EMANUEL SWEDENBORG
so far as it is correctly rational, cannot be repugnant to the end. The very mysteries that are above reason cannot be contrary to reason, although reason is unable to explain their grounds." Thus begins the first chapter:—
"In order that we may be favored and happy in our endeavors, they must begin from the Infinite, or God, without whom no undertakings can attain a prosperous issue. He it is that bestows on all things their principles; from whom all things finite took their rise; from whom we have our souls, and by whom we live; by whom we are at once mortals and immortals; to whom in fine we owe everything. And as the soul was created by Him and added to the body, and reason to both, in order that the soul might be His, so our thoughts, whether we revolve them within, or utter them in words, or commit them to writing, must always be so directed as to have their beginning and end from Him; whereby the Deity may be present with gracious favor as the First and the Last, in either end as well as in the means."
Then alluding to the desire of human reason to be convinced in order to accept theology, he shows at length the impossibility of the reason's
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