, and, if possible, have school in the pale of the Ministry. This is an Academy principle which should not be sacrificed. We should support missionary work, but other issues must not be neglected.

     Rev. Alfred Acton, after noting the recent missionary work at Kitchener, pointed out that the Lord is the Great Missionary. He was "sent forth by the Father." He also sent out his twelve disciples throughout the whole Spiritual World.

     With regard to the children, they are gentiles indeed, very much of gentiles and savages (laughter), but missionary work is to bring the Doctrines to the knowledge of the "remnant." This work we should always be willing to do, each according to his perception and ability. The speaker did not agree with the sentiment that the lecturer derives more good than the audience. It is true that often missionary work has not been a success. But just as instruction is needed to learn how to educate, so it is necessary for the Church to learn how, to do missionary work, and this she is beginning to do.

711

The Church is to be with a few, but it is to extend to many. New Church homes, New Church schools, must be established; yet, if there are those in the Church who have the love of the missionary use, it is a love which we should foster. When there are indications to go forward with the work, do so. When signs are wanting, wait. There is no good pushing.

     Mr. Pryke, in thanking Mr. Baeckstrom for his address, voiced the feeling of sympathy and support for the good work being done in Sweden.

     The docket was revised, and Mr. Potter was asked to read his paper on "Swedenborg and the Nebular Hypothesis." The Assembly was thus treated to an entire change of subject. In a summary, kindly provided by Mr. Potter, the following theme was presented:

     The paper presented a brief sketch of La Place's Nebular Hypothesis, of the Planetesimal Theory, and of Swedenborg's Cosmology from the Principia. La Place's conception of a primitive nebula gradually contracting and condensing into a system of planets and satellites with a central sun, which for a century was regarded by astronomers and physicists as the most scientific theory of cosmology ever formulated, had now been definitely abandoned by the scientific world in favor of the Planetesimal Theory based upon the observed phenomena of recent new stars. Powerful and delicate instruments, in conjunction with photography, showed that, in all recent observations of new stars, nebulae succeeded the appearance of the star, and not conversely, as La Place supposed.

     The Principia theory of Swedenborg was outlined, showing its discordance with the Nebular Hypothesis and its wonderful agreement with the Planetesimal Theory, and emphasizing the marvelous intuition of Swedenborg, the philosopher, in anticipating the most modern scientific discoveries, not only in cosmology, but in many other branches of science.

     The paper also referred to the extraordinary attitude adopted by certain New Church people, who, in their eagerness to placate the scientific world, have actually attributed the authorship of the Nebular Hypothesis to Swedenborg, asserting that La Place derived the idea from Swedenborg and published it as the product of his own intellect.

     The paper concluded with an exhortation to the young people of the Church to study the philosophical works, the writer believing them to contain a true system of science and philosophy, designed by Divine Providence to meet the needs of the New Church, and to combat the materialistic science and philosophy of the present day.

     Rev. Alfred Acton, in expressing thanks to the writer for such an interesting contribution, felt that there were the evidences of a born teacher. Mr. Potter possessed the faculty of making difficult things easy. The paper touches on matters which are still of grave dispute in the Church; for example, there are many who cannot reconcile some statements in the Principia. The writer has effectively shown how some have done injustice, both to Swedenborg and to themselves, regarding the theory of La Place.

712

     Mr. Wilfred Howard appreciated the writer's comparison of modern scientific researches with Swedenborg's Scientific works. The New Church has a clear conception of what is meant by science and what by philosophy. Science changes, because of an accumulation of new data, usually followed by a modification of viewpoint. It is a question whether there is an infallible science. It is relative to the observation of men at any given period. We cannot say that Swedenborg's early works are science, but a philosophy of science. They are really philosophic works. But the marvelous point is that the researches of modern science confirm the deductions of Swedenborg. For example, that all things have an active sphere surrounding them. Many facts of the science of today also prove this.

     The Chairman here reminded the Assembly of the fact that there were still a number of subjects on the Docket. The paper, entitled "Self-Examination and the means of Reformation," by Mr. Raymond Cranch, was thereupon called for and read.

     After prefacing the fact that in the Writings constant emphasis is placed upon the necessity of shunning evil, whereas in the Old Church exhortation is made to "be good," note was made of the four great classes of human loves,-love of the Lord, love of the neighbor, love of self and love of the world. As the New Church grows, there will be fuller, knowledge of what is involved in the first two loves, but the urgent duty is to shun the two latter. The means were cited whereby a true conscience can be formed, namely, by striving for a pure love of the Lord's Kingdom, of His Church, of one's country, and by Conjugial Love. It is by such means,-the removal of self-love and the cultivation of humility-that the uses of the New Church will go steadily forward.

     Mr. Acton thanked Mr. Cranch for his paper, and considered it a suitable conclusion to the evening's proceedings, as well as being in harmony with the sphere of the morning's service.

     THIRD SESSION.

     At 10:30 on Monday morning, the Chairman opened the meeting and invited the Rev. Albert Bjorck to give his address on "The Necessity for Divine Revelation."

     The writer first noted the continued reference, during the Assembly, to the effects of the War. The Chairman's Address had referred to it, and it was a subject continually present in all minds. The world generally is occupied with the necessity of reconstructing human society. Hence attention was directed to the necessity of Divine Revelation as a factor in that reconstruction. The Lord permits nothing which would prevent His end, namely, the formation of a heaven from the human race. It is often difficult to see that evils serve towards that end.

713

One result of the war from which good may come is the feeling of the need of religion, but here again men are at variance. There will be no living faith unless the Divinity of the Writings is acknowledged.

     The address then pointed out our responsibilities to bring this truth before men, which is best done by means of education, because the Church is where the Word is and where it is rightly understood.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: Mr. Bjorck has clearly shown the necessity for Divine Revelation. Every student of history ought to know that civilization and religion go hand in hand. Civilization is said to be the result of evolution, but this is not correct. Civilization has resulted from religion. If we lose Christianity, our civilization is lost. The Ten Commandments still rule the Christian World and mold the common sense of our nation. The real fear of Bolshevism originates in the danger of their destruction. Selfishness never yet made a bond to keep the world together. The common people of the world preserve Christianity. This is the "rod of iron" spoken of in the Lord's Coming. Men's minds are now free to see the truths of the Lord's Coming; the cloud has been removed, so that men have more light. But unless something internal grow within that external, the latter cannot be maintained. The Christian Church is a dead Church, and its external cannot remain forever. Civilization is preserved in order that the New Church may grow, and this can only descend through men, because they are the bond between heaven and earth, which means that "the New Church is to be established through you and me,"-through the sincerity of every member and an acknowledgment of the Word.

     Mr. Pryke expressed thanks for the paper, which was full of interest and practical application. What is wrong with the world is that it has departed from God, and continues to do so. The world can only be cured by a return to God. Unless the Word is acknowledged to be a Divine Revelation, the world will depart from it. We do not know whether the Christian Church will ever come back to that acknowledgment. A knowledge of the Lord is given to the world. We can see and hear God speaking to the world in the system of theology now revealed,-"the leaves of the tree given for the healing of the nations."

     Mr. Pryke then expressed pleasure that Mr. Bjorck had fully accepted the Academy position. Last night a good deal was said about new stars, but "a new star has appeared on the horizon, and there is no nebular hypothesis about it." (Laughter.)

     Mr. Cooper spoke with appreciation of Mr. Bjorck's having joined the General Church,-a considerable accession to our strength, from which we may take courage. Men gifted with strong affection are coming to us. Noting the revival of the missionary spirit, he then gave a short account of successful missionary work done in Colchester, and expressed the opinion that efforts at missionary work should be made at least once a year, even if there was no apparent result, or if only one man was brought into the Church by that means.

     Mr. Wilfred Howard expressed interest in the references to education made by Mr. Bjorck. Education which has the New Church as an end will be the means by which the Word will be retained.

714

One man sees the Divine origin of the Writings, another cannot see it; why, we cannot tell, except that the one has what we call remains, the other has not. New Church education is not for the acquisition of science, but for the inculcation of the faith that the Lord rules the world. Faith in the Word and in the Ten Commandments is what saves the world at the present day. Any nation turning away from those laws is doomed. The end in the Church is that man may become more closely conjoined to the Lord. Education in that sense means that the child is so moulded that it can receive the Divine Revelation, and the implanting of remains to receive this Revelation is indeed the end of New Church education, and is of paramount importance to the Church.

     Mr. Ball thanked the lecturer for his very able paper. It only failed because we all agree with it. (Laughter.) But it gives us hope that we are consolidated. We never fall out on principles, but only on their application. The question of missionary work was again brought forward, but he believed that in the majority of cases men were brought into the Church in a miraculous way. This, however, should not militate against making other efforts.

     Mr. Waters also appreciated Mr. Bjorck's paper. During the discussion it had been said, "it is a miracle" that people are brought into the true faith, and into a position where they may be further instructed in the commands of our Lord. The miraculous part appeared to the speaker to be that men who possess in their minds the letter of the Word have fundamental principles which can be appealed to by further revelations of the Word which they already possess. "Unless the Lord build, they labor in vain that build." This confirms the whole situation. As noted by Mr. Howard, it cannot be doubted that the best results are due to education, commenced in the earliest period of life. This is even seen in the Roman Catholic Church. Without the recognition of God, the whole of civilization will collapse.

     Mrs. Gill related the miraculous way in which Mr. Gill had been brought into the Church, and confirmed Mr. Cooper's remarks relating to the early history of the Colchester Society.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: When, some years ago, investigation was made into how people came into the church, it was found that the majority (2/3) had come in by conversation with a friend; some by reading (principally Heaven and Hell); and lastly, by missionary work. We must do our part. In Divine Providence, it says the preacher may preach with fire and zeal, but the Lord alone can turn the heart. All the Lord's work is miraculous, and all the work is done by the Lord. The speaker used a free paraphrase: "Unless the Lord build the home, they labor in vain that build the house," meaning that the Lord must build the internal. We must do missionary work, acknowledging that the Lord does the work, not being depressed by failure or conceited by success. We are now engaged in proclaiming the Divinity of the Writings, and must not be concerned about the results. The spreading of the General Church is not due to us. We must labor in the belief that the Lord does the work. Unless the Lord come again, no one can be saved.

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     Reference was also made to the double column translation of Heaven and Hell, where a passage in support of the Divine Authority had been omitted, though not, in the speaker's opinion, deliberately.

     Mr. Bjorck, in thanking the Assembly for the appreciation of his remarks, noted that reference had been made to the fact that no success from missionary work can be looked for among those who do not acknowledge the Divinity of the Lord. His plea was to reach even those who do not acknowledge the Divinity of the Word. He himself had not had this belief, having receded from the Lutheran Church. All people are brought in in a miraculous way. Many others may be in the same predicament, though they have no faith in the Lord or in the Word. Many lose faith through the teaching of the churches and the development of their rationality. We should not cease to try in all directions. A Roman Catholic Bishop in Massachusetts said that unless we go back to the Ten Commandments we are lost. Protestants go away from the Divinity of the Lord and from a belief in the Word. The idea is disappearing that the Commandments are given us by the Lord, and so they lose their authority.

     The final paper, entitled "The Relation between Clergy and Laity in the New Church," was then read by Mr. J. S. Pryke.*
     * See elsewhere in this issue.

     Rev. Alfred Acton: The appreciation of this paper is well deserved. It embodies the whole spirit of our Church.

     Mr. Ball then questioned the authority of a layman in dealing with several aspects of the subject, some of these being outside his province. What has been said according to doctrine is quite true, but in dealing with priests and with men, we have to deal with the shortcomings of all. Apart from doctrine, the personality of a priest bears largely on the subject. The speaker understood that the priesthood represents (not forms) the "first of the Church," and he wished that this subject had not been brought forward here. Any doctrine can be so inflated as to be wrong, and he hoped that too much emphasis would not be laid on the position of the laity and the clergy.

     Mr. Cranch, after asking Mr. Pryke's pardon for replying to some points, remarked that in so far as a minister presents the truth and leaves the people in freedom to see for themselves, in so far he is successful. He had heard the laity of the Church treat this subject in Bryn Athyn, and never better than by Mr. Pryke. We all stand equal before the Lord. As regards regret that this subject had been brought forward at this Assembly, there should be no danger in bringing forward any subject in the New Church. (Hear, Hear!)

     Mr. W. Howard: Mr. Ball has the happy faculty of making our Assemblies interesting. (Laughter.) The paper expresses an affection for the truth, which is indeed the spirit of the Assembly. Such papers and the affection of truth contained therein are the basis for the inspiring quality of our Assemblies.

     Rev. Albert Bjorck: Mr. Pryke's paper is an able exposition of what the Writings teach us, and shows great study and reflection, and logical and rational inferences from the different teachings of the various works.

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The only fault was the same that had been found with the speaker's paper. He agreed with it. If such conceptions of the difference between the offices of the laity and clergy were recognized elsewhere in the New Church, they would have something to rest upon. As noted by Mr. Howard, Mr. Ball and Mr. Pryke took virtually the same position.

     Mr. Ball: Hear, hear!

     Rev. Alfred Acton referred to the description in Conjugial Love of the imaginary heaven of continual worship, which is quite satisfactory for the priest, but the layman has to sit still and listen while the clergy are active. I feel there is no difference between Mr. Pryke and Mr. Ball. Mr. Ball laid emphasis on one side, which Mr. Pryke had not in his mind. These positions might be abused, so that the clergy is not only the first, but also the last and the whole of the Church, even to the shaking of the ecclesiastical door mat. (Laughter.) The priesthood, not the priest, is the "first of the Church." A priest does not understand truth better than a layman, but is in the particulars of doctrine. The illustration of the priest is to teach truth and to confirm it, which a layman should not do. A layman may write a paper on whatever subject of the Church he may like, from the Doctrine of the Lord to the Finances of the Church. Every man is illustrated according as he approaches the Lord.

     Mr. Cranch then moved a resolution of thanks to Mrs. Gill and her daughter for lending their Studio for the use of the Assembly. This was seconded by Mr. Pryke and carried with acclamation.

     In conclusion, Mr. Acton stated that he had looked forward with trepidation to these meetings, but they had proved to be a time of spiritual food. We had been confirmed in our belief in the Divinity of the Writings, and had been refreshed by the spiritual food of that belief. The spirit of New Church education and of social life had been a means of uniting us more closely. Misunderstandings arise, but on these occasions our propriums are laid aside, and we have grown in spiritual unanimity.

     "May the Lord give His blessing on the Church in England."

     THE ASSEMBLY SOCIAL.

     During the sessions of the Assembly, it was noted by the Chairman that a trine of meetings was significative of fullness and completion, and that the concluding social would be as a sign and seal of charity and good fellowship. This "sealing" was indeed realized at the Assembly Social, the several ideals for which the New Church stands being richly expressed in words, and unanimously confirmed by the affectionate sounds of harmony and melody.

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     In response to the toast to "The New Church," and after the singing of "Vivat Nova Ecclesia," the Rev. Albert Bjork spoke on the subject of "The Lord," Mr. Cranch on "The Church," and Mr. Pryke on "Worship." "The General Church" was responded to by Mr. Anderson, "The British Assembly" by Mr. Appleton, "Friendship" by Mr. Denny, "The Academy" by Mr. Ball, and "Conjugial Love" by Mr. Elphick.

     Each Toast had its appropriate song. The Toast list was provided by Mr. Acton, who, as toastmaster, effectively united the individual themes and interspersed the lighter and humorous side, noting that this feature of the Academy social life was not a case of a descent from "the sublime to the ridiculous," but that it was possible to raise the mind to the contemplation of spiritual and permanent things and to descend again to the light and mirthful. Hence the Assembly also appreciated a humorous recitation by Mr. Anderson and a lecture from Miss Gill, with blackboard diagrams, on "What the Moon saw." Two part songs were sung by the young people of the Colchester Society, items which were thoroughly appreciated.

     At the invitation of Mr. Acton, Miss Venita Pendleton gave a most interesting account of the work in the Academy schools, and of the School Scholarships,-an address which captivated attention and conveyed it to Bryn Athyn, visiting the class rooms, the studies of the professors, and the editorial chairs.

     Impromptu toasts were offered to "NEW CHURCH LIFE" by Mr. Potter, "The Home" by Mr. Ed. Waters; and, realizing the prevailing sphere of the evening and the character of the whole Assembly Meetings, Mr. Waters spoke on "Harmony."

     After singing "Auld Lang Syne," (Mr. Acton adding the verse "When permeation permeates"), the Assembly gradually disbanded, leaving many of the young people to waltz together and welcome Tuesday morning.
     FREDERICK W. ELPHICK,
          Secretary.

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-On July 4th, I started out on my eighth annual visit to the Canadian North West, and three days later arrived at CHAPLIN, SASK. Here there are two groups of New Church people, all farmers. The first group live a few miles north of the town, the second about fifteen miles south. In the two together there were formerly twenty-two families; but last fall, because of three successive years of drought, ten of these families moved to Roblin, Man., of whom later. There are now five families left to the north of the town, and seven to the south. On arrival, I found another year of drought threatening; and, as I have heard since, this condition did not improve, on which account more families will likely go elsewhere. The Church in the Chaplin district was built up largely by the instrumentality of the Rev. Peter Hiebert; but during the last few years he has done no work, because of ill health. Since his withdrawal, services have been conducted occasionally either by the Rev. John Zacharias, of Herbert, Sask., or by the Rev. Henry Peters, of Waldeck, Sask.; but both of these ministers have gone to other fields, the former to Texas and the latter to Kansas. I also have visited regularly each summer. This year I went first to the people living to the south of the town. In the seven families there, there are 13 adults and 17 children. During the week's stay, services were conducted four times, and one doctrinal class was held, the attendance ranging from 16 to 26 persons. An earnest spirit of interest in the heavenly doctrines was shown. The great adversity which these people were suffering as to temporal things seemed to make them all the more eager to receive ministrations in the things pertaining to eternal life. Afterwards, two days were spent with the people to the north of the town, and a missionary sermon was given, at which 25 persons were present.

     The next place visited was ROSTHERN, SASK., where I remained for several weeks. Here I worked in three localities: at Rosthern, at Hague, twelve miles south, and at Klippenstein's, twenty miles west; in all of which places Sunday Schools are maintained throughout the year attended by adults as well as children. In this entire Rosthern district there are eight families and one other person adhering to the General Church, numbering 28 adults and 40 children. I made the trips from place to place by automobile. The weekly program was as follows: Sunday morning, Sunday School and services at Rosthern; Sunday afternoon, Sunday School at Hague, and in the evening services; Monday, still at Hague, children's instruction in the morning and doctrinal class in the evening; Tuesday, at Rosthern, children's instruction in the afternoon and doctrinal class in the Wednesday, at Klippenstein's, children's instruction in the morning and a missionary sermon in the school house in the evening; Friday, at Rosthern, the same as Tuesday. It would hardly be fair to give statistics of attendance, because nearly always, when a gathering was held at one of the places, persons from the other two would be in attendance. The highest attendance was as follows: at services, 29; at missionary sermon, 38; at Sunday School, 23; at children's instruction, 21; at doctrinal class, 21. The children did not attend services, having had Sunday School shortly before.

     After two weeks spent in this manner, I made a side-trip to ROBLIN, MAN., to which place, as already said, ten families moved last fall from Chaplin, Sask.

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In these families, there are 22 adults and 35 children. Mr. John Heinrichs, of Hague, accompanied me. We arrived at Roblin at 11 o'clock at night, and were met by two of the members. Then came a sixteen-mile ride in a "democrat" to the home of the nearest member. Our friends have settled here in a hilly, stony, wooded country, and for the most part live in small log houses. But their crops looked good, and were a pleasure to see, in contrast with what I had seen on their Chaplin farms during three preceding years. During the five days spent there, two services and one doctrinal class were held; also a funeral service. At services, the highest attendance, on a Sunday, was 34. The doctrinal class was not called by that name. We announced it as a gathering for conversation on the doctrines and for answering such doctrinal questions as might be asked. Seventeen adults attended. The meeting was held out of doors, In the shade of the house. Two most delightful hours were spent. The topic to which most of the questions led was the distinctiveness of the New Church. Our hosts then invited all to supper, and afterwards the conversation was continued until the friends had to leave. Again at Rosthern, for three weeks, continuing according to the program before stated. We will mention a few of the noteworthy events of this period.

     On Sunday, August 8th, we had with us Mr. and Mrs. William Evens and family, of Benton, Alberta, and at services their two youngest children were baptized. The same day, after the evening services at Hague, a business meeting was held, the members from the two other localities also being present. Among the subjects considered was the need of an annual meeting of the members and friends of the General Church residing in the Canadian North West. All were much in favor of the plan, and it was decided to work towards its execution, even though two or three years may elapse before the first meeting can be held.

     On August 19th, a picnic was held, and all had a splendid time. There were present 61 New Church persons, young and old, and 12 others. The young men had put down a dancing floor among the trees, and above it were suspended Chinese lanterns. Here the fun began after supper, the older folks joining with the young people in the dance, which continued until near midnight.

     Sunday, August 15th, was a big day. No services were held at Rosthern, but all gathered at Hague. The morning service was given entirely to baptism and confirmation, there being no sermon. Ten persons were baptized, eight of these being of one family. Three young ladies were confirmed. At this service the children also attended, and 49 persons were present. In the afternoon the usual services were held. The day brought with it much delightful social intercourse.

     On August 18th, the Rosthern and Hague members went out to Klippenstein's and spent the afternoon there. Oh, that chicken supper! In the evening all attended the missionary sermon In the school house, which, by the way, is the place where one of the Academy boys, Mr. Erdman Heinrichs, fills the master's chair.

     On my last Sunday, August 22nd, all gathered at Rosthern. A child was baptized, and the Holy Supper was administered to 22 communicants. The remainder of the day was spent socially.

     On Monday evening, the 23rd, the closing social was held at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Lemky, near Resthern. The Pastor was toastmaster. Mr. John Bech responded to "Internal Evangelization;" Mr Peter Classen to "External Evangelization;" Mr. C. P. Unruh to "The New Church Home." All these addresses were most excellent, and were heartily applauded. Other toasts followed. The Pastor closed with remarks on the spirit of the General Church, which is that of the spiritual affection of truth, loyalty to and affection for the truth, first and before all else. Then followed various social pleasures, including dancing; also refreshments. It was 1:30 a. m. when the party finally broke up. No one wanted to go.

720

All seemed to want to hold on as long as possible to this closing event of the summer's happy church life, which had indeed been like a continuous church festival.

     August 25th to 30th were spent at GIRVIN and at DAVIDSON, Sask., places ten miles apart. At the former live Mr. and Mrs. George Pagon and family; at the latter, Mr. and Mrs. Harold Bellinger. Instruction was given the children three times, one doctrinal class was held, and Sunday services conducted at which the infant daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Pagon was baptized, and the Holy Supper administered.
     F. E. WAELCHLI.

     LONDON, ENG.-The Rev. F. E. Gyllenhaal arrived from Durban on August 23rd. On the following Sunday he conducted worship, administered the Communion, and delivered a very instructive and appropriate discourse on the text, "Except the Lord build the house." In the evening, a general meeting of the Society was held for the purpose of making preliminary arrangements for the work immediately at hand.

     Already our various activities have received new impulse, among which is the institution of a weekly doctrinal class and music practice. As the holiday season is not yet over, it can hardly be said that we are in full swing; but in the course of a month or two we hope to be in a position to record a more detailed account of events which will undoubtedly result from the good work of our new leader.
     F. W. E.

     KITCHENER.-The new season opened with several occasions worthy of record. The Kitchener chapter of Phi Alpha Upsilon invited the society to a formal dance on the evening of September 10th, and it was a most festive and joyous event. The decorations were original and effective. In place of the usual lighting, we were surprised to find little bracket lights all around the walls, with pretty little colored shades. And in place of the usual ceiling, we beheld a very gracefully curved canopy made of white and blue paper slips. There were printed programs, a reception committee, hired music, and, last but not least, a number of visitors, including Mr. William Whitehead and Mr. Marshall Fuller, of Bryn Athyn; the Rev. L. W. T. David, from Denver; Miss Gladys Brown, and Miss Lottie Caldwell, of Toronto; Rev. and Mrs. F. E. Waelchli, of Cincinnati; Mr. and Mrs. Archie Scott, of St. Catharines; and Mr. and Mrs. Fred Roschman, of Winnipeg.

     The Sons of the Academy had invited Mr. Whitehead to speak to the society the following evening on the subject of New Church Education. It was an inspiring address, and I am afraid that any comment might only detract. I feel certain of this, however, that it went home to every New Church heart present as an appeal for greater co-operation, courage and sacrifice, that our great ideal of New Church Education may grow and increase until that final day when "the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.

     The next evening, Mr. Whitehead was guest of honor at a banquet, to which the Sons had invited the men of the society. Forty-eight were present, including four ministers,-the Revs. F. E. Waelchli, K. R. Alden, L. W. T. David, and H. L. Odhner. From all reports, it was a very successful meeting, Mr. Whitehead again speaking on the subject of Education. Altogether, his visit was a most enjoyable and successful event; and if we may judge by results, he "worked wonders." For several days later three of our young men and one young lady had departed for the Schools at Bryn Athyn.

     On a recent Friday we held the first supper and social of the season, at which we officially welcomed our new Pastor, the Rev. Llewellyn W. T. David, who had been visiting Kitchener since the beginning of the month at the invitation of the society.

721

On the next Sunday, Mr. Odhner preached his last sermon as our retiring Pastor, though we have not yet bid him farewell, as we expect him to be with us until his boat sails, the date of which has not yet been determined.
     F. V. S.

     SHARON CHURCH, CHICAGO.-Services were resumed on the second Sunday in September, with about 30 in attendance. Though we lose a few members from time to time by removals, our average at meetings is about the same, and we are encouraged to know that we seem unlikely to lose any more for the present. A supper was held on Friday of the following week, with a full attendance. A strong sphere prevailed, and the lesson on the Doctrine of the Lord was much appreciated. The following Sunday, the rite of Confession of Faith was performed for Mr. Donald Gladish, who was about to leave for northern Minnesota. The ceremony was impressive and uplifting, as is always the case when our young men and women take the solemn vows of life-long devotion to our beloved Church.

     At the Ladies' Meeting on September 29th, it was decided to have two suppers a month, one to be followed by doctrinal study, the other by a social meeting, to which we wish to invite some of our young friends from Glenview, as our own numbers are limited.

     The year promises to be one of growth in our small but loyal and affectionate group.
     E. V. W.

     GLENVIEW.-The very first thing to be mentioned this month is our latest wedding. Not that we had the wedding here, but that we had a share in the festivities when Mr. and Mrs. Felix Junge arrived in Glenview after being married in the Cathedral at Bryn Athyn. When the happy couple reached home, they found that they had not been forgotten, as a number of our people had made a surreptitious visit to the bungalow recently erected by the bridegroom, and had left behind them a variety of articles likely to be handy about the house.

     The following evening, after our usual Friday supper, there was a reception in our Parish Hall, when all had an opportunity to meet the bride and bridegroom. Our Pastor, on behalf of the Immanuel Church, made the speech of welcome. He finished his remarks by proposing a toast, which he introduced by singing the following words:

"Blessing, blessing, blessing from above,
From our hearts we wish them true conjugial love;
Happy, happy, happy may they be,
Not for time alone but to eternity!"

     This very appropriate adaptation of the couplet so well known by our people was heartily sung by all present, and the loving cup passed round. The bridegroom responded by thanking the friends for their kind welcome, and related some of the particulars of the wedding ceremony. If, from nervousness or any other impediment, he did not exactly describe the details, the bride was able to come to the rescue immediately, and she appeared to remember everything. It should be added that the bride looked very becoming in her beautiful wedding dress, while the expression of the bridegroom was one of great content. After the speeches there was ice cream and dancing, and everybody had a good time celebrating this welcome addition to the membership of the Immanuel Church.

     On Saturday evening, Sept. 29th, Mr. and Mrs. Felix Junge invited the society to a Barbecue on the lawn in front of their house; a large company attended, and partook of the bountiful supper provided. After supper the company enjoyed listening to violin music by Mr. Jesse Stevens, and watching charades given by the young people.

     Our School opened early in the month with the following staff of teachers: Principal, Rev. Gilbert H. Smith, Assistant Principal, Miss Helen Maynard; and Miss Gladys Blackman, Miss Jennie Cole and Miss Katherine Burnham.

722

     The doctrinal classes following the Friday Supper have been resumed, and the one for the older members is being conducted by Dr. G. G. Starkey.

     Dr. J. B. S. King has started a class for the study of Swedenborg's work, The Soul, or Rational Psychology. This meets on Sunday evenings, and the attendance at the first two classes was very good.

     The New Church Life "coffee meetings" commenced on Sept. 28th with a good attendance, and spent an enjoyable time talking over the important subjects dealt with in our Bishop's Address, published in the September Life. Our Pastor presided on this occasion.

     As it is the function of these news notes to record facts, it seems advisable to correct a statement made in our August report. Through an inexplicable lapsus memoriae, we said Dr. King's class had taken up the study of Goldsmith's "She Stoops to Conquer," when it should have been Shakespeare's "Love's Labors Lost."
     G. A. MCQUEEN.

     TORONTO, CANADA.-On the second Sunday of August, the Rev. E. Robert Cronlund preached his farewell sermon to the Olivet Society, and for the last three Sundays in August the church was closed according to the yearly custom here.

     On the first Sunday of September, the Rev. K. R. Alden, who had been called to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Mr. Cronlund, preached his first sermon. The Olivet Church was fortunate on this occasion in having twenty-four visitors from Kitchener, most of whom had come to Toronto to attend the Provincial Exhibition. An informal dance was arranged for the following evening. About fifty persons came, and the evening was very pleasantly spent in dancing and singing the old Academy songs.

     On Wednesday evening, September 22nd, the first supper was held, followed by a reception to the new Pastor. Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Rothaermel acted as host and hostess of the evening, and had arranged a formal greeting for the new incumbent and his wife, all present filing by and shaking hands with them, and thus welcoming them to the new field of endeavor. This was followed by a number of welcoming speeches from various members of the society. The evening closed with dancing.

     The Sunday School will open on the first Sunday in October, and also the weekly doctrinal class, the subject of which will be "The Glorification Series, beginning with the Twelfth Chapter of Genesis."
     K. R .A.

     THE LAUSANNE NEW CHURCH CONGRESS.

     The widely advertised Congress, called for the purpose of forming a federation of French-speaking New Church people, was held from July 29th to 31st at Lausanne. Six pages in Le Messager of August, 1920, are devoted to a report of the proceedings, and three pages of its covers set forth thirty-six of the fifty articles of organization that were adopted.

     About seventy New Church people were in attendance throughout the meetings. At some of the sessions quite a large number of strangers were present. But of people of French-speaking countries, other than Mauritius and French Switzerland, only two came, and both from France, viz., the Rev. R. Flon from l'Eguille, and Madame Humann, from Paris. Mr. Flon conducted the morning services on the second day of the meetings, and was elected on the Committee of Missions. Mme. Humann "with much eloquence pleaded the cause of Paris, and asked for a pastor to preach the doctrines of the New Church in that great city. It was the cry of the Macedonian (Acts 16:10.) M. Galland replied to her that the Central Committee would devote all its energy to that question."

     Among the visitors were the Rev. A. Goerwitz, with a number of his parishioners from Zurich and Berne; a delegation from the English Conference, including the President, the Rev. E. J. Pulsford, the Rev. Joseph Deans, Dr. de Beaumont, and Messrs. Winter, Gardiner, and H. N. Morris; and, as the representative of the American Convention, the Rev. Paul Sperry.

723

The latter was to bring back to America with him the two sons of the Lausanne Pastor, Rev. G. Regamey, one of whom is to take up his studies for the ministry at Cambridge this fall, while the other has been engaged as instructor in French at Urbana.

     The leading addresses were: The opening speech of welcome by the pioneer New Churchman of Lausanne, the Rev. Charles Byse, now nearing his ninetieth birthday; two addresses by Mr. Maurice Galland, one on accepting the presidency of the Congress, and the other on introducing the proposed Federation; one by the Rev J. Deans on "Our evidences of the life after death;" one by the Rev. E. J. Pulsford on the contrast between the Ancient Church and the New Church; and Dr. de Beaumont's discourse on how a true and genuine science was found to harmonize with the religious principles of the New Church. The Revs. Goerwitz and Regamey had charge of the religious opening services on two of the three days, and, in company with the Revs. Sperry and Pulsford, assisted the Rev. Joseph Deans in transmitting to Mr. Rundstrom of Sweden his diploma of pastor accorded to him by the English Conference after a few months of study in their theological school.

     On reading the report in Le Messager, one is struck by the ardor and sincerity of these New Church brethren for the missionary spread of the New Church, and their lusty ambition to organize a formidable number of committees under which to direct the efforts to convert the French-speaking world. The meetings were undoubtedly a source of inspiration to all; and the spirit of the occasion was refreshed by the balm of Gilead, with no admixture of the virus of indistinctiveness. But, while noting with pleasure these signs of ardent New Churchmanship, I feel impelled, as one who has been personally acquainted with many of those present, and a recipient of their cordial hospitality, to point out some inherent weaknesses in their doctrinal and ecclesiastical pronouncements which may embarrass them considerably if they are vouchsafed that success in gaining new members which they ardently hope for.

     First, their attitude towards the Writings. Various pronouncements from Lausanne show that officially they only regard the Writings as at best a "key" or commentary" to the Old and New Testaments, and not in any way as a New Bible. I am convinced that, if this is the best they can be allowed to say about the Writings, their plea to convert others will be weak, and their own interest and zeal will die down. Fancy the disciples of the Lord going about among the Greek Gentiles with no stronger argument than that the New Testament was a commentary on the Old Testament, given by the most learned of rabbis that had ever expounded the Law and the Prophets! And now that the Lord has made His Second Coming, and established a Church that will not pass away as former ones have, are His disciples in this Second Coming to say nothing better about the Revelation on which the New Church is based than that it is the best "commentary" on previous Revelations? Do not the two following statements with regard to the descent of the New Jerusalem among the Africans justify a higher estimate of the works in which the Holy City has descended?

     "I was led towards the right, where I also heard them speaking and awaiting revelations, with whom the angels spoke, and instructed them about the Lord, and that they would receive the entire doctrine of the Church out of heaven, and also that they would receive bibles, but new bibles from the Lord." (S. D. 4775)

     "There was afterwards given them the work on Heaven and Hell, which they received and preserved; also the Last Judgment, the Earths in the Universe, and the White Horse, and afterwards the Doctrine of the New Jerusalem." (S. D. 5946)

724

     As they had previously received the Old and New Testaments, (see S. D. 5946), it is evident that it is these five works of Swedenborg which are meant by the "bibles, but new bibles" which had been promised them.

     Secondly, their attitude towards the priesthood. Although Article 30 of their Federation states that the laws for guidance on this subject are to be found in nos. 311-319 of the New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine, it is questionable whether other points in their Federation will not seriously interfere with the freedom of the priesthood to teach in the way enjoined in N.J. 311; and whether the admonition in A. C. 6822 about heresies arising from those who are not "teaching ministers" will have been heeded. For I note that the very important Committee on Studies which has charge of the training of future ministers and "directs the faculty of theology" is composed at present of a professor of science, two physicians, one chemist, and only one minister. These functions, it would seem, should have been assigned to the Committee on Consecration, (Art. 35), which is composed exclusively of pastors.

     Furthermore, all the intellectual or doctrinal qualifications required of a candidate for ordination, according to Art. 32, are "to present three sermons that treat severally of the Lord, the Word, and of Life, to the Committee on Consecration, and receive their approval as satisfactory." In my opinion this does not make for a high standard of theological attainments. Another unfortunate feature is that induction of a man into any degree of the ministry is determined primarily on the recommendation or expressed desire of a society or a group of societies to have the ordination performed. (Art. 32-34.) Closely examined, this is tantamount to acting from the circumference to the center, and not the reverse.

     A third cause of embarrassment to this French Federation is its financial obligation to foreign contributory bodies or individuals who have already placed certain hampering restrictions on their doctrinal beliefs and affiliations, which in time may act like those who would bind Peter and lead him where he would not go. Even if they become independent of outside support, and thus emancipated from an outside dictation of their doctrinal beliefs and ecclesiastical politics, they will sooner or later come face to face with the problem that has wrecked churches restricted within merely national or racial limits. Will their guiding principle be one of spiritual leadership by the Lord through the Writings, or will it be the path of least resistance and expediency in accommodation to the clamors of their rank and file? Then they will be tested to see if their pastors are true leaders or hirelings, and the resulting conflict may cause a separation into two groups, one of which will go on with the distinctive work of the New Church, while the other will inevitably gravitate back to the Old Churches and welcome brotherhood with them as a sign of a new dispensational charity.

     I am not rashly indulging in prophecy, but merely stating what has happened elsewhere in the New Church in a number of localities where a start was made with as much fanfare and blowing of trumpets and under as fair spiritual auspices as here at Lausanne. But a few decades sufficed to show that the movement had not been founded on a rock, and that its backers had done what is popularly termed "capitalizing on a shoe-string."
     E. E. IUNGERICH.

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ACADEMY LIBRARY 1920

     LIST OF WORKS DESIRED FOR THE SWEDENBORG COLLECTION.

     (Continued from October issue, Page 647.)

     Internal Sense of Prophets and Psalms London, 1800. Same, London, 1896.

     On the Divine Love, and concerning the Divine Wisdom. From the Apocalypse Explained. New York, Boston, Cincinnati, 1848. Same, London, Edit. of 1840.

     Doctrine of the Lord. London, 1791. Same, Boston, 1795. Same, Philadelphia, 1815. Same, Cambridge, 1821. Same, London, 1822. Same, Boston, 1824. Same, London, 1831 Same, Boston, 1833. Same, Boston, 1833. Same, Boston, 1842. Same, London, 1846. Same, Manchester, 1848. Same, Boston, 1850. Same, London Edit. of 1846. Same, New York, 1859. Same, London, 1860. Same, New York, 1866. Same, New York, 1867. Same, London, 1868. Same, New York, 1811. Same, New York, 1872. Same, New York, 1873 Same, New York, 1878. Same, New York, Philadelphia, 1880.

     Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture: London, 1786. Same, Landon; Sold by J. Deighton, Holborn; and R. Hindmarsh, Clerkenwell-Close. (Without date, issued in 1788) Same, London, 1810. Same, Philadelphia, 1816. Same, London, 1824. Same, London, 1826. Same, Boston, 1828. Same, London, 1842. Same, Boston, 1842. Same, Boston, 1841 Same, Manchester, 1848. Same, London Edit. of 1842. Same, Boston, New York, Cincinnati: J. F. Desilver. (Without date, issued about 1855) Same, London, 1860. Same, London, 1863. Same, New York, 1866. Same, New York, 1869. Same, New York, 1878. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1880. Same, Manchester, 1891.

     Doctrine or Life. Plymouth: printed by Robert Weatherby, etc. (Without date, issued in 1772.) Same, London 1786. Same, London, 1787. Same, Boston, 1821. Same, London, 1825. Same, Boston, 1831. Same, Seventh Edition. Published by J. S. Hodson, Cross Street, Hatton Garden, etc., 1834 Same, Boston, 1836. Same, Boston, 1838. Same, Boston, 1842. Same, London, 1846. Same, Manchester, 1849. Same, Edit. of 1846. Same, London, 1860. Same, London, 1864. Same, New York, 1866. Same, Boston, 1868. Same, New York, 1868. Same, New York, 1871. Same, New York, 1872. Same, Philadelphia, 1880. Same, Philadelphia: New Church Tract and publication Society, etc. (Without date, issued in 1882.) Same, Congregation of Wretham Road, Birmingham, 1883. Same, Philadelphia, Boston, etc. (Without date, issued in 1889 and 1902.)

726

     Doctrine of Faith. Manchester: printed by C. Wheeler. (Without date, issued in 1792.) Same, London, 1819. Same, Boston, 1838. Same, London, 1842. Same, Manchester, 1849. Same, London Edit. of 1842. Same, London, 1860. Same, New York, 1862. Same, New York, 1866. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1873. Same, London, 1875.

     The Four Leading Doctrines. Boston, 1838. Same, London Edit. of 1846. Same, with questions by the Rev. E. D. Rendell, etc. (Without important, issued in 1849) Published also under the title, Tracts on various subjects, Manchester, 1852. Same, Boston: published by Otis Clapp, 23 School Street. (Without date, issued in 1855) Same, New York, 1851. Same, New York, 1866. Same, New York, 1867. Same, New York, 1868. Same, New York, 1871. Same, New York, 1872. Same, New York, 1878. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1880.

     Continuation of the Last Judgment. London, 1841. Same, London, 1846. Same, New York, 1863. Same, Manchester, 1865. Same, Boston, l899.

     Divine Love and Wisdom. London, 1788. Same, Boston: New York: Cincinnati, 1847. Same, New York, 1851. Same, Boston: New York: Philadelphia: Cincinnati, 1852. Same, New York, 1853. Same, London Edit. of 1843. Same, London, 1859. Same, New York, 1863. Same, New York, 1868. Same, London, 1873. Same, London, 1883, (cheap edition). Same, Philadelphia, 1990.

     Divine Providence. New York, 1853. Same, London Edit of 1843. Same, Boston, 1856. Same, New York, 1857. Same, New York, 1860. Same, New York, 1865. Same, New York, 1868. Same, New York, 1869. Same, New York, 1871. Same, London, 1873. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1817. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1881. Same, New York, 1893.

     The Apocalypse Revealed. London, 1851, 2 vols. Same, New York, 1855, 2 vols. (Library has vol. 1.) Same, New York, 1859, 2 vols. Same, New York, 1879, 2 vols. Same, Philadelphia, 1815, 2 vols. Same, London, 1877. Same, London, 1878. Same, London, 1882. Same, Philadelphia, 1882. Same, New York, 1883, 2 vols. Same, London, 1886. Same, New York, 1887, 2 vols. Same, Philadelphia, 1886. Same, London, 1890. Same, Philadelphia, 1896. Same, London, 1897.

     Indexes to the Apocalypse Revealed. London, 1797. Same, London, 1832.

     Doctrine of Charity. Cincinnati, 1840. Same, Boston, 1840. Same, Boston. 1848. Same, New York, 1858, Same, Manchester, I866.

     Conjugial Love. Boston, 1833. Same, Boston, 1840. Same, Boston, New York, Cincinnati, 1852 Same, Boston, 1856. Same, New York, 1856. Same, London, 1862. Same, New York, 1868. Same, New York, 1892. Same, London, 1898.

     Extracts from Conjugial Lope. The joys of heaven, and the nuptials there. London, 1857 Marriage, London: C. W. Daniel, 3 Amen Court, Paternoster Row, E. C. The People's Classics, no. 17.

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     Brief Exposition of the Doctrine of the New Church. London, 1818. Same, Boston, 1848. Same, Manchester, 1851. Same, Boston, 1851. Same, London Edit. of 1840 Same, London, 1818.

     Intercourse of Soul and Body. London, 1832. Same, Boston, 1838. Same, Hampton, Middlesex, 1839. Same, Boston, 1839, Same, London, 1844. Same, Boston, 1849. Same, London, 1850. Same, Holborn, 1852. Same, London Edit. of 1844 Same, London, 1861. Same, New York, 1892. Same, London, 1897. Same, New York, 1898.

     True Christian Religion. London, 1846. Same, London, 1848, 2 vols. Same Boston, 1848. Same, London, 1849. Same, London, 1853. Same, New York, 1853. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, etc., 1856. Same, London, 1863. Same, New York, 1865. Same, New York, 1868. Same, New York, 1869. Same, New York, 1870. Same, New York, 1871. Same, London, 1813. Same, New York, 1878. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1878, 3 vols. Same, London, 1880. Same, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 1881, 3 vols. Same, Philadelphia, 1882. Same, London, 1883. Same, London, 1885. Same, Philadelphia, 1886. Same, London, 1888. Same, London, 1890. Same, London, 1893. Same, Philadelphia, 1896. Same, London, 1898. Same, New York, 1898. Same, London, 1901.

     Extracts from True Christian Religion. The first chapter of True Christian Religion, etc., Manchester, 1808. Christmas Day. (Without imprint, issued in Manchester in 1811 and 1812.) The Joys of Heaven, Manchester, 1814. A treatise on the Divine Trinity, Philadelphia, 1817-61. The end of all old Churches, London: W, Newbery, 1851. An abridgment of Swedenborg's work entitled, T. C. R., London, 1868. Same, Boston, 1869.

     Nine Questions. London, 1786. Same, London, 1790. Same, London, 1802. Same, London: printed and published by T. Goyder, 415 Strand. (Without date, issued in 1824.) Same, Boston, 1830. Coronis. London, 1789 Same, Boston, 1833. Same, London Edit. of 1843.

     The Doctrines of the New Jerusalem, etc., etc. New York, 1872. Same, Boston, 1839.

     The Minor Works of Swedenborg, Manchester. (Without date, issued in 1866.)

     Miscellaneous Theological Works, New York, 1857. Same, New York, 1888. Same, New York, 1802. Same, New York, 1897.

     Writings of Swedenborg, etc., etc. Boston, New York, Cincinnati, London, 1841, 2 vols.

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DOCTRINE AND WORSHIP 1920

DOCTRINE AND WORSHIP W. F. PENDLETON 1920

     Announcements.


NEW CHURCH LIFE
VOL. XL DECEMBER, 1920 No. 12
     (Delivered at a service in celebration of the first anniversary of the Dedication of the Bryn Athyn Church, October 3, 1920.)

     In the twenty-first chapter of the Book of Revelation, the New Church appears, first, as the Holy City, New Jerusalem, descending from God out of heaven; second, as the tabernacle of God with men; third, as the bride, the wife of the Lamb. By these three are meant: The revelation and reception of the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Jerusalem, signified by the descent of the Holy City; the establishment of the worship of the one God, the Lord our Savior Jesus Christ, signified by the tabernacle of God with men; and the marriage of the Lord and the church, signified by the bride, the Lamb's wife, as shown by the angel unto John.

     These three are established in successive order. The first is doctrine, without which there is no church, no worship, no conjunction with the Lord, no salvation and eternal life. The revelation of doctrine, the teaching of doctrine, and the reception of it, is first, because doctrine from heaven teaches the true idea of God, the true way of salvation, and the true nature of the spiritual world. The knowledge and understanding of these three things is necessary for the existence of a truly spiritual church on earth; for such a church cannot exist and grow unless men are able to think rightly about God and the way to Him, and unless they are able to form a true conception of the nature of the spiritual world. To think aright on these subjects is fundamental to spiritual growth, fundamental to progress in the regenerate life. Hence we read that "the church is founded on doctrine; for doctrine teaches what we are to believe and how we are to live" (A. R. 902).

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     Next in the orderly development of the church is the institution of worship, which, however, is not genuine until there is sound doctrine in the church. "For worship is prescribed in doctrine, and is performed according to doctrine" (L. 64). And "the goods and truths of doctrine are in worship as the soul in the body; wherefore, worship without these is a lifeless form" (A. R. 775).

     We read further that "the things which are of doctrine are first set forth, and those which are of worship follow, because the quality of worship is from the goods and truths of doctrine; for worship is nothing but an external act, in which there must be the internal things of doctrine; without these, worship is without its essence, its life and soul" (A. R. 777).

     Doctrine not only inaugurates worship, but accompanies it in its progress, from its beginning onward. It is doctrine,-true doctrine,-that not only establishes worship, but makes it holy, and causes it to be the efficient means of salvation. False doctrine perverts worship, falsifies it, profanes it, even as it does the Word itself, and finally destroys the church; for when there is false doctrine, and therefore a false worship,-the worship of a false God,-heaven is closed, and the Lord departs from such a church. But a new church is formed amid the wreck of the former church, and is, therefore, more or less in a state of ignorance at first; for all knowledge is progressive. And so we are instructed that "all worship is natural in its beginning, and afterwards becomes spiritual by means of truths from the Word and a life according to them. Hence truths ought to be learned, for by truths man has faith, charity, and all things of the church. If the Word is not searched for the purpose of learning truths and living according to them, nothing is known concerning worship, whether it be dead or living; and yet, according to the quality of worship, man himself is either dead or living. Otherwise, of what use is the Word and doctrine from it, or of what use is the Sabbath and sermons, as well as books of instruction; yea, for what purpose is the church and religion" (A. R. 161.) That is, the Word is to be searched by reading and reflection, that we may acquire knowledge, that we may acquire understanding, that wt may be inspired to do the things we have learned, in order that worship from dead may become living, may become the efficient means to heaven and eternal life.

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     Worship becomes living, becomes spiritual, when the truths of doctrine are received into the understanding, and from the understanding into the will, thus into the life. The worship of the sanctuary will then be continued in the daily life, so that external worship becomes also internal, and the church from natural becomes spiritual, and the way of salvation made plain.

     Those familiar with the history of the church body to which we belong know that in its beginning much was made of doctrine, and that comparatively little attention was paid to external worship. It existed, indeed, but was mostly a continuation of what we previously had. Among other things, we were for many years without a church edifice devoted to the worship of the Lord. This condition is now gradually being rectified throughout our body; and here, in our midst, a noble temple has been erected for the purpose of Divine worship. But it is important to remember that church buildings, a powerful external,-will remain a merely natural thing if worship is not made spiritual by the truths of doctrine from the Word. The doctrine which the Lord has given us in His second coming must retain its important place which it assumed in the beginning of our work; for doctrine is the Lord, and by it he is present in worship, and in the life of the church. The external of worship is but an instrumentality to internal worship, without which there is no church, no heaven, no conjunction with the Lord; without which, even doctrine itself remains a merely natural thing, and the church does not become the bride and wife of the Lamb.

     We are to realize the importance of a fuller establishment and development of the worship of the church, as well as the provision of all the other necessary instrumentalities; and we are to realize that these things are but provided means by which doctrine itself is to become spiritual with us, by which the church is to be married and become the bride, the Lamb's wife,-provided means for a spiritual increase, a spiritual multiplication of the truths of the church, through which alone heaven is opened and the church on earth becomes one with the church in heaven.

     There will not be a natural increase, an increase in numbers, until there is a spiritual increase. The Lord will not permit a natural increase until there is a spiritual increase in His Church which is the New Jerusalem.

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If there is not this spiritual increase, if there should be a natural increase without its spiritual counterpart, the Church will be taken away from us and transferred to those more worthy of its blessing and privilege.

Let us, with humility of heart, pray the Lord for this spiritual growth of the Church, leaving its natural growth to Him who provideth all good to those who worship Him supremely from the heart. "Seek ye first the kingdom and the justice of God, and all these things shall be added unto you." Amen.
GRACE AND PEACE FROM THE LORD 1920

GRACE AND PEACE FROM THE LORD Rev. K. R. ALDEN 1920

     "Grace be unto you, and peace, from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come." (Revelation 1:4.)

     The quality of the water in a stream depends upon the fountain-head from which it flows. If this be polluted, or filled with bitter salts, the stream will be unfit for use. But if the fountainhead be pure, if its waters be sweet and sparkling, then will the stream it supplies be of use and delight to all who come thirsting to its brink.

     The quality of the blessing contained in our text, which the Divine Spirit placed in the mouth of John, that he might pour it forth upon the seven churches in Asia, was determined by its source. Had it been a blessing from man, it would have been tinctured with a human element. Had it come from the church, it would still have been fraught with something of the human proprium. But the fountain-head of that blessing was not the church or man, but the infinite and eternal God,-the all-wise, all-powerful Heavenly Father. That blessing came from the Divine Logos, who was from eternity, and who became flesh in time, even our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, God-Man in His glorified Human. In the words of the beloved disciple, the blessing came forth "from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come."

     Those who are regenerating value a gift not so much for its intrinsic worth as for the love and affection of the giver. For true charity looks to the duality of a deed-the internal beauty of it-rather than the outward form.

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Thus the regenerate find deepest pleasure in the gifts that flow from pure and noble sources, and their supreme delight in the gifts that come from the Lord Himself. For the chiefest of all gifts flow in unmeasured sweetness from Him. And these gifts of the Divine blessing are meant in our text by the "Grace and peace from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come."

     The chief gift of God is life itself, imparting all life to man,_ present, past, and future. In one sense, the present is the all of man's life, for he is conscious only of the immediate present. We are, as it were, forever on the crest of an onward rushing wave, each instant of life being as a particle of the water, the sensation of the moment being the all of our conscious life. Yet we also make the past and the future a part of this present by reflection upon them. And this is a finite image of Him to whom alone the past and the future are eternally present. In all three of these provinces of our life, the Lord God "from whom all blessings flow" reigns supreme. He alone changeth not. "Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever Thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, Thou art God." "Before Abraham was, I am."

     Who among us cannot see the hand of God in the bygone pages of His life? Who has not felt the tender sympathy of His love, the powerful direction of His wisdom! Our past life unfolds as a series of events which took place under the immediate guidance of His Providence. Were there not moments when we stood upon the brink of chaos? Were there not times when sin threatened to engulf us? And were we not led back into the paths of righteousness and peace by an unseen power scarcely known at the time? Was it the hand of man that kept this struggling band of New Churchmen together through trials and temptations, through thick and thin, through the sway of this man and that, and the leadership of different personalities? No! The Divine alone can create and perpetuate. And man, in his feeble and groping way, can only prepare himself to receive the Divine operation, endeavoring to make himself worthy of the Lord's presence in that inmost and loving relationship of a Father and His children; for we are all the sons of God.

     The Church is above and beyond personality, beyond the power of an individual to make or mar, because it is founded upon the Divine Authority of the Lord's Revelation.

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It is founded upon the rock of an acknowledgment that Christ is the Son of the living God,-the Divine Truth incarnate. And a Church founded upon that Rock does not in reality depend upon individual men. Regardless of men, it will go on to boundless victory. The Truth is King; and if we could see the mighty spiritual forces behind the Truth of Revelation, they would appear to us as a gigantic, irresistible glacier moving slowly, majestically, but inevitably down the mountain side of time. So moves the true Church of God, though it seem little to us. But if we realize that power of the Divine Truth, it will flood our souls with light, and we will see that the Church is not small, that it numbers countless millions in the spiritual world, and that it goes forward upon earth with the solemn progress of the only true and correspondential resting-place of those countless angels who depend upon the Church of God for their sustenance and eternal existence.

The blessing of our text was given to the New Church under the Apocalyptic title of the "seven churches in Asia." It is a blessing from the God who watched over us in childhood, who implanted in the tender years of our infancy the remains which shall be for the salvation of our souls. It is a blessing from the Lord who is "a shade on thy right hand," who is thy shepherd, and who "knows His sheep,"-the Lord who "neither slumbers, nor sleeps," "who is, and who was, and who is to come."

It may be we are disturbed by present events. A calamity hangs over our heads; we are perplexed, and know not whither to turn. Yet this feeling we must shun, because of the Lord who has blest us, who has sent all the good things of the past, who has guided us aright through the paths of darkness and the shadow of death, who is present now in our midst, even as He is present wherever "two or three are gathered together in His name." He is here to enter every troubled mind, knowing "what things ye have need of before ye ask Him." He "will not leave you comfortless," but will "send the Comforter, even the Spirit of truth that leadeth unto all truth." True it is that we cannot fathom His wisdom. True it is that there are times when the events of this world seem like tragedies that do not speed but retard our work. Such thoughts are doubts of His Providence. He knows best; and we must say, without bitterness or regret, "Not my will, O Lord, but Thine be done."

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     To know the living presence of God, to bow to His judgments and the ruling of His will, requires stout hearts and humble spirits. It is ever the test of the work He has accomplished in our midst. If we have not been prepared to meet trying situations, then of a truth we have not entered into the New Jerusalem, but have only been gazing at its Portals through the eyes of others. We have seen the golden streets, but have not walked thereon. We have looked upon the precious stones of its foundations, but have not taken them for our own. We have heard of the pearl of great price, but have not sold our all that we might buy it.

     This truth stands. We are blest by the God "who is," and in the events of the present moment. In all present perplexities We stands as the Rock to whom we must cling, and from whom we must gain our hope. Human guides are indeed useful and necessary; but they are only servants, only ministers toward that perfect communion of God and man which is independent of all mediaries save the Divine Human Itself. If, then, we are patient and trusting in the present, the future will look bright and roseate. For every oncoming minute brings "Him who is to come." To all eternity He is to come. The Second Coming is an established fact of the past, but the eternal coming of the Lord is ever a fresh promise of the future. He will come unawares into our darkest musing, taking away all bitterness, if only we have faith and trust in Him. "Grace be unto you, and peace, from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come."

     We have now seen that this blessing of grace and peace comes forth from its source as a "pure river of the water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." The Divine benediction is the Lord's will to impart His grace, His peace, every moment of our lives. In the twofold expression of the blessing, "grace" refers to the Divine Truth and "peace" to the Divine Good. The Divine Good of Love and Truth of Wisdom are the infinite source of the life which the Lord would impart to us, to each according to his ability to receive, which is measured by the use he makes of the gift.

     The word "grace" is from the Greek charis, ckaritos, from which we also have the word "charity." Hence the ancients who had a knowledge of correspondences named a group of their goddesses "Charities"-or "Graces," as they are called from the Latin gratia.

736

These divinities were supposed to be the origins of all the beauty, good will, favor, kindness, loveliness and grace that existed in the world. With the ancients who had a true understanding of correspondences this was a mode of describing how all those blessings came from God, even as all Divine blessings are involved in the words of John, "Grace be unto you."

     What is beauty in a spiritual idea? Beauty is truth embodied and made to stand forth. The truth that is with the angels produces everything of form which is about them, while their goodness makes the quality of that form. The form of the angel's mind produces the form of his heavenly mansion, and the gracefulness of that form depends upon the "grace of God that is with him and is his own from the Lord."

     That the Divine Grace is the Divine Truth, and that grace with man is his affection of truth, will be evident from the use of the term in the Word. When the Lord read from Isaiah in the synagogue, it is said that those who heard "wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth." His words are called "gracious" because they are Divine Truth, and because they are grateful and delightful to all who have the affection of truth. Again, we read that "the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ," where "the law" is the Divine Truth in the ultimate or natural degree, but "grace and truth" the Divine Truth in the spiritual and celestial degrees proceeding from the Divine Human of the Lord, whose glory they beheld "as of the Only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." The Jews had obeyed the law of Moses from fear, but Christians were to obey the Lord from affection, because "grace and truth came by Jesus Christ."

     But "grace" was to become a much perverted term in the Christian Church, expressive of the horrible falsity of salvation by faith alone, and of Divine grace. But the grace of God which saves man is not that. It is as far removed as the verdant foliage of the tropics from the chilly icebergs of the north. For the "grace which came by Jesus Christ" is the Divine of the Lord that makes heaven and the church, made manifest to us in the pages of written Revelation, and received by those who live according to its teachings from the affection of truth.

737

And so the "grace of the Lord" is the revelation He has vouchsafed for the salvation of our souls, and when we receive the "grace of Him who is, and who was, and who is to come," we receive the affection of truth for the sake of truth, which is the verimost essential of the spiritual kingdom of the Lord. Again we realize how the Divine Truth may be received independently of human instruments, from the Lord Himself who is present in His Word to which all can go, there to receive the Divine grace. In other words, the perpetual benediction of the Lord's grace to His Church is the ability that each one enjoys to enter intellectually into the mysteries of faith, from the love of truth for its own sake, unaided by anything but the Truth Itself. "And of His fullness have we all received, and grace for grace.

If such be the grace that comes from the Lord, what shall we say of the peace from "Him who is, and who was, and who is to come?" Peace is the inmost joy of heaven. It is the essential quality of the angels of the celestial heaven. It is the tranquillity of spirit which forms the inmost good of conjugial love, which "welds the twain in one." It is born only of a state of regeneration. The sword of truth is needed for the work of man's reformation, but the day comes when this sword is "beaten into a plowshare, as the spears into pruning hooks,"-the day following the warfare of temptation when spiritual peace comes from the Lord. "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem; they shall rest that love thee. Peace be within thy walls, tranquillity within thy palaces."

After the Lord had risen from the dead, He imparted peace unto His disciples, saying, "My Peace I give unto you," and that peace involved all the fruits of His victory, the blessings flowing from the Divine Human. He also said: "This is my Body, which is given for you," because His glorified body is Divine Good Itself, the Divine Substance Itself, even to ultimates, and from this glorified Human all angels, spirits and men receive all the good they possess. We have seen man's need of the Divine "grace," which is the Divine Truth; but in the regeneration he also receives the Divine Good of "peace," which is the sustaining food of his spiritual life, the "bread of heaven" given by the Lord as the reward of victory in temptation when He has led man into states of peace and tranquillity. This spiritual state may be likened to the feeling of natural content that comes at the end of a feast, when the demands of the body have been satisfied, especially at a feast of charity, which is attended with a feeling of mutual love and confidence that banishes fear of the future.

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In heaven this state is perfect, for every angel knows that among his cherished friends no hypocritical enemies are concealed in sheep's clothing. His soul is filled with peace and his mind with tranquillity, for he has full trust in the Divine care of the Lord.

He who believes that he rules himself can never come into this state of tranquillity, and can never know " the peace that floweth like a river." To him, life is a battle with his neighbors, and his future depends solely upon his past and present efforts. But he who looks to the Lord, and has confidence in Him, will not thus fear for events that are to come; as he emerges victorious in spiritual combats, he will enter upon states of internal peace, and be fed with the bread of heaven. The Lord's own battles of temptation were fought from a state born of the Divine innocence of wisdom, which He imparted ever more fully to the Human by victory. Nor is it necessary for man to wait to the end of life to enter into states of peace; these are given after every conflict, providing him strength to go forward to ever sterner battles. It is only necessary that we believe that the Lord rules all things, that we meet all temptations with courage born of trust in Him, and He will reward us with inner states of heavenly peace.

Let us observe that peace is of three degrees. There is natural peace, which comes from the possession of health and worldly success. There is spiritual peace, which is born of the conviction that the Lord has provided a threefold Word of Divine Truth, accessible at all times and accommodated to all states. There is celestial peace, which is born of mutual love and supreme love to the Lord. The "dew that descended upon Mount Hermon" represented the truth of heavenly peace; for it was replenished every morning, as it were from heaven. And this peace is such that it removes every evil, and especially the evil of self-confidence and self-conceit; for it attributes all things to the Lord, and is not anxious for the rewards of earthly peace. Such a state, attained only by regeneration, is receptive of the Divine blessing of "grace and peace from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come."

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In conclusion, let us recall that among the sacrifices of the Jewish Church there were those called "peace offerings or eucharistic observances," which were among those abrogated by the Lord when He instituted Baptism and the Holy Supper for the Christian Church, into which He gathered all that was represented by the Jewish worship. Thus the bread of the Holy Supper, signifying the gift of good from the Lord, also involves the spiritual peace and tranquillity which he imparts to the regenerate, while the wine of the Supper represents the Divine Truth given to man, or the Divine grace.

"This do in remembrance of me,"-in remembrance of the grace and peace which comes "from Him who is, and who was, and who is to come." And as we draw near to the table He has prepared for us, let our hearts be full of thankfulness and rejoicing that our past, our present, and our future are of His Providence. Let us be filled with His grace to exclaim with the sweet singer of Israel, "My cup runneth over; surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." Amen.
STATE OF THE CHRISTIAN WORLD THE CAUSE OF WAR 1920

STATE OF THE CHRISTIAN WORLD THE CAUSE OF WAR Rev. J. E. BOWERS 1920

In the course of some years before the recent great war, many people imagined that the world was progressing in every respect, and fast getting better. The notion generally held was that we had a Christian civilization such as we could be proud of. It was supposed to be the safeguard of all the best interests of mankind. There were movements for the disarmament of the nations of Europe. It was thought that this would effect the peace of the so-called Christian world. To promote this movement, evidently in full confidence of its success, the late Andrew Carnegie built the fine Palace of Peace at The Hague.

Such movements of philanthropists are made with good intentions, and some use is the result of them. But they are made from and according to the natural ideas and desires of men of the world.

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From natural intelligence, and without any knowledge from Divine Revelation concerning the spiritual state of the world, it seemed that men would see that peace among the nations would pay better than war and be more desirable in every way, because it was so perfectly evident at a glance that, with the modern machinery of war, greater destruction could be wrought in a year than it would be possible to repair in a century; involving hundreds of thousands killed in battles, and untold millions of people subjected to mental states that no words could express.

     In the Writings of the New Church the state of the Christian world, which is the cause of war, is described in absolute fullness. But it is intended in this short article to say only a few words in a general way on this great subject. By the Christian world are meant all the sects of Christendom. All the people, in the process of time, departed from the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ and His apostles in the New Testament. Every truth of the Word was falsified, and its corresponding good adulterated. Thus originated falsities of religion from the dogma of the tripersonality of God and salvation by faith alone. And the sad thought of it is that all falsities of religion are spiritually insane ideas.

     By the beginning of the fourth century, the apostolic natural common sense of the primitive Christians, the light of the Gospel which they had from the literal sense of the Word, had been turned into a confusion of ideas, and a state of dense mental and spiritual darkness prevailed. In their conceit from self love, men invented an easier way of being saved, more agreeable to the natural man than keeping the Ten Commandments. In the man-made "scheme" of salvation by faith alone, the two Great Commandments of love to God and love toward the neighbor, and also the one universal precept called the Golden Rule, are entirely repudiated as being essential to salvation.

     Falsities of faith lead directly to confirmations in evils of life. From these, there inevitably proceed such infernal and inhuman feelings and principles as envy and jealousy, contempt and hatred against others. And when such mental conditions and spiritual states so generally prevailed in the Christian world, as is revealed in the Divine Revelation to the New Church, need we wonder that the recent Great War came to pass? Surely not. And the world becoming genuinely Christian is for many reasons a very slow process.

741

It is a remarkable fact, that, in externals, great changes for the better have taken place in the world since the New Church began one hundred and fifty years ago. And we may expect that there will also be desirable improvements as to internals in the future.

     The only and truly Christian Church, the Church of the New Jerusalem now coming down from God out of Heaven; the dissemination of its spiritual and Divine doctrines and principles, and the reception and application of them by the people,-in this, and in this alone, is the hope of the evangelization and thereby of the civilization of the world. Concerning this it is written in the Apocalypse that John "saw an angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people." (14:6.) Now this is the gospel of the New Church, which is taught on every page of the Revelation to the Church, which is the Lord in His Advent. And every sermon, lecture, talk, article, or paper that teaches in accordance with the Lord's final Revelation, in the widest sense is preaching the gospel.

     So long as the New Church necessarily remains with comparatively few, because the masses of the people are not in a spiritual state to receive or to appreciate the Heavenly Doctrines, or to live in accordance with the principles of peace and fraternal love, it may be expected that there will be wars. But in the course of centuries in the future the New Church will grow, will increase in numbers, and will become a greater power for good in the world than it is at this day.

     It is the promise of Prophecy that they "shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." (Isa. 2:4) But by "war" here and elsewhere in the Word are meant, of course, combats between good and evil, truth and falsity, in the spiritual sense, and not war between nations in the world.

     The Lord, "the everlasting Father, and the Prince of Peace," is the Supreme Ruler of the nations, and in infinite loving kindness, according to the laws of His Divine order, He mercifully overrules all the consequences of wars for the greatest possible good of the children of men, or of the whole human race.

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REPUGNANCE 1920

REPUGNANCE Dr. J. B. S. KING 1920

     "It is known that infants love milk, and that adults are unaccustomed thereto, so that some think that it does them harm. Wherefore, it is a rule of physicians that milk is injurious in case of sickness. The reason it is hurtful, although it is the simplest diet, and above all things free from harm, is that men accustom themselves to drinks which are repugnant to them, especially to malt liquors (cerevisiis). Hence their stomach and intestines, and also the blood, grow accustomed thereto, which therefore cannot bear a milk diet. When such persons are first associated in the other life, there is a sort of repugnance; for I manifestly perceived the odor of ale (cerevisia) from some of them when I drank milk." (Spiritual Diary 2084.)

     The "rule of physicians" spoken of above does not now apply, for the profession of the present day is unanimous in the opinion that milk is the best diet for many diseases and disorders.

     It is true, however, that milk was in bad repute with the profession in Swedenborg's time. Brouzet, a noted French doctor of that period, thought so poorly of milk that he advocated state interference to forbid mothers from suckling their infants as an important means of preventing disease as well as of improving morals. Van Helmont, the leading chemist and physician of the generation preceding Swedenborg, attributed all our diseases, if not our sins, to the inborn propensity for milk. He proposed that bread boiled in beer and sweetened with honey should be used as a substitute for milk in the rearing of infants. The reason for this bad reputation was probably, as indicated in the above number, that the people of that age, including physicians, had so accustomed their palates and blood to malt drinks that milk disagreed with them. Such people find milk insipid, and productive of sliminess in the mouth and sliminess in the stomach; it also produces in them an obtruding effect upon the gastric juice, with resulting fermentation.

     Milk, then, is repugnant to the human organism only when this is in an unsound or unhealthy state.

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As mentioned in the passage from the Diary, it is repugnant to systems that have been saturated and vitiated by strong malt liquors and highly seasoned foods. Children and milk-drinking adults have a natural distaste for ale, and are apt to shudder when they taste it for the first time. Shortly afterwards a loathsome and nauseous exhalation fills the nostrils and palatal spaces. The antagonism between the two substances is confirmed by the observation made by a number of physicians that the best way to produce in drunkards a distaste for alcohol is to put them upon an exclusive milk diet.

     REPUGNANCES IN GENERAL.

     The following observations may throw some light upon the intimate nature of repugnances in general:

     Taste is an appreciation of the intimate form of substance by the taste-buds of the tongue. No other organ or sense of the body can do this. Sugar, salt and strychnine, for instance, may be made to appear exactly alike to the eye; nor can the nose distinguish any difference, for salt and strychnine are odorless, and sugar is nearly so. The tongue alone is so constructed as instantly to Perceive the sweetness, the salinity and the bitterness that appertain to those three substances respectively.

     Substances which are of a congruent form, so as to affect pleasantly the minute expansions of the gustatory nerves, are agreeable and delightful; such are fruit, milk and bread. But substances, whose intimate forms are harsh, sharp or rough, affect the taste-buds unpleasantly, as in the case of acid, bitter and acrid materials.

     Hence arises repugnance. This is the natural state of affairs; but taste, like the other senses, may be educated. All people learn to like foods the first taste of which was disagreeable. Few people like tomatoes when first tasted, but may grow very fond of them later. Hardly anyone likes pepper, mustard or garlic at first, but many like them after frequent repetition. And so it is a common experience that we acquire tastes for things which are in themselves disagreeable.

     A further result is that the palate loses appreciation and perception of the simple, bland foods of early years in the same proportion that it acquires a taste for the sharp, spicy, hot and bitterish foods.

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     This explains very well the statements made in No. 2084 of the Diary.

     ODOR AND TASTE.

     The sense of taste is greatly fortified by the sense of smell; the two are almost inseparable. Most foods have volatile constituents, and while the tongue is applying itself to the fixed parts, the nose is appreciating the volatile constituents. The tongue sensates savor, the nose flavor.

     Everyone knows how dull the taste becomes when the sense of smell is obliterated by a cold. Anyone may prove the fact by this experiment: A slice of onion and a slice of apple cannot be distinguished from each other by the tongue if the nostrils are closed and the eyes shut. A blindfolded person with his nostrils closed cannot tell red wine from white by the tongue alone. Thus the two senses of taste and smell work together in the appreciation of food, and they also combine to express repugnance, which is done by a closing of the nostrils and by such motions of the tongue as will speedily eject or spit out the offending or distasteful substance.

     Heat stimulates and cold is grateful, but lukewarmness relaxes and unnerves, producing disgust in the mouth and nausea in the stomach.

     INTERIOR REPUGNANCE.

     The above considerations will serve to illustrate and confirm what is said of spiritual repugnance in many passages of the Writings.

     Evil is repugnant to good, and vice versa. The organic forms of a good spirit are orderly to the tip of his tongue; the organic forms of an evil spirit are disorderly throughout. The exhalations or spheres from each are congruent and harmonious to their own forms respectively. The organism of each absorbs from the surrounding elements forms of substances that are homogeneous to it but inimical and apocrustic to the other.

     An evil spirit feels repugnance to good because the minute forms of the sphere of good are inapposite, harsh, repellent and constricting to the order of his cells and the flow of his fluids. Such a one cannot breathe the atmosphere of heaven; his eyes cannot endure its light, nor his blood the sphere of its love.

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RIGHT TRAINING.-THE ROAD TO HAPPINESS 1920

RIGHT TRAINING.-THE ROAD TO HAPPINESS PETER CLAASEN 1920

     By training we understand bringing up a child to become a man of good and honest character; it is, briefly stated, the true cultivation of the mind.

     Let us illustrate this by an example from nature. We place an apple seed in the ground. It grows up, and in the course of a few years becomes a tree which blooms in the springtime and bears fruit. But when testing the fruit, we find it coarse, bitter and unfit to eat; for it is a wild apple tree, being uncultivated and unimproved. Hereby is represented the nature of man at birth and what would be his growth in a merely natural state, without that training which develops what is spiritual.

     As soon as the child begins to think and to have ideas, instruction commences, first by imitation of what he sees and hears from others, during which period his mother guides and instructs him. She is his first teacher. She it is who teaches him the principles of morality by saying, "Do not do that," or "Do this," or "Be a good child." As soon as the little one begins to speak, his mother teaches him to pray his first short prayer; and there is for the mother-heart no event so joyful and so sweet as when her child for the first time repeats his little prayer. A new day, with its hopes and blessings, has dawned. That which is spiritual is now to open and expand his mind. It is the beginning of the spiritual creation, of which the Creator says: "Let there be light, and there was light."

     In our Heavenly Doctrines we are taught that a tree signifies man; and since man is man by virtue of the affection which is of the will and the perception which is of the understanding, therefore these also are signified by a tree. As there is a correspondence between man and a tree, there appear in heaven paradises of trees, which correspond to the affections and perceptions of the angels. In the hells also there are forests of trees bearing evil fruits, and these correspond to the lusts and thoughts of those who are there. (A. R. 400.)

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We are also told that "the man who is being reborn begins like a tree from seed, which is truth from good, and also like a tree he produces leaves, then blossoms, and finally fruit. For he produces such things as are of intelligence, which are signified in the Word by 'leaves,' then such things as are of wisdom, which are signified by 'blossoms,' and finally such things as are of life, that is, the goods of love and charity in act, which are signified by 'fruits.' Such is the representative likeness between the fruit-bearing tree and the man who is being regenerated, insomuch that if anything is known about spiritual truth and good, the nature of regeneration may be learned from a tree." (A. C. 5115)

     Another similitude between the fruits of a tree and man is given us in A. R. 623: "The 'first-fruits' signified that which is first born and afterwards grows up like an infant into a man or a shoot into a tree; and hence they signified everything that followed until it was complete. For everything that follows is in the first, as the man is in the infant and the tree in the shoot; and because this first exists before its successions, both in heaven and the church, therefore the `first-fruits' were holy to the Lord, and a 'feast of first-fruits' was celebrated." Again we read that "the first fruits of the land (Exodus 23:19) signify the state of innocence which is in infancy." (A. C. 3519.)

     Training provides the means for a life of regeneration. It opens the way to perceive what should be done in order to be regenerated; and upon a life of regeneration depends everything,-happiness in this and the eternal life, as the Lord said to Nicodemus: "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3.) Therefore regeneration is the outcome of right training. Regeneration, or the new birth, goes through six states, to which correspond the six days of creation; for the whole creation, as related in Genesis, comprehends the spiritual transformation or new birth of man. After he has gone through all these states, he becomes an inhabitant of heaven.

     With feelings of joy and pride the mother sees her child begin to attend school, and if she has been faithful to her trust,-like Hannah, the mother of Samuel,-then she has laid a good foundation in the mind of the child, on which the teacher in the school has now to build. There need be no fear of the future, since this has been provided for by the remains of good and truth implanted during in fancy; and besides, the guardian angels are with him.

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The mother continues to pray for the prosperity of her child; and the training commenced by her instruction and many exhortations goes forward in the school satisfactorily, if the teacher be such as he should be. The various subjects taught in school are means-we may call them spiritual tools-for instruction and training.

     We know that the holy Word of God is the foundation of all instruction and training. It is also the source from which lawmakers have drawn all civil and moral laws; and hence it follows that the prosperity, welfare and blessedness of the State and the community depend upon the Divine law, given in the Word. Therefore the pupil must learn to read and write in order, primarily, that he may become acquainted with the Divine precepts of the Word, and thereby become both a true member of the Church and a useful member of the community. Thus will come into fulfillment the commandment of the Lord: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matt. 22.)

     The youth, after completing the course of the elementary grades, has gained considerable knowledge in natural and also in spiritual things. And as by knowledge comes enlightenment, he who has enjoyed such an education can see and understand far more than one who is ignorant; he can better advance himself and perform uses more ably. If the course of study is lengthened, and he receive a high school, or, better still, a college training, we can say that he has been excellently and thoroughly educated. The young citizen then enters well-equipped upon life and its duties, provided the remains of good and truth, implanted during infancy and childhood, have been interiorly operative during the acquisition of knowledge by study and literary pursuits. For only then can we say that he is truly trained, and has before him the prospect of true blessedness and happiness. Of him is true, in his own measure, what is said of the Lord in Luke: "He increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man."

     When we look about us in the world, we see instances where deeply learned men lack a good and noble character. Internally, they are untrained.

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This shows that schooling and true training are in many cases not a one, as they should be. Many among the learned are wicked men,-atheists, who deny God, the need of a righteous life, and the life after death. Why is such the case? It is because the planted tree has not been properly cared for, and growing up, has brought forth corrupt fruit. And what fate awaits such a one? Our Lord Himself gives the answer: "Every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire." (Matt. 3:10) But a well-educated and well-trained man, because of his usefulness, is an ornament and a strong support in the community and state to which he belongs; and he enjoys the love and esteem of his fellow citizens. "He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of waters, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; and his leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. (Ps. 1.)

Finally, I would say that a man can be well educated and trained only when he has studied, acknowledged, and received the truth as revealed in the opened Word, as we are taught in the Book of Revelation: "And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth; and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal. And he measured the wall thereof, a hundred and forty and four cubits, the measure of a man, that is, of an angel." (21:16, 17.)
ORDER INTO WHICH MAN IS BORN 1920

ORDER INTO WHICH MAN IS BORN 1920

"If man were without hereditary evil, he would be born into Divine order itself, namely, into love to the Lord and charity towards the neighbor, wherein would thus be implanted all and single the things which are of faith; just as animals, which are born into their own order, are born into the affections natural to them, within which are all things that belong to their life. When, however, [the hereditary state] is contrary to order, then it is otherwise.

"The sons of the Most Ancient Church were born almost so, namely, into the affections of good and the affections of truth. Wherefore, in the very affections was everything whatever of good and truth which the doctrine of faith teaches; but still, in course of time, by instruction, experience, inspiration and revelation, it was given them to know all things that pertained to faith, to which they at once assented inwardly, so that they had a perception of them, because they accorded with their affections." (Spiritual Diary 4635m, 4636m.)

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Editorial Department 1920

Editorial Department Editor 1920

     NEW CHURCH LIFE
Office of Publication, Lancaster, Pa.
Published Monthly By
THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM
BRYN ATHYN, PA.
Editor               Rev. W. B. Caldwell, Bryn Athyn, Pa.
Business Manager     Rev. W. H. Alden, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     All literary contributions should be sent to the Editor. Subscriptions, change of address and business communications should be sent to the Business Manager.

     TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION
One Year               $3.00 payable in advance
Single Copy           30 cents
     REDEMPTION AND SALVATION.

     The Incarnation was the Divine means of "bearing the iniquities" of the human race. Without the assumption of the infirm human by birth, the Lord could not have entered the perverted plane to reduce it to order. (D. L. W. 234; T. C. R. 124.) "He could not derive into Himself evils and iniquities except by the hereditary way; for the Divine is not susceptible of evil. . . . But He came into the world that He might also put on evil, to fight against it and conquer it." (A. C. 1573.) By successive victories in temptation, the human was purified and the assaulting hells were subjugated. The one was glorification, the other redemption. "These two are distinct from each other, but still they make one for salvation." (T. C. R. 126.) By redemption, the race was delivered from impending destruction. By glorification, the Lord became Redeemer to eternity, controlling the hells henceforth, that they may overpower no man willing to be saved. It is thus that redemption and glorification "make one for salvation."

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It is said that the Lord came to " save the human race," by which we are to understand that He restored the way of salvation to men,-the way of repentance and regeneration,-a way $11 but closed by the dominance of the hells. This restoration He effected by the works of redemption and a new revelation of Divine Truth. But that redemption relieved no man of his own burden of hereditary evil, and delivered no one from the responsibility of bearing his own iniquity. The spiritual judgment then performed restored the freedom in which that responsibility is assumed by the individual who would be saved. Hence the tenet of our doctrine that redemption is not salvation, except for those who avail themselves of its opportunity. But the Christian Church came to grief when it confused redemption and salvation, confirming this comfortable belief by the appearances of Scripture, such as the declaration, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of the world." Rightly understood, this means that the Lord removed hell from men by acts of redemption, and that He gained all power in the glorified Human to protect man while saving him,-to protect the man who has "taken up his cross " to follow the Lord in the life of repentance, who has assumed the burden of his own evil, who acknowledges it in the light of the Lord's truth, and who, with the Lord's help, gains the victory in spiritual combat against the hells that are permitted to attack. This, too, is a tenet of our doctrine, that there is no salvation without victory in temptation, which is the way of man's cooperation with the Lord in actual repentance. No otherwise can the Divine redemption be fufilled in the life of the individual. Nor can the race be regenerated, and the Lord's kingdom restored upon earth, except by the regeneration of the individual. (A. C. 6554e)

But why is it that this burden of responsibility for his own salvation or damnation is placed upon every man, and in the exact degree of his enlightenment, according to the Gospel words, "If ye were blind, ye should have no sin; but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth." (John 9:41.) Why is it that every child comes into the world laden with inclinations to the evils of his ancestors or generations back? Is it in keeping with elemental ideas of justice that one generation should thus pay the penalty for the sins of another? The Jewish law itself answers that a man was to suffer only for his own sin. (Deut. 24: 16.)

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And the Heavenly Doctrine answers: "It is from Divine justice that no one suffers punishments on account of the evils of his parents, but only on account of his own; and therefore it is provided by the Lord that hereditary evils do not recur after death, but one's own evils; and it is only for those that recur that a man is then punished." (A. E. 989e. See H. H. 342.) And this Divine justice must also apply to men on earth, preserving their freedom to adopt or reject their inherited evils. Indeed, as we have already noted, it was to restore this free-choice that the Divine redemption " shortened the days " of the increasing tide of heredity which threatened to engulf all mankind.

Yet it was not part of that redemption literally to " take away the sins of the world," to purify men upon earth by an act of Divine omnipotence. Evils are still handed down by heredity, and remain until repented of. And there must be some Divine end of justice, mercy, and love in such a permission,-some end of good which cannot otherwise be fulfilled. For the Lord can will only good. "He hath no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live." Every man is free to "turn from his way," to repent of his evil, and to receive good from the Lord. And if he does not choose to turn from his evil, that good cannot be forced upon him. For the good that is given after victory over evil is good that appears to man as his own,-a good that can only be acquired by his voluntary co-operation with the Lord in faith and obedience, a good that cannot be imparted until hereditary evil is recognized, shunned, resisted, combated, overcome,-given in the exact degree that man has striven against the opposing forces of hell.

Like all Divine permissions, the evil heredity, as an opposing force,-as an avenue of entrance for the hells,-is a means of providing what cannot otherwise be imparted to mankind, namely, that degree of heavenly good which is attained by victory over its infernal opposite,-a good felt by man as his own, its blessedness heightened by contrast with the evil overcome. The Christian Church was established internally with those who scorned the thought that the Lord's redemption had left them nothing to do for their own salvation.

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That Church perished when faith in the vicarious atonement supplanted saving repentance, when Christians confirmed the spiritual impotence of this state, and so began to hand it down to their posterity,-a new accumulation of evil bequeathed to present-day Christians, an inheritance to be acknowledged, shunned, resisted, combated, overcome, by those who are brought to the light of the Second Coming.

The good now made possible by the Heavenly Doctrine will enter the man of the Church from the Lord in the degree that he removes the falsity and evil of his Christian inheritance. Ignorance excuses, but light brings responsibility. "If ye were blind, ye should have no sin." A perception of the Heavenly Doctrine imposes the duty of repentance, the duty of assuming responsibility for our evil until we have overcome it in battle. The evils thus made known to us in the light of truth are the ones we become guilty of unless we reject them. "Now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth." No greater burden is placed upon any man than he can carry, if he will. He is never called upon to resist beyond his powers. "Sufficient Unto the day is the evil thereof." "As thy days, so shall they strength be." Man must "Work While it is day "-in the light and power of the truth-" for night cometh when no man can work,"-the night of self-intelligence, which has no power over evil.

The measure of man's ability in temptation is foreseen by the Lord, who wills to impart infinite good, but who can only do so in the measure of man's willing reception, determined by his effort in the striving of repentance. The universal law is that the Lord permits only so much of evil as can be of use. The bells are permitted to excite hereditary evil as a means of man's regeneration. Just as our Lord "laid on Him the iniquities of us all,"-admitting one hell after another to the infirm human, to the end that He might meet them in combat and subjugate them by victory,-so He lays on every man the burden he must bear for his soul's salvation. The man who wills to be saved is called upon to meet the hells that are permitted to assault him, that are permitted to attack in the measure that he can and will defend the Lord's truth. No more than this is asked. No one is admitted into spiritual temptation who would succumb therein.

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The Lord foresees who will "endure unto the end," to whom He can impart the good of heaven as the spiritual fruit of His own victory and the reward of the redeemed who follow Him in the regeneration.
NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

NOTES AND REVIEWS 1920

     As our present number closes the fortieth volume of NEW CHURCH LIFE, we would mark the occasion by reprinting the announcement which appeared at the beginning of the first volume, in January, 1881. It reads as follows:

     "A few years ago, about thirty of the young people connected with the New Church in Philadelphia, formed a Club for intellectual and social culture. In the fall of 1879, they began a Manuscript Paper for their own use. In its contents, the paper was somewhat miscellaneous, treating of topics doctrinal, literary and social. Some of the articles were intended to instruct, and others merely to amuse. Of the later numbers of the periodical, manuscript copies were made and sent to friends in other cities. The paper met with so favorable reception that its continuance was called for. This led to the conclusion that its sphere might profitably be enlarged so as to embrace the Young People of the New Church generally. Measures were accordingly taken to print and publish the paper, and as the result, we herewith present the first number of "NEW CHURCH LIFE." Devoted to the interests of the Young People of the New Church, our journal will, we hope, satisfy a great want in our literature. The NEW CHURCH LIFE will be very similar in its character to the manuscript paper; only that the Department of Correspondence and Church News will be greatly enlarged. As formerly, contributions will, for the most part, be from the young people themselves.

     "The NEW CHURCH LIFE is to be thoroughly and distinctively a New Church paper, designed to Promote the culture of the Young People in the doctrines and life of the Church; thus, if possible, leading them to embrace fervently the Heavenly Doctrines of the New Jerusalem as the only means of becoming true men and women.

     "And, finally, by bringing the Young People into closer relations with one another, the NEW CHURCH LIFE, it is hoped, will become an ultimate of that bond of love which must always exist among those whose one great aim is to become useful members of the New Church which, in heaven and on earth, is 'the Crown of all Churches.'"

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The subsequent development of the journal until, in 1890, it became the organ of the Academy, and later of the General Church, is pretty well known to the present generation. The forty volumes are weighty with material of great value to the student of the doctrine and history of the New Church, and of the Academy movement in particular. To make this more easily accessible, there is need of an Index covering the go-year period, supplementing the 19-year Index published in 1901; and we are pleased to state that the Rev. David H. Klein is devoting himself to this task, preparing a card-index for use in the Academy Library, which we trust will afterwards appear in book form.

Izisekelo Zamah Qiniso, Ze Nkolo obu Krestu is the title of a 20-page pamphlet in the Zulu language recently printed at Durban, Natal, under the direction of the Rev. Theodore Pitcairn, who has kindly sent us a copy. It comprises a series of passages from the Writings treating of the Second Coming of the Lord, as previously compiled for a pamphlet published by the Swedenborg Society, London. The translation into Zulu was made by Mr. Moffat Mcanyana, a recent convert to the New Church, whose letters appeared in the LIFE for July, 1920, p. 440. So far as is known, this is the first printed publication of the Heavenly Doctrines in any of the native languages of South Africa.

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TWO SEEMING CONTRADICTIONS 1920

TWO SEEMING CONTRADICTIONS E. E. IUNGERICH 1920

     1. ON THE CURES OF THE MIND. 2. ON THE RECLAIMING OF CATHOLICS.

Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE:
     There are two passages-one in the Apocalypse Explained and the other in the Last Judgment-which, in their literal form, seem to be opposed to familiar teachings in the Divine Love and Wisdom and the Brief Exposition. Thus, in A. E. 1168, we read that the turn of the mind from left to right is contrary to order, while that from right to left is according to order; whereas D. L. W. 270 declares the exact reverse to be the case. In L. J. 56, we read that the Roman Catholics can be led away from their worship with greater difficulty than others; but B. E. 105-9 declares they can be introduced into the New Church ahead of Protestants.

     Before presenting these two sets of passages in contrasted parallel columns, I wish to affirm my conviction that the apparent discrepancies can be solved by the discovery of a deeper principle which, on application to either pair of divergencies, will effect a reconciliation. I have in mind the teaching of A. C. 6766 in regard to why Moses, who had previously settled a conflict between an Egyptian and a Hebrew by killing off the Egyptian, was unable to settle a quarrel between two Hebrews, where so summary a method could not be used. The teaching is as follows: "In the internal sense, it treats of the progress of Divine Truth with the man who is being regenerated. The progress is such that the man can first discern between falsity and truth; for from the truth in which he is, he can see the false, since this is opposite; but he cannot, in that first time, settle [disagreements] between the truths of faith within the Church. To be able to do this, he must make further progressions; for a man is successively illustrated, as is manifestly evident from those who are in the age of adolescence and first youth, who believe the doctrinals of their Church to be truths themselves, and thence pass judgment upon falses, but cannot as yet settle disagreements among the things which are of faith within the Church.

756

This comes successively. Wherefore, also, the man to whom this can be given must be of a more advanced age, in which the interiors of the understanding are illustrated." (A. C. 6766.)

     As a case in point, take this very matter of getting deeper and more interior lessons from the Writings themselves. The young New Church theologian, zealous in the early state of passing judgments upon anything that runs counter to the doctrinal concepts his masters have instilled into him, would quite naturally resent at first the suggestion that the Writings have deeper lessons to give than what appears so obviously in their pages. In his various polemics with Old Church people, and with the partially instructed of his own flock, he has often justly and vigorously maintained that the Writings are the Spiritual Sense of the Word standing forth naked in their literal statements, that they are a clear and rational Revelation, and that they fulfill the predictions about the time when the Lord would "lay bare His holy arm." The very zeal in this combat between truth and falsity would make him prone to resent the suggestion that there are deeper lessons to be obtained from the Writings as something that would silence or invalidate his batteries. To him, this would imply that the Writings are cryptic Revelation like former ones, and that the understanding of them might become the sole property of the esoteric few who had the penetration to get at their supposedly deeper teachings.

     In point of fact, both positions are correct, and in no sense conflicting. The first needs to be accentuated in the early period of the conflict between truth and falsity. But when this battle is over, it is then possible to appreciate the endless possibilities of sounding the infinite depths of the Writings without any discredit to the value of the shallower levels that have hitherto been reached.

     For instance, experience has shown that the oftener a New Churchman re-reads the Writings, the more he is likely to see principles which his previous readings had not apprised him of. We have also the familiar instances of those who have read much in the Writings without being able to see that they are the Word of our Lord in His Second Coming, and that they inculcate a distinctive baptism and a separation from the Old Church in all vital matters.

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     There is also plain doctrinal teaching in regard to deeper lessons than those on the surface of the Writings, as follows: "The internal sense is not only that sense which lie, hid in the external sense, as hitherto shown, but also that which results from many places of the sense of the letter rightly compared with one another; . . . for the illustrated intellectual discerns between apparent truths and truths themselves, especially between falses and truths, although it does not judge concerning truths themselves in themselves" (A. C. 7233). As to "a literal sense" in the Writings, see S. D. 2185, A. C. 2533

     "When a man is being purified, first of all such truths are learned as can be grasped by the sensual man, these being such as are in the sense of the letter of the Word. Next are learned interior truths like those which are collected from the Word by those who are in illustration, for these collect its interior sense from various places where the sense of the letter is explained. Out of these truths, when known, still more interior truths are then derived by the illustrated, which, together with the former truths, serve the Church as doctrine; these latter for doctrine to those who are men of the internal Church, and the former for doctrine to those who are men of the external Church. The former and the latter, if they have lived according to them, are elevated into heaven among the angels, and there imbued with angelic wisdom, which is from still more interior truths, and at length from the inmost ones in the third heaven. These latter truths, with the prior ones in their order, rest upon the ultimate ones which are of the external sensual, and are there together" (A. C. 10028).

     The history of the New Church is brimful of illustrations of the operation of this process in its various stages. There are those to whom certain of the plain sensual truths of its surface are an offence, and who either openly reject them, or covertly make them of no effect by their traditional glosses; or else, by the itch of innovation, they try to find some esoteric sense in the light of which they hope to be able to invalidate their literal force. Again, there are those who, having accepted as literally true all statements in the Writings, yet differ in the ways of comparing passages so as to elicit the interior truths of the first sublimations. In some cases, the contest between the parties is like that between Isaac and the herdsmen of Abimelech who would fain choke up again the wells Isaac had dug.

758

If we look upon the merely human aspects of these quarrels, we are apt to see only the bickerings of intolerant and opinionated men, void of consideration for the opponent, and singularly lacking in that first rudiment of charity,-the ability to put one's self in the other's place. But, looking at it from within, it is possible to descry the Lord's hand, and an infinite wisdom that is providing in New Church collateral literature that there be a motley and varied display of the successive tiers of truth described in A. C. 10028, as well as contrasting examples of failures to produce anything illuminating or constructive in a sound sense. To the dispassionate and judicial New Churchman of the future, this extant literature will be a prolific field of object lessons from which to cull with an approximate degree of success an orderly arrangement of truths, ranging without conflict or discrepancy from the higher ones of the second sublimations down to those surface statements in the Writings that are the ultimate containants.

     Of course, the discovery of seeming contradictions, such as in the two I have called to your attention, does not mean that we are ready to discover some higher universal that will enter healingly into the apparent breach. Yet the endeavor to discover it is wholesome to our intellectual activities, and it is with this end in view that I have broached the matter, and that I now present both contradictions in contrasted parallel columns.

     I. THE MINDS ORGANIC SPIRAL.

     A. E. 1168.

     "Man's mind, before it was conjoined to heaven, was turned backwards, because not yet led out from hell. But when it is in the state of reformation, it looks from truth to good, as from the left to the right, which is contrary to order. But after the mind is conjoined to heaven, it is tuned forward, and is elevated to the Lord, and looks from right to left, thus from good to truth, which is according to order. Thus a turning is made."

     D. L. W. 270.

     "The natural mind, with all things of it, is circumfexed into gyres from right to left, but the spiritual mind into gyres from left to right. Thus those minds are in a contrary turn to each other; an index that evil resides in the natural mind, and that from itself it acts against the spiritual mind. In fact, the circumgyration from right to left is turned downwards, thus towards hell, but the circumgyration from left to right goes upwards, thus towards heaven."

759

L. J. 56.

     "But the nation now treated of can be led away from its worship with greater difficulty than other nations, because they are not in good from truths, still less in truths from good; for their truths are not from the Word, except a few which they have falsified by application to dominion. Hence they have no good, except what is spurious; for such as are the truths, so good becomes."

     B. E. 105-9.

     "That the Roman Catholics today know nothing about the Imputation of Christ's merit, and about justification by the faith thereof, into which their Church was initiated, because it lies entirely covered over by the externals of worship which are many. Therefore, if they recede as to a Part from the externals of their worship, and immediately approach God the Savior Jesus Christ, and also take both kinds in the holy Eucharist, they can be introduced ahead of the Reformed into the New Jerusalem, that is, into the Lord's New Church."

     I may at once confess that I think I see ways to reconcile both pairs of contradictions. But I prefer to say nothing further here, and would invite your readers to express themselves in the matter before advancing my own suggestions.
     E. E. IUNGERICH.
ARE THE SACRAMENTS MERE "CEREMONIES" IN THE OLD CHURCH? 1920

ARE THE SACRAMENTS MERE "CEREMONIES" IN THE OLD CHURCH? GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY 1920

The general idea is that externals, as such, have last at this day the power they had when a purely correspondential worship prevailed in the Jewish Church. It is impossible to say where this notion originated, unless, perhaps, in the inner consciousness of some members of the Church, or in that imagination which, when let lease, will favor any idea, however absurd.

In the Jewish Church, we are taught in T. C. R. 670, "washings were commanded the sons of Israel," and this "because the Church instituted among them was a representative Church," but of such a nature "as to prefigure the Christian Church which was to come." Besides these "washings," which were then purely representative, there was also another Divinely important institution, that of the "lamb, of which there was a daily sacrifice, and a full sacrifice at the Feast of the Passover."

760

     Now in both of these ordinances of the Jewish Church, which were superseded by the Lord, neither the "internals" of the officiating priest, nor those of the laity of that Church, were in the smallest degree represented. These, we are taught, were "separated," and therefore inoperative. Why? Because they were full of corruption, that is, replete with the hereditary evils of the Israelitish or Jewish race.

     Even when Aaron, the High Priest, was officiating, clad in his holy garments, he and the worshipers were surrounded by evil spirits. This is plainly stated in A. C. 4311, as follows:

     "What it is to be present representatively must be briefly told. A man who is in corporeal and worldly love, and not at the same time in spiritual and celestial love, has none but evil spirits with him, even when he is in a holy external; for good spirits can by no means be present with such a person, since they perceive immediately in what kind of love the man is. There is a sphere exhaled from his interiors, which the spirits perceive as manifestly as a man, by his sense of smell, perceives offensive and foul vapors floating around him in the air. That nation (Jewish), which is here treated of, was in such a state as to good and truth, or as to love and faith. In order, however, that they might serve as a representative of the Church, it was miraculously provided by the Lord that when they were in a holy external, and were at the same time surrounded by evil spirits, the holy in which they were might yet be lifted up into heaven; and this by means of good spirits and angels, not within but without them, for within them there was nothing but emptiness and uncleanness. Communication, therefore, was not given with the man himself, but with the holy itself, in which they were when they fulfilled the statutes and precepts given them, which were all representative of spiritual and celestial things of the Lord's Kingdom. This is signified by the Lord's being present with that nation representatively."

     But when the Lord made His First Advent, a great change was made in the representatives of the church and heaven. Internals were now to enter into and qualify the external representatives of the worship and ritual of the church. It was for this reason that the Lord even changed the representatives themselves, and substituted for the distinctive Jewish ordinances two others altogether new in form, which "should contain all things of the internal church in one complex" (T. C. R. 670).

761

     Now, where those who think superficially appear to go wrong is, that they imagine that, whatever may be the internal state of the Old Church, or of its officiating clergyman, and his particular "understanding of the Word" (which is the church within him), he conveys the Divine influx,-the Holy Spirit,-to a Person so baptized, with efficacy as unimpaired as a New Church priest, whose understanding of the Word and its Doctrine is as the poles asunder to that of the Old Church priest.

     In thinking thus, they do not see the absurdity of their contention, because they imagine that the Old Church is still a true Christian Church of some kind or other, and, therefore, that its two Sacraments must at this day be efficacious and spiritually valid. The teaching given in C. L. 532 is quoted to establish this position. Let us see whether there is any truth in this incredible assumption. The paragraph in question is the following:

     "The angels were greatly rejoiced that it had pleased the Lord to reveal this great arcanum which, through some thousands of years, had lain so deeply concealed, and they said: 'It is to the end that the Christian Church, which is founded upon the Word, and which is now at its end, may again revive and draw breath through heaven from the Lord.'"

     Now the Writings teach us that the Old Church, since the day of the Council of Nice, when a false idea of God was introduced, has not been " founded upon the Word," but upon "a single statement of Paul, falsely understood" (A. R. 675), and "is not Christian, because at variance with the Word" (T. C. R. 627). The Church, which was "founded upon the Word" was the Christian Church as it was at first established, but which was destroyed in the minds of those who invented the tripersonal idea of God in the fourth century. Since then, there has never been a true Christian Church, but a spiritual chimera,-a "make believe" of a church. This kind of Christian Church, we are taught, is "from adultery, and is like a harlot, or like a woman who is married to one man, spending nights with two others, and calling the one she chooses her husband." The Christian Church which was "founded upon the Word" and which the Lord is now raising up anew, is the Church as it was when it acknowledged Him as God and Lord. It was then a true wife, and not an "adulteress."

762

     Now it is clear that if the internals of the Old Church are such-corrupt beyond imagination-its externals have put on all the infernal qualities of the internals. In his remarkable work, The Importance and Necessity of an External Church, the Rev. Richard de Charms, in his usual incisive style, puts the question before us as follows:

     "The Catholic priesthood, in administering the Sacraments (Holy Supper and Baptism), represent the devil; and the Catholic worshiper, in partaking of it, has his spirit brought into communion with hell" (p. 118). And what is here so forcibly said of the "Catholic priesthood" holds good, of course, of its misshapen offspring,-the Protestant Churches,-whose religious tenets are the same as its own,-tripersonality, vicarious sacrifices, justification by faith alone, and all the rest of it.

     If we hold these cardinal facts in mind, how can any New Churchman, who is not suffering from chronic obliquity of vision, fail to see that baptism administered by a New Church priest is as distinct From that which is administered by any minister of the Old Church as heaven is from hell, and that the false one is, at this day, of the consummation of the old,-an empty "ceremony," devoid of all spiritual or saving efficacy. Indeed, how can he escape the conclusion, when it is revealed: "There is no knowledge of Baptism and the Holy Supper, which are scarcely anything else than ceremonies." (The Abomination of Desolation, 1:18.)
     GLENDOWER C. OTTLEY.

763

PITTSBURGH DISTRICT ASSEMBLY 1920

PITTSBURGH DISTRICT ASSEMBLY HOMER SYNNESTVEDT 1920

     OCTOBER 8TH TO 11TH, 1920.

     Yes, we had a large time. It was so long since we had had our Bishop with us-and he gave us, not only in his address on Friday night, but also in his sermon on Sunday, such a clear and satisfying analysis of the great subject of the Nature of Spiritual Substance, and of the Lord's Resurrection Body, that we all breathed deep breaths and felt deeply refreshed. It is true that not all in the audience had studied the question enough to realize the importance of the solution given; but most of those present had weighed and studied these matters for years, and their interest was proportionately great.

     On the other hand, at some of the occasions where the men met upon the old Philosophy Club basis of free and informal discussion, they took particular delight in the Bishop's keen swordplay. The ladies, no doubt, have their problems, although they had no meeting of their own, except an afternoon tea with Miss Alice Grant, who has been visiting Pittsburgh and giving talks on Education, and who has contributed in no small measure to sustain and make more intelligent our already strong interest in New Church Education. The children were very glad to see the Bishop at Day School and Sunday School.

     The reception on Friday evening, after the opening session of the Assembly, was in charge of Dr. and Mrs. Boggess, and among the guests who arrived in time for this pleasant introduction all around were Dr. King, of Chicago, and Mr. Eugene Cranch, Mr. Johnson, and Miss Alma Johnson, of Erie, Pa.

     At the luncheon downtown on Saturday, twenty men kept the Bishop busy for two hours telling about the new elements that have come to sojourn at Bryn Athyn, and discussing their desire for some organic channel of responsible participation in the educational work at Bryn Athyn. It seems to some laymen that the General Church has too little to do with the chief use of our body, and that there is too loose and uncertain a connection between them. The Bishop expressed the view that as long as the present arrangement works so well, this matter is not likely to require any very drastic changes. Under its civil charter, the Academy is independent and self-perpetuating, and the charter is too valuable to give up.

764

It would be impossible ever to get another as liberal, and meanwhile there is room for the development of working arrangements that might secure the desired end more fully. No one present, however, had any plan to propose. Everybody seems to think that the ideal way is to tell the Bishop in a most general way what is wanted, and then leave it to him to work out a plan. Mr. Hermann Lechner had charge of this gathering, and must certainly have had some "pull" to provide for us as he did.

     The second session of the Assembly was held on Saturday evening, when we listened to a very clear and succinct statement by Mr. Eugene Cranch, setting forth the need of publicity in Erie to correct existing misinformation or ignorance concerning the New Church. The remainder of the evening was devoted to the hearing and discussion of Dr. King's illuminating address on "New Church Psychology," which was very much enjoyed. We all know how the Doctor, with his sallies of wit, relieves the most abstruse subjects. He showed how, from the time of Galen and Plate, the soul has been sought, first from the side of its purely mental phenomena, and then from the side of the organ of the mind, viz., the brain. Berkeley, a well-meaning divine, did much damage with his idealism, while Hume countered with frank materialism, "but the stupidest of all was Kant. All these are now incorporated in Christian Science." Dr. King was particularly effective when he described the passionate zeal of Swedenborg in his lifelong quest for a knowledge of the soul, making a direct dash now and then, only to return, that he might patiently resume the trail through the kingdom of effects and instruments. Swedenborg alone, he said, truly and fully combines the organic view with the rational; for to him alone was given an insight into the spiritual realm. Only the knowledge of God can open the way to a knowledge of the soul. Even before his intromission, however, Swedenborg had already discovered the great doctrine of correspondence, of periodicity, etc., etc.

     In answer to questions, the Doctor also spoke briefly of more recent developments in the realm of experimental psychology, and of its practical applications. " But none of this," he said, " rises to the exalted plane of Swedenborg."

     Dr. King also addressed the Sunday School, giving a vivid account of the topography of the Land of Canaan.

     We have already spoken of the Bishop's sermon on Sunday morning. We were blessed with perfect weather, which no doubt helped us to a fuller attendance at the Holy Supper in the afternoon, when the Bishop again gave a brief address. This service, of course, was the climax of the meetings.

     On Sunday evenings, some of the men, who called upon the Bishop informally, carried further the question asked by one of the ladies at the first session: "Why does the Lord permit idiots to stay so long upon earth?"

765

This led to a philosophical discussion of the exact nature of the soul, which is perfect from birth, and of the usefulness of even sense impressions in giving it a broader basis for eternal life. This, in turn, led to a discussion of whether sex is of the soul, and how a " union of souls " is effected in marriage. Later in the evening, we noticed several groups gesticulating earnestly, and caught the words "league" and "reservations." The Bishop, however, was kept discreetly engaged upon other matters!

On Monday evening, about eighty sat down to a tasty supper prepared by Mr. and Mrs. Lechner, with the able assistance of Miss Junge and others. In spite of the entire absence of the wine which cheers the hearts of gods and men, the sphere was electrical from the start, and Mr. Brickman, as toastmaster, had the satisfaction of seeing both his serious and gay numbers received as only a happy crowd can receive them. It was the purpose of this meeting to enjoy the spirits who had gathered around us during the Assembly, and this we certainly did. It was everybody's meeting after the Pastor, the Bishop, and Mr. A. P. Lindsay had spoken upon various phases of the " Protection of our Homes."
HOMER SYNNESTVEDT.
TRULY RATIONAL AND MORAL MAN 1920

TRULY RATIONAL AND MORAL MAN 1920

"Every man rightly educated is rational and moral; but there are two ways to rationality, one from the world and the other from heaven. He who has become rational and moral from the world, and not from heaven also, is not rational and moral except with the mouth and gesture, and is inwardly a beast, yea, a wild beast, because he acts as one with those who are in hell, where all such are. But he who is rational and moral from heaven also, is truly rational and moral, because he is so in spirit, word, and body together; the spiritual is inwardly in these two latter like a soul which actuates the natural, sensual and corporeal; he also acts as one with those who are in heaven. Wherefore, there is the spiritual rational and moral man, and also the merely natural rational and moral man, and in the world the one is not distinguishable from the other, especially if the man has by practice imbued hypocrisy; but by the angels of heaven they are as rightly distinguished as doves from owls or sheep from tigers." (T. C. R. 564.)
MERELY NATURAL MAN 1920

MERELY NATURAL MAN 1920

"The merely natural man can see evils and goods in others, and can also reprove others; but because he has not looked into and scrutinized himself, he does not see any evil in himself; and if any is discovered by some one else, he cloaks it by the use of his rationality as a serpent hides his head in the dust, and immerses himself in it as a hornet buries himself in mud." (T. C. R. 564)

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Church News 1920

Church News Various 1920

     BRYN ATHYN.-The Bryn Athyn Society, assembled in its annual meeting on October 1st, was, by a carefully planned mode of legal procedure, merged into The Bryn Athyn Church Incorporated, under a Charter granted by the Courts of Pennsylvania on July 19, 1920. The process, necessarily involved in a maze of technicalities, was trying to the patience of the uninitiated. But a sense of security followed the reading of the resolution by which the transfer of property was to be effected; for although one could not possibly analyze its contents, its length was sufficient to inspire awe and reverence. Then, too, the careful guarding of the ballot, in the matter of elections, convinced even the most skeptical that the administration was thoroughly honest, and that the Trustees were the true representatives of the will of the majority. The step thus taken is one of unusual interest, as it marks a distinctly new departure in the annals of New Church government, whereby the ecclesiastical and civil affairs of the Church become more closely conjoined than has hitherto been possible. It is hoped that the new form of organization will adequately meet the needs of future development, lending strength to the body without involving any appreciable infringement upon the freedom of administration, either clerical or lay.

     The opening of the Academy schools this fall was unusually auspicious. Not only were we privileged to welcome to Bryn Athyn many more boys and girls than have ever before been enrolled as students, but they brought with them a delightful sphere of hope and confidence which profoundly affected all who came in contact with it. At the opening exercises, Prof. Wm. Whitehead delivered a scholarly address, inspiring to students and Faculty alike in pointing the way toward making the utmost of the unusual opportunities which Providence had presented for the coming year. With the dormitories filled to capacity, and teaching space and equipment taxed to the utmost, both in the Secondary and Elementary Schools; with the Scholarship Plan a proved success, and the student body as a whole ready and willing to co-operate with an efficient teaching staff; we look forward with pleasure to the coming months of delightful labor in the cause of New Church Education.

     On October 3d, the spiritual delights of the last General Assembly were vividly recalled by the first annual celebration at the Cathedral in memory of the Dedication. A special service, in which much of the music used last year was repeated, with a procession of six ministers, a powerful dedicatory address by Bishop W. F. Pendleton, and the quarterly administration of the Holy Supper, marked the occasion. The musical program,-including a quartet of wind instruments which played both from the tower and from the chapel, also string selections and a choir an them, "Except the Lord build the house," added greatly to the impressive sphere, and all hearts were filled with gladness at a renewed realization of the manifold blessings which had been bestowed upon the Church by the good Providence of the Lord.

767

     The stream of strangers, coming to enjoy the architectural beauty of the church, has continued since last spring, and even increased. It is estimated that over 20,000 persons have been through the cathedral during the past year. Without special effort, a large number of books and pamphlets have been sold, and many have expressed a passing interest in the teachings of our religion. It would be surprising if a few, at least, should not be brought into the Church by this means. At all events, the Missionary Committee, composed of young people of the Society, is acquiring a degree of efficiency and a knowledge of our Faith that will be a source of added strength to the Church of the future.
     G. DE C.

     ENGLAND.-The death of Sir William Mather, on September 20th, serves to recall that he and Lady Mather visited Bryn Athyn in 1905. She and Mrs. John Faulkner Potts were daughters of the late Thomas Watson, of Argyle Square, London, who was active in the affairs of the Swedenborg Society. Sir William was a noted engineer, sat in the English Parliament for twenty years, and was a member of the Privy Council.

     CINCINNATI, O.-The Bishop's visit to this city, October 13-15, was marked by a round of activities such as are seldom compressed into three short days, no less than six meetings being held, besides visits to the homes of our members. Wednesday noon, the 11th, the men of the circle met the Bishop at the Business Men's Club, where they were entertained at luncheon as the guests of Mr. Chas. G. Merrell. This event was such a success, the feast in all its particulars being so well up to Academy standards, that those present were glad to hear that it would be followed by similar reunions on Thursday and Friday.

     The first meeting of a more formal nature was held Wednesday evening at the home of our Pastor, the Rev. F. E. Waelchli. On this occasion, the Bishop presented a paper which brought new light to bear on the declaration of our Lord that in heaven there are no marriages nor giving in marriage. This paper, coming most opportunely at a time when the circle had been receiving instruction, in sermons, and otherwise, regarding Conjugial Love, was listened to with much interest, and a number of questions were asked and answered.

     The chief social event in this series of meetings was a banquet, held at the Merrell home, which reflected great credit on the ladies of the circle who prepared it. Like the men's meetings, it was a real Academy affair, affording nourishment in plenty on several planes. The program included speeches by several members on topics assigned by our Pastor, namely, "The Priesthood in Instruction", "The Priesthood in Worship", and "The Priesthood in Government". In the course of his summing up of what had been said, the Bishop spoke of the ever-present need for distinctiveness in our Church life, saying that with distinctiveness, "no matter how slowly you may grow, when you have grown, you will have something that is worth while."

768

His remarks were followed by numerous speeches, both grave and gay, pleasantly punctuated by the drinking of toasts, the final toast being one to "The Academy Schools," proposed in a spirited talk by Mr. Frederick E. Merrell, who spoke as an ex-student, bearing witness to the permanency of the work done at Bryn Athyn,-a work which confirms our young people in the life and doctrines of the Church " so that nothing can root them out". This tribute was fittingly followed by the singing of "Alma Mater."

     At the final meeting, Friday evening, the Bishop read a paper on "Immortality: A Predicate of the Infinite transferred to the Finite", which paper, with the informal talk that followed, afforded a splendid wind-up to a most successful and encouraging series of meetings.
     A. M.

     REPORT OF THE VISITING PASTOR.-The fall visit to MIDDLEPORT, OHIO, was made October 16th to 25th. Two Sunday services were held. At the second of these we had with us a number of visitors from various places in Ohio: Miss Ida Sempel, of Wellsville; Mrs. Carrie Williams, of Toronto; Mrs. E. Armstrong, of Washington Courthouse, and Mr. S. A. Powell, of Givens. It was almost like an Assembly. Twenty-one persons were present, and sixteen partook of the Holy Supper. During the week there were five evening doctrinal classes, a social, and a men's meeting. On three afternoons, instruction was given the children. This year, after quite a long interval, Middleport is again represented by a pupil in the Academy Schools; and there is the promise of more to follow during the next few years. F. E. WAELCHLI.

     TORONTO, CANADA.-The Sunday School work in the Olivet Society opened on the first Sunday in October with sixteen pupils in attendance. Some had not yet returned from their vacations and others were detained by sickness. It was gratifying, however, to have thirty-four present on the last Sunday in October, and the number of children of elementary school age makes it quite evident that we should have a local school here. In connection with the Sunday School work, a Teacher's training-class has been instituted which meets every Monday evening to receive instruction from the Pastor on the lessons for the following Sunday, and in the principles of New Church education. The class has been attended by the five active teachers and about five substitutes who are ready at any time to fill gaps. At present we have the following classes: Primary, under Mrs. Ray Brown; Intermediate Junior, under Miss Gladys Brown; Intermediate Senior, under Miss Clara Scott; Junior, under Mr. Sargent, who is also the Sunday School Superintendent; and the Senior class of six boys and girls, under the Pastor.

     A series of semi-missionary sermons has been given by the Pastor on the four great doctrines of the New Church, followed by an explanation of the creed of the New Church as repeated in the offices of the Liturgy.

769

No special effort was made to get outsiders to attend services other than friends of members, to whom cards were sent inviting the recipient to attend. They have shown marked interest, and the general attendance has been very good, from five to fifteen persons not yet baptized into the Church being present on each occasion.

     In the general doctrinal class, the subject considered this year is the "Glorification Series", as expounded in Genesis, commencing with the 12th chapter. The attendance to date has averaged about forty-five. Weekly suppers are being held, and prove very delightful to those who attend.

     On October 10th, we had the good fortune to receive a visit from the Rev. Hugo Odhner, who dedicated the home of the Pastor on Saturday evening. In response to a toast to the Church, Mr. Odhner brought out in a clear and interesting manner how the mind is the home of man, and how the power which results in having the Lord as the first of his natural home thereby images the true spiritual order. Mr. Odhner preached a masterful sermon on Sunday which delighted the entire congregation. On Monday night he was the guest of honor at a special men's meeting, and spoke upon the subject of the " Order of the General Church."

     The Ladies have been holding meetings regularly every other week, while the Theta Alpha has had monthly meetings.

     On October the 26th, we had the great pleasure of Miss Alice Grant's arrival. In the afternoon, a tea was held for her at the home of Mrs. K. R. Alden, and practically all the ladies of the Society had the opportunity of meeting her there. On Thursday evening, the local chapter of the Theta Alpha gave a banquet in her honor, at which she read a paper; and we learn that the whole affair was very successful,-at least none of the ladies returned home until very late.

     On Saturday she attended Hallowe'en Party given by the oldest class in the Sunday School. The party was a great success, and made us all realize how many children we have here.

     On every Monday evening during Miss Alice's visit, she will instruct the Teacher's Class in the Conversations on Education. The first talk was given last night, and about fifteen were present. The meeting was enjoyed by all. Miss Alice is scheduled to stay here for three weeks before going on to Kitchener. She is preaching the gospel of New Church education, and we feel sure that her visit here will be productive of far-reaching results in the future.
     K. R. A.

     SHARON CHURCH, CHICAGO.- The aftermath of the District Assembly has usually fallen to our lot, but this year we came in for a lion's share of the good things during the visit of the Bishop. On Saturday, October 16, he met with our Ladies' Society at the church rooms, the subject of his paper being "Immortality," which was much enjoyed by us all. There was a good attendance, and after the discussion of the paper we all shared the tea and cakes and conversation that followed.

770

     On Sunday, the 17th, a service was held at the Irving Park Hall, which proved large enough to accommodate our own members and those of Mr. Headsten's society, as well as the friends who come once a year at the time of the Bishop's visit. The Revs, John Headsten and W. L. Gladish assisted in the worship, and the Bishop's sermon was on "The Divine Human."

     The next evening, Monday, the 18th, a meeting was held at our church rooms on Centre Street, at which the men from Glenview were entertained by the male members of our two city societies. Fifty or more were present, and I hear that a very enjoyable and profitable time was spent.

     The following Wednesday evening-the usual time for our weekly supper-the gathering proved to be the most delightful of all the meetings. Places were set for one hundred, and all were filled. Besides our own members, and those of Mr. Headsten's society, our guests included friends from the congregation of the Rev. W. J. C. Thiel, from the Immanuel Church, Glenview, and from the parishes of the Chicago Society of the General Convention. After the supper and much social chat, the tables were cleared and the rooms arranged for the great feature of the evening,-the address by the Bishop on the subject of "Service." The Rev. John Headsten presided, and when the address had set forth and expanded the doctrine that "man is not the important item, but his use", the discussion included several other short papers. The Rev. Gilbert H. Smith treated of "The Aim of the Church", and the Rev. W. L. Gladish gave a talk on "The Importance of Freedom in the Church."

     On Friday, the District Assembly itself began in Glenview; but somehow our own gatherings seemed like a very real Assembly,-a very beautiful and helpful series of meetings, even if it could not be called an "Assembly." They will live long in loving memory.
     E. V. W.

771

DIRECTORY OF THE GENERAL CHURCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM 1920

     OFFICIALS AND COUNCILS.

     Bishop.
The Right Rev. N. D. Pendleton.

     Secretary and Treasurer.
Rev. Wm. H. Alden.

     Consistory.
Bishop N. D. Pendleton
Rev. Alfred Acton
Rev. F. E. Waelchli
Rev. C. E. Doering, Secretary
Rev. W. B. Caldwell
Rev. Homer Synnestvedt
Rev. E. E. Iungerich

     Executive Committee.
Dr. Felix A. Boericke, President
Mr. Raymond Pitcairn, Vice-President
Mr. Paul Carpenter, Secretary
Rev. Wm. H. Alden, Treasurer
Mr. Edwin T. Asplundh
Mr. Edward C. Bostock
Mr. Robert Carswell
Mr. Randolph W. Childs
Mr. Walter C. Childs
Mr. Harvey L. Lechner
Mr. S. S. Lindsay
Mr. Charles G. Merrell
Mr. Seymour G. Nelson
Mr. Richard Roschman
Mr. Rudolph Roschman
Mr. Jacob Schoenberger
Mr. Anton Sellner
Mr. Paul Synnestvedt.

     THE CLERGY.

     Bishop.

     PENDLETON, NATHANIEL DANDRIDGE. Ordained June 16, 1889; 2d Degree, March 2, 1891; 3d Degree, November 17, 1912. Bishop of the General Church. Pastor of the Bryn Athyn Church. President of the Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

772

     Bishop Emeritus.

     PENDLETON, WILLIAM FREDERIC. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, September 3d, 1873; 3d Degree, May 9th, 1888. Professor of Theology, Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     Pastors.

     ACTON, ALFRED. Ordained, June 4, 1893; ad Degree, January 10, 1897. Pastor of the Societies in New York and Washington. Dean of the Theological School, Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     ALDEN, KARL RICHARDSON. Ordained, June 19, 1917; 2d Degree, October 12, 1919. Pastor of the Olivet Church, Toronto, Canada. Address: 229 Dunn Avenue.

     ALDEN, WILLIAM HYDE. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, May 30,1886. Secretary and Treasurer of the General Church. Manager of the Academy Book Room, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     BAECKSTROM, GUSTAF. Ordained, June 6, 1915; 2d Degree, June 27, 1920. Pastor of the Society in Stockholm, Sweden. Address: Grefgatan, 57.

     BJORCK, ALBERT. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, August 17, 1890. Address: 107 Shakespeare Ave., Bath, England.

     BOWERS, JOHN E. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degree, May 11, 1873. General Missionary, 37 Lowther Ave., Toronto, Canada.

     BRICKMAN, WALTER E. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, January 7, 1900. 419 Evaline St., Pittsburgh, Pa.

     BROWN, REGINALD W. Ordained, October 21, 1900; 2d Degree, October 12, 1919. Professor and Librarian, Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     CALDWELL, WILLIAM BEEBE. Ordained, October 19, 1902; 2d Degree, October 23, 1904. Professor of Theology, Academy of the New Church. Editor of NEW CHURCH LIFE, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     CRONLUND, EMIL ROBERT. Ordained, December 31, 1899; 2d Degree, May 18, 1902. 32 Springhurst Ave., Toronto, Canada.

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     DAVID, JOSEPH S. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, April 6, 1882. Acting Pastor of the Society in Denver, Colorado. Address: 543 Delaware Street.

     DAVID, LLEWELLYN W. T. Ordained, June 28, 1914; 2d Degree, June 19, 1916. Pastor of the Carmel Church, 820 King Street West, Kitchener, Ont., Canada.

     DE CHARMS, GEORGE. Ordained, June 28, 1914; 2d Degree, June 19, 1916. Assistant Pastor of the Bryn Athyn Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     DE CHARMS, RICHARD. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, January 21, 1877. Instructor in the Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     DELTENRE, ERNST. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, May 26, 1912. Missionary in Belgium and Holland. Address: 33 Rue Gachard, Brussels, Belgium.

     DOERING, CHARLES EMIL. Ordained, June 7, 1896; 2d Degree, January 29, 1899. Dean of Faculties, Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     GLADISH, WILLIS L. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, June 3, 1894. Acting Pastor of Sharon Church, Chicago, Ill. Address: 541 N. Waller Ave.

     GYLLENHAAL, FREDERICK EDMUND. Ordained, June 23, 1907; 2d Degree, June 19, 1910. Pastor of the Societies in London and Colchester, England. Address: 174 Peckham Rye, S. E., London, England.

     HARRIS, THOMAS STARK. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, April 8, 1897. Pastor of the Society in Arbutus, Maryland; Visiting Pastor of the Abington, Mass., and Meriden, Conn., Circles. Address: Halethorpe P. O., Maryland.

     HEADSTEN, JOHN. Ordained, June 19, 1913; 2d Degree, June 28, 1914. Pastor of the Swedenborg New Church Society, Chicago, Ill. Address: 3749 Janssen Avenue.

     HUSSENET, FERNAND. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, October 10, 1909. Pastor of the Society in Paris, 84 Avenue de Breteuil. Address: 3r Rue Henri Regnault, St. Cloud, Seine et Oise, France.

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     IUNGERICH, ELDRED EDWARD. Ordained, June 13, 1909; 2d Degree, May 26, 1912. Dean of the College and Professor of Theology, Academy of the New Church, Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     KLEIN, DAVID HAROLD. Ordained, June 26, 1898; 2d Degree, October 27, 1902. Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     MORSE, RICHARD. Ordained, 1st and 2d Degrees, October 12, 1919. Pastor of the Society in Sydney. Address: 180 Regent St., Redfern, Sydney, N. S. W., Australia.

     ODHNER, HUGO LJUNGBERG. Ordained, June 23, 1914; 2d Degree, June 24, 1917. Pastor-Elect of the Society in Durban, Natal, South Africa. Address: Kitchener, Ont., Canada.

     OTTLEY, GLENDOWER C. Ordained, July 23, 1893; 2d Degree, October 21, 1894. Address: 22 Oakley Ave., Ealing, W-5, London, England.

     PITCAIRN, THEODORE. Ordained, June 19, 1917; 2d Degree, October 12, 1919. Address: Maseru, Basutoland, South Africa.

     PRICE, ENOCH SPRADLING. Ordained, June 10, 1888; 2d Degree, June 19, 1891. Professor, Academy of the New Church. Pastor of the Society in Allentown, Pa. Address: Bryn Athyn, Pa.

     ROSENQVIST, JOSEPH E. Ordained, June 19, 1891; 2d Degree, June 23, 1895. Huntingdon Valley, Pa.

     SMITH, GILBERT HAVEN. Ordained, June 25, 1911; 2d Degree, June 19, 1913. Pastor of the Immanuel Church, Glenview, Ill.

     SYNNESTVEDT, HOMER. Ordained, June 19, 1891; 2d Degree, January 13, 1895. Pastor of the Pittsburgh Society. Address: 4924 Centre Ave., Pittsburgh, Pa.

     TILSON, ROBERT J. Ordained, 2d Degree, June 19, 1892. Address: 7 Templar Street, Camberwell, London, S. E.

     WAELCHLI, FRED. E. Ordained, June 10, 1888; 2d Degree, June 19, 1891. Visiting Pastor, General Church. Address: 252 Ehrman Ave., Cincinnati, Ohio.

     Ministers.

     PFEIFFER, ERNEST. Ordained, June 20, 1920. Visiting Minister of the Advent Church, Philadelphia, Pa. Address: Bryn Athyn, Pa.

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     Ministers in Basutoland.

     MOFOKENG, SAMUEL MABINA. Ordained, April 14, 1919.

     NYAREDI, EPAINETUS LEKHABU. Ordained, April 14, 1919.

     SERUTLA, BETHUEL TSIBELE. Ordained, April 14, 1919.

     Authorized Candidates and Preachers.

     EVENS, WILLIAM. Authorized, July 8, 1913. Penetanguishene, Ont., Canada.
SPECIAL NOTICE 1920

SPECIAL NOTICE 1920

MID-YEAR MEETINGS.-BRYN ATHYN, PA.

February 2-6, 1921.

Wednesday 2nd.-Consistory, 10:30 a. m. 3 p. m.
Thursday 3rd,-Council of the Clergy, 10:00 a. m. 3 p. m.
Philadelphia District Assembly, 8 p. m.
Friday 4th.-Council of the Clergy, 10 a. m. 3 p. m.
-Philadelphia District Assembly, 8 p. m.
Saturday 5th.-Joint Council, 10 a. m. 3 p. m.
-Philadelphia District Assembly, 8 p. m.
Sunday 6th.-General Church Anniversary, 1897-1921.
-Special Service and The Holy Supper. 11 a. m.
-Banquet. 6:45 p. m.

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