Christians, may be tempted, but ought not to be overcome.8

1 Thus Reinhard, p. 176 ss. He does not venture to decide which office they have in the present time (p. 191.) Storr. § 49. (quoted by Hase, Dogmatik p. 237.)

2 Göttliche Offenbarung i. p. 87: "Men are always surrounded by spirits and angels of God, who understand everything spiritually, because they themselves possess a spiritual nature. After death men are also instructed by angels," p. 102. Comp. ii. p. 102. 126. 178. 226. In many places Swedenborg relates his discourses with angels who, in his opinion, are human beings. Angels breathe as well as men, their heart also beats; they breathe according to the measure of Divine wisdom which they receive from the Lord; their heart beats according to the measure of Divine love which they receive from the Lord, p. 112. comp. p. 220. Angels and spirits are also men; for all the good and true which proceeds from man is, according to its form, man; but the Lord is the Divine-Good, and the Divine-True itself, hence he is the man himself from whom every man is man, i. p. 112. Because angels are angels on account of the degree of love and wisdom which they possess, and the same is the case with men, it is evident, that on account of the good connected with the true, angels are angels of heaven, and men are men of the church, p. 157. The wisdom of angels consists in the power to see and to apprehend what they think, p. 213. All that takes place in the spiritual world, is correspondence; for it is corresponding to the tendencies of angels and spirits, p. 250. In opposition to the doctrine of the church, that the angels were created at first, and that the devil is a fallen angel, Swedenborg professes (p. 180) to be taught by the angels themselves that in the whole heaven there is not one single angel who was created at first, nor in the whole hell one single devil who was created as an angel of light, etc., but that all angels, both in heaven and in hell, derive their origin from the human race. Hell and devil are one thing, and angels and heaven are one thing, comp. p. 303. That which is in man, viz., his spirit, is, according to its true nature, an angel, p. 281, therefore man is created to become an angel, p. 289. In some places Swedenborg understands

the Scriptural term: angel in a symbolical sense. Comp. vol. ii. p. 6. 16. 18. 52. 307.

3 De Dæmoniacis, 1760 (4th edit. 1779.)-Versuch einer biblischen Daemonologie, Halle 1776..

4 Reinhard p. 195 ss. p. 206, speaks only of those diseases which the devil is said to have caused in the times of Christ and his apostles. Comp. p. 211. "We admit such corporeal possessions in the narratives of the gospel only on the testimony of Christ and his apostles. Accordingly, when such an authentic testimony is wanting in modern times, no man is justified in maintaining that a diseased man is truly possessed with a devil." Comp. Storr § 52. (quoted by Hase p. 238.)

5 The exorcisms practised by Gassner, a member of the Roman Catholic Church (from the year 1773.) See Walch, neueste Religionsgeschichte, vol. vi. p. 371. p. 541 ss. Justinus Kerner, (who belongs to the Protestant Church): die Scherinn von Prevorst, Stuttg. 1832, 2 voll. Ueber das Besessensein, Heilbr. 1833. Geschichte Besessener neuerer Zeit, nebst Reflexionen von Eschenmayer, Karlsruhe 1836.

6 Glaubenslehre i. § 45. p. 243.

7 Judas Ischariot, oder das Böse im Verhältnisse zum Guten betrachtet, 2 parts in 3 sections. Heidelb. 1816-19. (Comp. Kant, Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft, p. 99 ss.)

8 Kant, 1. c. p. 66. Twesten, Dogmatik ii. p. 331 ss. comp. p. 358-360.

426

THIRD SECTION.

ANTHROPOLOGY. CHRISTOLOGY. SOTERIOLOGY AND THE ECONOMY OF REDEMPTION.

§ 295.

THE DOCTRINES CONCERNING MAN, SIN, AND LIBERTY.

We may expect as a matter of course, that in an age in which philosophical and theological works were full of "philanthropy and humanity," much would be said concerning the nature, dignity, and destination of man.1 In opposition to Augustine's views, the excellency of the human nature was extolled, and (after the example of Rousseau) many indulged in fanciful representations of the ideal state of man.2 The rationalistic theologians erased the doctrine of original sin from their systems. On the contrary, Kant himself pointed out the innate evil in man, but did not understand by it original sin in its ecclesiastical sense. The adherents of later speculative philosophy were also far from believing that the natural state of man is the normal one, they admitted that he had fallen from his original state, and a reconciliation had become necessary, and attached little importance to the Pelagian idea of liberty, upon which Rationalists laid great weight. But after a closer examination of their theory, it appeared that the kind of original sin they established was identical with the

finite character of the nature and consciousness of man which is a matter of necessity. Thus the idea of sin and responsibility was destroyed, and a doctrine introduced which would prove fatal to all true morality.5 In opposition to both these tendencies (the rationalistic and the speculative) the Pietists and those theologians who returned to the received faith of the church, revived the doctrine of Augustine in its essential points, to which the followers of Schleiermacher also adhered, though with various modifications." At present the regeneration of the church and of theology are chiefly to be expected from a right understanding of the doctrine concerning sin.8

1 It is worthy of notice that physical and psychological anthropology, which had formerly been treated in connection with systematic theology, was now separated from it. Man was made the subject of philosophical treatises written in a popular style, see Pope, Essay on Man, 1733. Spalding, Bestimung des Menschen, Lpz. 1748. Zollikofer, J. J., Predigten über die Wurde des Menschen, Lpz. 1783. Ith, J., Anthropologie oder Philosophie des Menschen, vol. i. Winterthur 1803. (For further particulars see Bretschneider, Entwurf p. 493 ss.) Herder has most ably represented man in his purely human aspect.

2 Comp. § 274. The modern system of education was, in particular, founded on the doctrine of the excellency of human nature. Comp. Campe, Theophron, 1806. p. 234 ss.

3 Steinbart (in the 5th section of his: System der reinen Philosophie.) Henke, Lineamenta, lxxxi.: Cavendam est ne hanc peccandi facultatem, hunc vitiorum fomitem cum ipsis vitiis, ignis materiam cum incendio, permisceamus, atque propterea totum genus humanum, perditum, corruptum, propter hanc suam indolem displicere Deo, vel parvulos adeo, recens in lucem editos, indignationi divinæ obnoxios esse dicamus, quod ne de catulis quidem sanus quisquam ausit dicere, etc. Quæ omnia (he then continues, p. lxxxiv.) ambiguitatis et erroris plena commenta sunt, pro lubitu arrepta, et præter sanæ rationis ac scripturæ sacræ adsensum.

4 Vom radicalen Bösen in der menschlichen Natur (Berliner Monatsscrift, April 1792.)-Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft.-Gegen die Schwärmereien der Paedagogen, p. 4 and 5. The natural tendency to evil manifests itself in three different ways: 1. As frailty (fragilitas); 2d, As impurity (impuritas, improbitas); 3. As malice and perversity (vitiositas, pravitas, perversitas.) The proposition: Man is wicked, means, he is conscious of moral laws, but he thinks it consistent with his principles of action, occasionally to deviate from them. The proposition: He is by nature wicked, means: he is wicked because he belongs to the genus humanum. (Vitiis nemo sine nascitur, Horat.) This tendency (to evil) has not its origin in the sensuality of man, but in his liberty, hence he is responsible for it. There are also different degrees of innate guilt (reatus.) The culpa corresponds to frailty and impurity; the dolus (dolus malus) corresponds to malice. Nevertheless Kant maintains (p. 37) that all theories respecting the propagation of this original evil, that is the most incorrect, which represents us as having inherited it from our first parents; for what the poet says in reference to good, may also be applied to moral evil: Genus et proavos, et quæ non fecimus ipsi, vix ea nostra puto. In his opinion the narrative of Adam's fall is only a symbol which he explains according to his principles of moral interpretation, p. 40-44. Therefore the doctrine of innate evil is not of importance for systematic theology, but only for moral edification (p.56.) On this account Kant's theory of original evil does not lead to the doctrine of redemption (in its ecclesiastical sense), but he comes to the conclusion: "That which man; considered from the moral point of view, is or is to be, whether good or wicked, depends on his own actions," (p. 45.) Comp. also § 298. on the economy of redemption. Herder therefore said: "Nobody knows how this original evil entered into the human nature, nor how it may escape from it." (Von Religion, Lehrmeinungen und Gebräuchen, p. 204. 5. For the further development of Kant's theory see Tieftrunk, Censur iii. p. 112 ss. The latter Rationalists rested satisfied with regarding evil as something which experience proves to exist among men, without tracing its origin to the sin of our first parents; nor did they deny that those who aspire