"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat better; half an hour after I heard a clamour under my head; I thought that then the tempter went away; immediately there came over me a rigor so strong from the head and the whole body, with some din, and this several times. I found that something holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over me so strong a shivering from head to foot, as if many winds rushed together, which shook me, was indescribable, and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while I was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw that I was cast down, and wondered what it meant. And I spoke as if I was awake, but found that the word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent Jesus Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to come to so great a sinner, make me worthy of this grace!' I held my hands together and prayed, and then came a hand which squeezed my hands hard; immediately thereupon I continued in prayer."[57] Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks with celestial visitants, and, of course, all thought of imposture must be put on one side. What one has to consider is whether we are to accept these experiences as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further evidence seems possible than the profound faith of the man himself, his recognised mental ability, and the belief of his followers. And against this it must be urged that the most complete honesty is no guarantee against self-deception, while ability and even genius are not at all incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in addition it must be borne in mind that these hallucinations are, after all, part of a very large class. Men of very little ability and influence experience substantially the same visions; they occur all over the world, under all conditions of culture, and always express the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject and reflect the character of his social environment. One may safely say that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while he might still have gone through the same mental and physical experiences, he himself would have given a very different interpretation of them.