| Show RB VISIONS OF THE NEXT WORLD home of founder of the church of new jerusalem to be reproduced at st louis in the shadow of some majestic trees opposite the fine arts belld etoy ta the calr grounds at st loula there now appears within a small in fit we i quaint gambrel thatched two j etory frame house and an equally odd garden pavilion both representing a type of architecture that distinctly belongs to the past the little house and the pavilion are being placed at the fair by the church of the new jerusalem in america and are a faithful reproduction of the humble home in stockholm where emanuel on whose strange teachings the doctrine of the new church has been built lived during the last thirty years of his life the qu eastlon of placing at the exposition a replica of the house where laid the foundations tor a new faith which has attracted thinkers in all parts of the world was brought before the last general conference of the new church at philadelphia there are now lan churches in the united states with an aggregate membership of nearly four of these churches are located in the exposition city the general conference passed a resolution favoring the project and a committee was appointed with plenary power A lay member of the new church in this city has recently returned from the swedish capital with photographs and a minute description of the old structure though built almost two hundred years ago and situated at the main thoroughfare of one of the busiest sections of stockholm where offer historic landmarks have been swept away the house walca was the dwelling place of the most remarkable man sweden ever brought forth remains in practically the same condition as left it when compelled by religious persecution he turned his back on sweden tor the last time in 1770 for a hundred years after his death it vas occupied as a place of residence by people in humble circumstances cum stances but the swedish government has since obtained possession ot it wite the result that it has been well maintained and remains in a state of fair preservation today A propaganda established the house at st louis besides being intended as a meeting place tor members of the new church visiting the exposition will be used as a centre of a propaganda which it Is to carry on among ors who belong to other faiths thou bands of tracts and pamphlets dealing with new church doctrines ea eie distributed from this headquarters and a reading room will be established in one of the rooms in which there will be placed a complete collection of religious writings as well as other lan utera ture Bw edenborg was a prolific writer and al the time of his death left behind a great mass of manuscripts not a few of these documents so intimately connected with the philosophers life have found their way to this country and these will be placed on view at the house together with the only authentic painting ot swea enborg now in existence this was obtained or a admirer in this country through the american minister al stockholm many years ago built the little house which cont alne only six rooms ana was simple in the extreme in 1740 when his efforts to define the infinite and its relation to the nature of man through the principles of science had ended in failure and he had deter mined after a journey to london during which he declared the lord appeared to him in the flesh to turn alg bacic on the world and devote himself purely to the mission of establishing a new religion more spiritual than the old one he lived alone attended only by an old gardener and the batters lat tvete about the only services cervices vices anre re alred from them was to make hla fire ind bring him water at times he remained in bed for daya at a time ap latently ly in a somnambulistic state during which he had no physical re luire ments in his spiritual diary which kill be one of the most interesting exhibits in the bouse at the fair tells at length how he first entered into communication with the spirit world his room would be suddenly lighted up by lashes of intense light in the depth ot night and words of mysterious purport were beard by him in the early morning before dawn when all life was hushed about the ahle hore A prodigious faculty of being able to hold bla breath without any sense of suffocation brean to manifest itself in him during thee periods of suspended respiration he was occasionally been by the old gardener ana his wife who were hit only attendants and they declared that his eyes were wide open and gleaming like fire it was then as he asserts that le visited the of bood and evil and in conversation aap els and demons learned the brets of those spheres bidden from ordinary ken WITH SPIRITS hla spiritual diary Is replete with odd narrations of chece conver rations under the date of march 20 1748 writes that he las just learned that the spiritual an elg he divided he angels into two classes spiritual and celestial dislike butter on jan 11 the bacis year he writes that the spirits of ten wish him to steal things of ablah velus such as arc exposed in shops anns that no strong Is their desire that they actually move his hands on fob C we find an entry in which he says 1 I ascertained that these spirita had 1 p sn trades who defrauded customers and thought it allow abe some wore celebrated mer chanty whereat I 1 wondered they van derod about seeking tor things to f astr al they are punished with detected ID on the heavenly sec I 1 which will br ono of the ex gives a rather t doivo description of bow girls who dlo young are treated in heaven it fore 1 ably reminds one of the plan on which boarding for young ladles are ielne conducted on earth three or tour of the girls wrote are placed together each has her own chamber and adjoining ll 11 a closet for clothes and lla they are allowed to have perfumes and are employed at embroidering embroider ing alc hangs which they either wear or give away but never sell each has her little garden and the girls rold and silver money as prizes tor and virtue the book contains minute descriptions both of scenery and surround digs as well as the life in heaven and tell as he claimed to have observed it his narrative would give a death liow to any assumption that his mind was of a mystic cast tor it is laid along the lines of euch economy and order as enter into the general social scheme on earth work industry eat inand drinking all enter into the order of life in heaven and hell as seen by A VISIT FROM VIRGIL Atter bom a swedish writer of the eighteenth century in his work on swedish seers and bards relates an odd episode of wiloh Sweden borgs house was the scene prof gabriel henry ot abo finland came to visit he was asked tc wait in a adjoining the study of the philosopher in the next room he heard voices one of them that c conversing easily in fluent latin on roman antiquities literature era ture and history As ho grew absorbed in the conversation the door opened and came into the room with a countenance radiant with joy he greeted the professor in pass ing but his chief attention was devot 1 ed to some invisible person whom with many profound bows he conducted through the room and out through the other door on returning the philosopher went direct to his guest and greeted him with a cordial handshake as he squeezed his hand well heartily welcome learned sir excuse ce for letting you wait I 1 bad as you observed a visitor yes go I 1 observed eald the pro feasor with growing amazement and embarrassment and can you guess whom asked it was virgil he is a fine and pleasant fellow I 1 always had a very high opinion of him and he deserves it he Is as modest as he Is witty and most agreeably entertain ang was not fundamentally an idle dreamer he was a man of toled learning and held a responsible position in his own country he was the originator of the idea of uniting the north sea and the baltic by means at a canal the distance Is miles ahe canal Is a reality today he arote among other things an essay on mathematics in which be proposed to do away with 10 as a basic number as impracticable and substituting it with cither 8 or 16 the denary basis in held was derived from the counting on their fingers by illiterate persons he pointed out how ten was an impractical basal number because it was divisible only by 2 and 5 without breaking tre aking into fractions and contained neither the square cube nor fourth power of any number while 8 was ar cubic number and ac was a bl quadrate number with 2 as a root he died in london on march 29 1772 and was burled under the altar of the swedish church there his body was disturbed eighteen years later A set of rell glou fanatics conceived the idea that pos hessed the elixir of life and that there fore he was not dead the lead coffin in which he was burled was saw eo open and there the the philosopher was found very well preserved and with the features so dla that every one could recognize him the coffin was not again sealed and soon the remains crumbled into dust all except the skull in 1817 there was another burial in the same vault one of those who attended abstracted he skull and tor some days it was peddled among the savanis savants and collectors of curiosities in the british metropolis tro polis but was finally recovered and le stored to its resting place by the rev dr wahlen who was chaplain at the swedish embassy in london |
