Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/361

 A STRANGE BOOK 345 confusions of grandeur and littleness. The satire and invective also are closely akin to Blake's in their uncouth strength, their furious, awkward hard-hitting ; though here again the younger poet never equals some of the happy decisive strokes of the elder. In- deed, much of Wilkinson's early severe criticism on Blake, cited in the first section, is juster criticism on Wilkinson's later self and on his too-revered master, Swedenborg. In this volume are conspicuous the " utter want of elaboration, and even, in many cases, inattention to the ordinary rules of grammar." Here also the writer's " Imagination, self-divorced from a Reason which might have elevated and chastened it," has "found a home in the ruins of ancient and con- summated Churches, and imbued itself with the super- ficial obscurity and ghastliness, far more than with the inward grandeur of primeval times." Here also the you value your small share of reason consult not long. Behold the heart, I mean the nose, of the mystery : " NoSE (the) sig. [signifies] the life of good, on account of the respiration which has place, which, in the internal sense, is life, and likewise on account of odour, which is the grateful principle of love, whereof good is. A. C. 3103. Nose, or nostrils, sig. perception. A. C. 3577, 10,292. Those in the pro- vince of the nose are in various degrees of the perception of truth, but the more interior, the more perfect. H. H. 96. . . . "Nostrils. See "Blast of the Breath of the Nostrils." (Ps. xvii. 16) sig. the east wind, which destroys by drying up, and overthrows all by its penetration. Ap. Ex. 741." So now the good reader is as wise as myself, and knows all about this bewildering nose. In dismissing this dreary subject, I may just remark that Swedenborg discreetly secures for himself a most convenient latitude of interpretation by attributing in a very large number of cases a good and a bad sense to the internal or spiritual meanings of the words and phrases of the Word. Thus if in certain texts the while signification would revolt your intellect or conscience, you have only to adopt the black, and vice versd. A truly admir- able hermeneutic device !