Swedenborg: Harbinger of the New Age of the Christian Church. Benjamin Worcester

by his father, with what remained the contention of his life. Born in Stockholm, removed with his father to Upsal when four years old, he received there his education as a schoolboy and later as a student in the University. His thesis at the conclusion of his course was a series of selections from Greek and Latin authors, together with some from Scripture, presenting certain moral and religious sentiments accompanied with apposite reflections, indicating his trend of thought at that time of life. Little more is known of his life at the University, but he was doubtless living with his sister Anna and Benzelius, his father having removed to his bishopric. From his letters to these much loved friends we learn what we know of his next ten years of study pursued mostly abroad. Within a few months after leaving the University he wrote from his father's home at Brunsbo begging of Benzelius letters to some English college, that he might there improve himself in mathematics, or in physics and natural history. He adds to his request—

      "As I have always desired to turn to some practical use and also to perfect myself in the studies which I selected with your advice and ​approval, I thought it advisable to choose a subject early which I might elaborate in course of time, and into which I might introduce much of what I should notice and read in foreign countries. This course I have always pursued hitherto in my reading; and now at my departure I propose to myself, as far as concerns mathematics, gradually to gather and work up a certain collection, namely, of things discovered and to be discovered in mathematics—or, what is nearly the same thing, the progress made in mathematics during the last one or two centuries." "Much kind love" he sends to his sister Anna.

      While awaiting letters, the royal permission, and perhaps money for his expenses, the young graduate learns the art of bookbinding and practises music, occasionally filling the organist's place at church. At length in 1710, the permission having been obtained by his father, he sets out for London, whence in October he writes to Benzelius—

      "This island has also men of the greatest experience in this [mathematical] science; but these I have not yet consulted, because I am not yet sufficiently acquainted with their language. I study ​Newton daily, and I am very anxious to see and hear him. I have provided myself with a small stock of books for the study of mathematics, and also with a certain number of instruments. . . . The magnificent St. Paul's Cathedral was finished a few days ago in all its parts. . . . The town is distracted by internal dissensions between the Anglican and Presbyterian churches; they are incensed against each other with almost deadly hatred. . . . Were you, dear brother, to ask me about myself, I should say I know that I am alive, but not happy; for I miss you and my home. . . . I not only love you more than my own brothers, but I even love and revere you as a father. . . . May God preserve you alive, that I may meet you again! "

      Again he writes in the following April—"I visit daily the best mathematicians here in town. I have been with Flamsteed, who is regarded the best astronomer in England, and who is constantly taking observations, which, together with the Paris observations, will give us some day a correct theory respecting the motion of the moon and of its appulse to fixed stars. . . . Newton has laid a good foundation for correcting the irregularities ​of the moon in his Principia . . . You encourage me to go on with my studies; but I think that I ought rather to be discouraged, as I have such an 'immoderate desire' for them, especially for astronomy and mechanics. I also turn my lodgings to some use, and change them often. At first I was at a watchmaker's, afterward at a cabinetmaker's, and now I am at a mathematical-instrument maker's. From them I learn their trades, which some day will be of use to me. I have recently computed for my own pleasure several useful tables for the latitude of Upsal, and all the solar and lunar eclipses which will take place between 1712 and 1721. . . . In undertaking in astronomy to facilitate the calculation of eclipses, and of the motion of the moon outside that of the syzygies, and also in undertaking to correct the tables so as to agree with the new observations, I shall have enough to do."

      A letter of January, 1712, answers various questions on scientific matters referred to him by Benzelius and the Literary Society of Upsal. Among other things our young student wanted to send home some English globes, but when mounted they were very dear as well as difficult ​to transport, and he tried in vain to buy paper sheets to be mounted at home. Characteristically he learned to engrave on copper and drew and engraved the plates for a pair of globes. At the same time he learned from his landlord to make brass instruments, and could when at home mount the globes. Of his studies he says—

      "With regard to astronomy I have made such progress in it as to have discovered much which I think will be useful in its study. Although in the beginning it made my brain ache, yet long speculations are now no longer difficult for me. I searched closely for all propositions for finding the terrestrial longitude, but could not find a single one; I have therefore originated a method by means of the moon, which is unerring, and I am certain that it is the best which has yet been advanced. In a short time I will inform the Royal Society that I have a proposition to make on this subject, stating my points, If it is favorably received by these gentlemen, I shall publish it here; if not, in France. I have also discovered many new methods for observing the planets, the moon, and the stars; that which concerns the moon and its parallaxes, diameter, and inequality, ​I will publish whenever an opportunity arises. I am now busy working my way through algebra and the higher geometry, and I intend to make such progress in it as to be able in time to continue Polheimer's discoveries. . . . When the plates for the globes arrive in Sweden, Professor Elfvius will perhaps take care to have them printed and made up. I shall send a specimen very soon; but no impression is to be sold." In this same letter he mentions valuable English books, and names all the principal poets as well worth reading for the sake of their imagination alone. In mild terms he complains of his father's not supplying him better with money; and we find the complaint quite pardonable when we remember that the father was borrowing his children's inheritance from their mother for his own enterprises, and when we learn that Emanuel had received from him but two hundred rixdalers—about two hundred and twenty-five dollars—in sixteen months. He says it is hard to live without food or drink.

Writing again to Benzelius, August, 1712, he repeats his confidence in his new method of finding the longitude, which Dr. Halley admitted to ​him orally was the only good method that had been proposed. "But," he adds, "as I have not met with great encouragement here in England among this civil and proud people, I have laid it aside for some other place. When I tell them that I have some project about longitude, they treat it as an impossibility; and so I do not wish to discuss it here. . . . As my speculations made me for a time not so sociable as is serviceable and useful for me, and as my spirits are somewhat exhausted, I have taken refuge for a short time in the study of poetry, that I might be somewhat recreated by it.^[1] I intend to gain a little reputation by this study on some occasion or other during this year, and I hope I may have advanced in it as much as may be expected from me; but time and others will perhaps judge of this. Still after a time I intend to take up mathematics again, although at present I am doing nothing in them; and if I am encouraged, I intend to make more discoveries in them than any one else in the present age. But without encouragement this would be sheer trouble, and it would be like non profecturis litora ​tubus arare—ploughing the ground with stubborn steers. . . . Within three or four months, I hope with God's help to be in France; for I greatly desire to understand its fashionable and useful language. I hope by that time to have, or to find there, letters from you to some of your learned correspondents. . . . Your great kindness and your favor, of which I have had so many proofs, make me believe that your advice and your letters will induce my father to be so favorable toward me as to send me the funds which are necessary for a young man, and which will infuse into me new spirit for the prosecution of my studies. Believe me, I desire and strive to be an honor to my father's house and yours, much more strongly than you yourself can wish and endeavor. . . . I would have bought the microscope if the price had not been so much higher than I could venture to pay before receiving your orders. This microscope was one which Mr. Marshall showed to me especially; it is quite new, of his own invention, and shows the motion in fishes very vividly. There was a glass with a candle placed under it, which made the thing itself, and the object, much brighter; so that any one could see the ​blood in the fishes flowing swiftly, like small rivulets; for it flowed in that way, and as rapidly. At a watchmaker's I saw a curiosity which I cannot forbear mentioning. It was a clock which was still, without any motion. On the top of it was a candle, and