— — — ›But SWEDENBORG had also in the course of his conversation with Charles XII. advanced several new proposals which won, in part, the King’s approval. SWEDENBORG suggested the establishment of a company to promote the exportation of Swedish iron and tar (a suggestion later put into practice by the Iron Office), set forth his plan for an observatory in Uppsala and brought up for discussion the establishment of salt works in Sweden in order to help his country against the terrible dearth of salt during the war: all these ideas he also committed to writing in pamphlets: ’_Om sättet för handelns och manufacturernas uphjelpande_’, ’_Memorial om Salt Siuderiers inrettning i Swerje_’ and ’_Om nyttan och nödvändigheten af ett Observatorii inrättande i Sverige_’ (preserved in manuscript in the Diocesan Library of Linköping).[23] Of the ideas just mentioned, it was in the first place the one on salt boileries which claimed the King’s attention and which he commissioned SWEDENBORG to put into practice. It still remains, however, to mention the most remarkable of SWEDENBORG’s projects. Through ERIC BENZELIUS he had come into possession of an old letter of Bishop HANS BRASK, in which the idea of a water way from the western coast straight across Sweden is expressed. SWEDENBORG, inspired by this, laid before the King the _suggestion for a canal from Göteborg through Lakes Vänern and Vättern to the Baltic_, which aroused the King’s enthusiasm. SWEDENBORG was commissioned to investigate the possibilities for the realization of this gigantic undertaking. — — — Shortly after this we find him in Uddevalla investigating the possibility of establishing salt-works, in connection with which SWEDENBORG at once set out to construct salt-pans and other apparatus better than those in use in the defective old salt-works at Strömstad. — — — We afterwards find him again at Trollhättan, Vänern, Gullspång and Hjälmaren examining the situation for the canal and locks and finding ’all to be possible and not of such great expense as had been supposed’. SWEDENBORG had passed over to the modern idea of an inland canal through Hjälmaren and Mälaren directly to Stockholm.› With justice it may be said that here he gives the impression of a very sharpsighted and energetic engineer, who possessed the power of turning his thorough theoretical education to practical use. It may thus be clearly perceived, from everything I have referred to above, how comprehensive and penetrating were the researches of SWEDENBORG in the mathematical (and especially the mechanical) branches of science, and what fruitful discoveries had been made by his searching eye. SWEDENBORG’S GEOLOGICAL, MINERALOGICAL, CHEMICAL, PHYSICAL AND COSMOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS. SWEDENBORG’s comprehensive interest now turned itself to new fields of work: to _geology_, _mineralogy_, _chemistry_, _physics_ and finally to _cosmology_, without giving up his first subject, _mathematics_.