Dreams of a Spirit-Seer/Part 2/Chapter 2

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Dreams of a Spirit-Seer by Immanuel Kant Part Second Chapter II.

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SECOND CHAPTER.

A DREAMER'S ECSTATIC JOURNEY THROUGH THE WORLD OF SPIRITS.

Somnia, terrores magicos, miracula, sagas,
Nocturnos lemures, portentaque Thessala.

Horace.

I cannot take it as in any way amiss in the cautious reader, if, during the development of this work, he should have grown doubtful about the manner of proceeding adopted by the author. For, as I treated the dogmatic part before the historic, and thus set reasons before experience, I gave cause for the suspicion of underhand-dealing, by having the whole thing before my mind from the start, and then feigning to know nothing but abstract considerations, so that I might finally surprise the reader who is expecting no such thing, by a pleasing confirmation from experience. In fact, this is a trick which philosophers have used at several times with very good success. To wit, all knowledge has two ends of which you can take hold, the one a priori, the other a posteriori. It is true, several modern scientists have pretended that one must, of necessity, begin at the latter. They think they can catch the eel of science at the tail, by first procuring enough knowledges from experience, and then ascending gradually to general and higher conceptions. But although this may not be unwise, it is not nearly learned enough, nor philosophical. For in this manner one soon arrives at a why which cannot be answered, and that is just as creditable for a philosopher as it is for a merchant to pleasantly ask one to come some other time when a bill of exchange is presented to him for payment. To avoid this inconvenience acute men have begun at the opposite farthest border, the outmost point of metaphysics. But a new difficulty is here incurred, of beginning I don’t know where, and of coming I don’t know whither; also that the reasoning, when continued, does not seem to fall in with experience; yea, it seems as if the atoms of Epicurus, after having fallen and fallen from eternity, might sooner meet by chance some time and form a world, than that common ideas will meet and exemplify these abstract principles. When the philosopher thus clearly saw that his reasons on the one hand and actual experience or report on the other might, like two parallel lines, run alongside each other into infinity without ever meeting, he agreed with others, as by mutual consent, that each should take the starting-point in his own way; each then should guide the reason not by the straight line of logic, but by giving to the lines of evidence an imperceptible twist, and so, by stealthily squinting in the direction of certain experiencies or testimonies, each one should bring the reason to the point of proving just what, unsuspected by the trustful pupil, he all the time had in mind as the experience to be rationally proved. Add to this that they call this road the road a priori, although they have imperceptibly directed it to the point a posteriori, by following a road already staked out. They do not tell you that, of course, because it is only fair for the initiated not to betray the tricks of the profession. With this ingenious method several men of merit have caught even secrets of religion by pure reasoning; just as a novelist makes the heroine flee into remote countries that there, by a lucky adventure, she haply may meet her lover; “et fugit ad salices, et se cupit ante videri.” (Virgil). With such celebrated predecessors, I need not have been ashamed even if I really had made use of the same trick to help my work to a good ending. But I earnestly beg of the reader not to believe such a thing of me. Anyhow, of what use would it be to me now when I can deceive nobody any more, having given away the secret? Moreover, I undergo this misfortune, that the testimony which I have stumbled upon, and which resembles so uncommonly the philosophical creation of my own brain, looks desperately misshapen and foolish, so that I must rather expect the reader to consider my reasons as absurd on account of their relation to such confirmations, than that he will consider these latter reasonable on account of my reasons. I therefore declare without more ado that in regard to the alleged examples I mean no joke, and I declare once for all, that either one has to suppose more intelligence and truth to be in Swedenborg’s works than a first glance will reveal, or that it is only chance when he coincides with my system; as poets sometimes, when they are raving, are believed to prophesy, or at least profess that they do, when, now and then, events bear them out.

I come to the point, the works of my hero. If many authors who are now forgotten, or, at least, in future will be without fame, deserve no small credit because, in the composition of big works, they took no heed of the expenditure of their reason, Mr. Swedenborg doubtless should carry highest honours among them all. For, surely, his bottle in the lunar world is quite full, and is inferior to none among all those which Ariosto has seen there, filled with the reason that was lost here, and which the owners one day will have to seek again; so utterly empty of the last drop of reason is his big work.50 Nevertheless, such a wonderful agreement we find there with what reason can obtain on the same subject by the most subtle investigations, that the reader will pardon me if I discover here that rare play of imagination which so many other collectors have found in the plays of nature, when, for example, in spotted marble they make out the Holy Family, or in stalactite formations they make out monks, baptismal fonts, and church organs, or even as the banterer Liscow discovered on the frosted window-pane the number of the beast and the triple crown, all of which nobody else sees but he whose head is filled with it beforehand.

The big work of this author comprises eight volumes quarto full of nonsense. He puts them before the world as a new revelation under the title of “Arcana Coelestia,” and applies therein his visions mostly to the discovery of the hidden sense in the first books of Moses, and to a similiar mode of explanation of the whole of Scripture. All these fantastic interpretations do not concern me here, but, whoever desires it, may look up Dr. Ernesti’s Theological Library, Volume first, for some information about them. Only the “audita and visa,” i.e., what he professes to have seen with his own eyes and heard with his own ears, we will extract, principally from the appendices to his chapters, because they are the foundation of all the other fancies, and are also pretty well in the same line with the adventure which, in the foregoing, we have undertaken in the balloon of metaphysics. The author’s style is plain. His stories and their arrangement seem really to be based upon fanatic observation, and afford little reason to suspect that fancies of a wrongly speculating reason have moved him to invent them, and use them for deception. In so far they are of some importance, and are really more deserving of being presented in a condensed form than many a plaything of brainless reasoners which swells our quarterlies. For a systematic delusion of the senses is a much more remarkable phenomenon than the deception of reason, the causes of which are well enough known, and which mostly could be prevented by an effort to guide the powers of mind, and to restrain somewhat an empty inquisitiveness. The delusion of the senses, on the other hand, concerns the first foundation of all judgments, against the perversion of which the rules of logic have little power. I distinguish, therefore, with our author, between delusions and the deductions thence, and pass over his incorrect reasonings, the consequences of his not stopping at his visions,—just as we often have to separate in a philosopher that which he observes from what he reasons, and just as even seeming experiences are, for the most part, more instructive than seeming reasons. While thus robbing the reader of some of the moments which otherwise he might have put to the study of the exhaustive discussion of the matter, without, however, being much more benefited, I have taken care, nevertheless, of his sensitive taste by leaving out many of the wild chimeras of the book, and reducing its quintessence to a few drops. I expect for that just as much gratefulness from the reader, as a certain patient believed he owed to his doctors because they made him eat only the bark of cinchona, while they might easily have compelled him to eat the whole tree.

Mr. Swedenborg divides his visions into three kinds. In the first kind he is liberated from the body, in a state mediate between sleeping and waking, in which he has seen, heard, even felt spirits. This he has experienced only three or four times. The second is being led away by the spirit, when he may be out walking on the street without losing himself, while at the same time his spirit is in entirely different regions and sees clearly elsewhere houses, men, forests, &c., and this perhaps for several hours, until he suddenly becomes aware again of his real place. That happened to him two or three times. The third kind of visions is what is usual with him, those which he has daily while wide awake; and from these visions his stories are taken.

All men, according to his testimony, are in equally close conjunction with the spirit-world; most men, however, do not perceive it, the difference between himself and others consisting only in the fact that his interiors are opened, a gift of which he always speaks with reverence (datum mihi est ex divina Domini misericordia). It may be seen from the context that this gift is supposed to consist in the faculty of becoming conscious of the obscure ideas which one’s soul receives by its continual connection with the spirit-world. He distinguishes therefore in man the outer and the inner memory. The former he has as a person belonging to the visible world. On this fact also the distinction between the outer and inner man is founded; his own privilege consists in seeing himself already in this life as a person in the company of spirits, and in being recognised by them as man.51 In this inner memory everything is preserved which has disappeared out of the outer,—nothing of all the perceptions of a man is ever lost. After death the remembrance of everything that ever entered his soul, also of what was formerly hidden to himself, forms the complete book of his life.52

The presence of spirits, it is true, affects only his inner sense. But this makes them appear to him as being outside of himself, and in the form of the human figure. The language of spirits is an immediate communication of ideas, but it is always connected with the appearance of that language which the observer ordinarily speaks, and is represented as being outside of himself.53 A spirit reads in the memory of another spirit the ideas which are contained in the inner memory with clearness. Thus the spirits see in Swedenborg the perceptions which he has from this world, with such clearness, that they deceive themselves, and often imagine they perceive immediately those things which it is impossible for them to see;54 for no spirit has the least sensation from the corporeal world. Also, through communication with the souls of other living men, they can receive no idea of this world, because the interior of such men is not opened, and contains only ideas entirely obscure. For this reason Swedenborg is the very oracle of the spirits, who are just as curious to view in him the present state of the world, as he is curious to observe in their memory, as in a mirror, the wonders of the spirit-world. Although these spirits are also in the closest conjunction with the souls of all other men, operating upon them and being operated upon by them, they yet know this as little as men know it; so entirely obscure is that interior sense which belongs to the spiritual personality of men. The spirits therefore believe that those things which have been effected in them through the influence of the souls of men, have been thought by themselves alone; just as men in this life think no otherwise, than that all their thoughts and inclinations come from themselves, although, as a matter of fact, they often flow into them out of the other world.55 Each human soul has already in this life its place in the spiritworld, and belongs to a society, always in accordance with the inner state of good and truth, i.e., of will and understanding.29 But the places of spirits among themselves have nothing in common with space in the corporeal world. Thus the soul of a man in India can be next to the soul of another man in Europe, as far as their spiritual places are concerned, while those which, according to the body, live in one house, may be spiritually very far from one another. When man dies, the soul does not change its place, but only perceives itself to be in that place which, in relation to other spirits, it occupied already in this life. But although the relation of spirits among themselves is no real space, it has still with them the appearance of it,56 and their conjunctions are perceived under the accessory condition of nearness, their differences, on the other hand, as distances. In the same way spirits possess no extent, but yet present to each other the appearance of human figures. In this imaginary space there exists a universal community of spiritual natures. Swedenborg talks with departed souls at will, and reads in their memory (power of perception) that state which they observe in themselves, and sees it just as clearly as with bodily eyes. Moreover, the enormous distances which divide the rational inhabitants of the world are nothing in regard to the spiritual universe, and it is just as easy for one to talk with an inhabitant of Saturn, as with a deceased human soul. Everything depends on the condition of the interior state, and upon the conjunction in which spirits are according to the harmony of their states of good and truth. And the more remote spirits can easily enter into mutual communication through the intermediation of others. Thus man does not need to have actually dwelt in the other worlds for the sake of knowing them some day with all their wonders. His soul reads in the memory of the deceased citizens of other worlds the perceptions which they possess about their life and dwelling-place, and thereby sees objects as easily as by immediate observation.57

A principal conception in Swedenborg’s phantasm is the following:—Corporeal beings have no substance of their own, but exist only through the spirit-world, not, however, that each body exists through one spirit, but through all taken together. For that reason the knowledge of material things has a double significance, an external meaning in regard to the inter-relations of matter, an internal meaning in so far as material effects indicate the powers of the spirit-world which cause them. Thus the parts in the body of man stand in relation to each other according to material laws. But in so far as the body is preserved by the spirit living in it, its various members and their functions are of value in indicating those powers of the soul by the operation of which they have their form, activity, and stability.58 This inner meaning is unknown to man, and it is that which Swedenborg, whose interiors are opened, wants to make known to the world. With all other things of the visible world the case is the same; they have, as I say, a signification as things, which amounts to little, and another as signs, which amounts to much.59 This also is the origin of all the new interpretations which he would make of the Scripture.60 For this inner meaning, the internal sense, i.e., the symbolic relation of all things told there to the spirit-world, is, as he fancies, the kernel of its value, the rest only the shell. Again, the important point in this symbolic conjunction of corporeal things, as images, with the interior spiritual state, is the following. All spirits present themselves to each other under the appearance of figures possessing extent; and the influences of all these spiritual beings among each other at the same time call forth the appearance of still other spiritual creatures possessing extent, thus, as it were, the appearance of a material world. The scenes of this world, however, are only symbols of its inner state; nevertheless they cause such a clear and enduring deception of the senses as to equal the real sensation of such objects. (A future interpreter will conclude from this that Swedenborg was an idealist, because he denies to this world its independent subsistence, and therefore held it to be only a systematic appearance, arising from the constitution of the spirit world.) Thus he talks about the gardens, vast countries, the dwelling-places, galleries, and arcades of the spirits, which he claims to see with his own eyes in the clearest light. And he assures us that, having spoken after their death with all his friends, he had nearly always found that those having died recently could persuade themselves with difficulty that they had died, because they beheld a similar world; also, that societies of spirits of the same inner state live in the same appearance in regard to the country and other things there, and that a change of state is accompanied by the appearance of a change of locality. The mass of wild and unspeakably absurd forms and figures which our dreamer believes to see quite clearly in his daily intercourse with spirits must be derived from the fact that, whenever spirits communicate their thoughts to the souls of men, these thoughts take the appearance of material things, which, however, present themselves to the subject only on the strength of their relation to an inner meaning, but, still, with all appearance of reality.

I have already stated that, according to our author, the many powers and qualities of the soul are in sympathy with those organs of the body which they govern. The whole outer man therefore corresponds to the whole inner man. If, then, a perceptible spiritual influx from the invisible world flows mainly into some one of the powers of the soul, he harmoniously feels its apparent presence also in the corresponding member of his outer man. Under this head he classifies a great variety of sensations in his body which he claims are always connected with spiritual contemplation. But their foolishness is too great for me to dare to quote even one of them.

From these data, if it be considered worth while, one may now form a conception of that most extravagant and queerest of fancies in which all his dreams culminate. Just as various powers and capacities form that unity which constitutes the soul or the inner man, in the same way also various spirits (whose principal traits have the same relation to each other as the many faculties of a single spirit have among themselves) form a society which has the appearance of a great man.17:36 In this image each spirit finds himself in that place and in that apparent member which is in accordance with his peculiar office in such a spiritual body. Again, all societies of spirits together, and the world of all these invisible beings, finally presents itself in the appearance of the Grand Man, Maximus Homo.61 A colossal and gigantic fancy, which, perhaps, has grown out of an old childish conception, just as in schools sometimes, as an aid to memory, a whole continent is pictured to the pupils under the image of a sitting virgin, &c. In this enormous man there is a universal, most intimate communion of one spirit with all others, and of all with one; and, whatever may be the positions or changes of living beings in regard to each other in this world, still each has his place in the Grand Man entirely distinct from his place here, a place which he never changes, which is in immeasurable space only according to appearance, but in reality signifies only a particular character of his relations and influences.

I am tired of copying the wild chimeras of this worst of all dreamers, and forbear continuing them to his descriptions of the state after death. I have still other scruples. For, although a collector of objects of natural history puts up in his press among the prepared objects of animal procreation not only such as are formed naturally but also abortions, he nevertheless has to be careful not to show them too plainly and not to everybody. For among the curious there might easily be some pregnant persons who might receive an injurious impression. And as among my readers some might be just as likely in an interesting condition in regard to spiritual conceptions, I should be sorry if they had received a detrimental shock by anything I have told. However, as I have warned them right at the start, I am responsible for nothing, and hope not to be burdened with the moon-calves which their fruitful imagination might bring forth on this occasion.

As it is, I have not substituted my own fancies for those of our author, but have offered his views in a faithful extract to the comfortable and economic reader who does not care to sacrifice seven pounds for a little curiosity. It is true, I have mostly avoided quoting the visions themselves, as such wild chimeras only disturb the sleep of the reader, and the confused meaning of his revelations has been brought now and then into somewhat intelligible language; but the main traits of the sketch have thereby not suffered in accuracy. Nevertheless, it is only in vain that one would hide the fact which, after all, is conspicuous to everybody, that all this labour finally comes to nothing. For, as the pretended private visions narrated in the book cannot prove themselves, the motive for bothering oneself with them could lie only in the supposition that the author might offer in substantiation happenings of the above-mentioned kind which could be confirmed by living witnesses. But nothing of the kind is found. And thus we retire with some confusion from a foolish attempt, making the rational though somewhat belated observation that it is often easy to think wisely, but unfortunately only after one has been for some time deceived.

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I have treated an unfruitful subject which the inquiries and importunity of idle and inquisitive friends has forced upon me. By submitting my labours to their curiosity, I have still left their expectation unrewarded, and have satisfied neither the curious by novelties, nor the studious by reasons. If I had been animated in this work by no other intentions than those just stated, I should have wasted my time; for I have lost the confidence of the reader, whom, in his inquisitiveness and eagerness to know, I have led by a tiresome roundabout way to the same point of ignorance from which he started. But I really had an aim in view that seemed to me more important than the pretended one, and that, I believe, I have attained. Metaphysics, with which it is my fate to be in love, although only rarely can I boast of any favours from her, offers two advantages. The first is that it serves to solve the tasks which the questioning mind sets itself when by means of reason it inquires into the hidden qualities of things. But here the result only too often falls below expectation, and also this time the answer has evaded our too eager grasp.

Ter frustra comprensa manus, effugit imago,
Par levibus ventis volucrique simillima somno.

—Virgil.

The other advantage is more adapted to human reason, and consists in recognizing whether the task be within the limits of our knowledge and in stating its relation to the conceptions derived from experience, for these must always be the foundation of all our judgments. In so far metaphysics is the science of the boundaries of human reason. And as a small country always has many boundaries, and is generally more careful to intimately know and defend its possessions than blindly to set out upon conquests, it is this use of metaphysics, as setting boundaries, which is at the same time the least known and the most important, and which further is obtained only late and by long experience. In this case I indeed have not accurately defined the boundaries; but I have indicated them for the reader” so far that, after further consideration, he will find himself able to do without such vain investigations about a question the data of which he has to seek in a world different from that of which he is sensible. Thus I have wasted my time that I might gain it. I have deceived the reader so that I might be of use to him, and although I have offered him no new knowledge, I have nevertheless destroyed that vain belief and empty knowledge which inflates reason, and, in its narrow space, takes the place which might be occupied by the teachings of wisdom and of useful instruction.

The impatience of the reader, whom our considerations thus far have only wearied without giving instruction, may be appeased by the words with which Diogenes is said to have cheered his yawning listeners when he saw the last page of a tiresome book: “Courage, gentlemen, I see land!” Before, we walked, like Demokritus, in empty space, whither we had flown on the butterfly-wings of metaphysics, and there we conversed with spiritual beings. Now, since the sobering power of self-recognition has caused the silky wings to be folded, we find ourselves again on the ground of experience and common sense. Happy, if we look at it as the place allotted to us, which we never can leave with impunity, and which contains everything to satisfy us as long as we hold fast to the useful.