PREFACE.
On the wrapper of the Intellectual Repository for January, 1863, the editor acknowledged the receipt of one hundred pounds, from "Philalethes," to be offered in two Unequal sums, for the best and second best essays on "The Last Judgment, and the Second Coming of the Lord as the Son of man, foretold in the Gospels and Revelation." In the following number of that publication, the conditions and arbiters were announced; and in the March issue the letter of "Philalethes" to the editor on the subject appeared at length. In that letter he stated his ideas respecting the broad and Christian spirit in which the essays should be written, and made some suggestions concerning the range of the review which should be embraced. He also indicated that, for the sake of the multitude, the work should be handled in a popular manner, and that as large a use as possible should be made of the literal sense of the Scriptures, in order that light might be thrown upon it by Swedenborg's explanations. This essay was selected by the arbiters for the first prize. It is designed to illustrate the teachings of the "New Church" on the various subjects of which it treats, and it is hoped that the results will be useful to the cause for which it is written.
