Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine WisdomSwedenborg, Emanuel
Religion
Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom
Swedenborg, Emanuel
God (Christianity) -- Love; God (Christianity) -- Wisdom
(7) Anatomy teaches that all fibers descend from the brains through the
neck into the body, and that none ascend from the body through the neck
into the brains. And where the fibers are in their first principles or
firsts, there life is in its first principles or firsts. Will any one
venture to deny that life has its origin where the fibers have their
origin?
(8) Ask any one of common perception where his thought resides or where
he thinks, and he will say, In the head. Then appeal to some one who has
assigned the seat of the soul to some gland or to the heart or somewhere
else, and ask him where affection and thought therefrom are in their
firsts, whether they are not in the brain? and he will answer, No, or
that he does not know. The cause of this ignorance may be seen above
(n. 361).
366. (3) Such as life is in its first principles, such it is in the whole
and in every part. That this may be perceived, it shall now be told where
in the brains these first principles are, and how they become derivative.
Anatomy shows where in the brains these first principles are; it teaches
that there are two brains; that these are continued from the head into
the spinal column; that they consist of two substances, called cortical
substance and medullary substance; that cortical substance consists of
innumerable gland-like forms, and medullary substance of innumerable
fiber-like forms. Now as these little glands are heads of fibrils, they
are also their first principles. For from these, fibers begin and
thereupon go forth, gradually bundling themselves into nerves. These
bundles or nerves, when formed, descend to the organs of sense in the
face, and to the organs of motion in the body, and form them. Consult
any one skilled in the science of anatomy, and you will be convinced.
This cortical or glandular substance constitutes the surface of the
cerebrum, and also the surface of the corpora striata, from which
proceeds the medulla oblongata; it also constitutes the middle of the
cerebellum, and the middle of the spinal marrow. But medullary or
fibrillary substance everywhere begins in and proceeds from the cortical;
out of it nerves arise, and from them all things of the body. That this
is true is proved by dissection. They who know these things, either from
the study of anatomical science or from the testimony of those who are
skilled in the science, can see that the first principles of life are in
the same place as the beginnings of the fibers, and that fibers cannot
go forth from themselves, but must go forth from first principles. These
first principles, that is, beginnings, which appear as little glands,
are almost countless; their multitude may be compared to the multitude
of stars in the universe; and the multitude of fibrils coming out of them
may be compared to the multitude of rays going forth from the stars and
bearing their heat and light to the earth. The multitude of these little
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