Consequently SWEDENBORG arrived at almost the same result as that to
which our own day has attained, although in a partly different manner.
Our times have had the assistance of exact methods of investigation
and of a most highly developed technique. In SWEDENBORG’s time the
research method of microscopical anatomy and experimental physiology
were yet in their cradle; and the two branches of science, medicine and
pathology, which afterwards with the greatest interest have taken part
in the investigation of the function of the cortex, had then hardly as
yet turned their attention thither. As to how SWEDENBORG nevertheless
succeeded in winning such rich and beautiful results in this field,
and how well he employed the widely spread literature in question, I
have attempted to show in this my presentation by tracing his path
through the folios of the old authors and indicating the places where
he gathered the material for his doctrinal structure and the premises
for his conclusions. Finally, however, it should be emphasized that,
when SWEDENBORG collected his facts from the many separated fields of
literature, he found them not at all presented in the large works as
important ›chief subjects›, or even as lying plainly at hand. No, he
was often, so to say, obliged to dig out his material from a chaos of
erroneous observations, false interpretations and curious conceptions;
and afterwards he had to still further sift and elaborate it, before he
could draw his conclusions out of it.
In view of all this one must say that it was in truth a _work of genius_
to search out of such a chaos the guiding threads which were concealed
within it, and that, in spite of their imperfection in many points,
nevertheless to be able to find so much of the truth!
NOTES.
[1] See the treatise of ANDERS RETZIUS on: ›The Origin and Development
of Anatomy in the Scandinavian North›, which he delivered as an address
on the occasion of his leaving the presidency of the Royal Swedish
Academy of Sciences on April 9th, 1845. See also GUSTAF RETZIUS: Preface
to ›EMANUEL SWEDENBORG’s Scientific Works›, edit. by the Royal Swedish
Academy of Sciences, Vol. I., 1907, p. V., _et seqq._, and ALFRED H.
STROH, M. A.: ›Some testimonies concerning SWEDENBORG, the Scientist›,
Stockholm 1909, p. 10.
[2] In an address before the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences at
Stockholm in connection with a reference to SWEDENBORG’s work: ›De
Cerebro›, which had just appeared in the English translation by DR.
RUDOLF TAFEL; See GUSTAF RETZIUS: Op. cit. p. VI. and ALFRED H. STROH:
Op. cit. p. 11.
[3] See an address of MAX NEUBURGER concerning ›Swedenborg’s Beziehungen
zur Gehirnphysiologie›, delivered before the ›Versammlung deutscher
Naturforscher und Ärzte›, Hamburg, 1901.
[4] See the article by C. G. SANTESSON concerning SWEDENBORG in ›Nordisk
Tidskrift›, 1904, No. 5.
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