Page:Swedenborg's Doctrine of Correspondence.djvu/57

Rh the answer has been given in what was said of the necessity for a dead sun and material world, and man's birth and experience in it, as a basis and containent of what is spiritual; and more will follow on this point in due course. Dr. Wilkinson has given an illustration of the connection of the spirit with the body, as to its reasons and modes, so striking and helpful that it is introduced here at length.

"The soul is connected with the body for the same reason as we are connected with the persons, objects, and circumstances that surround us, and which answer to our wants and interests. In a similar manner the body answers to the wants of the soul, being the soul's wife, the soul's friend, the soul's house, the soul's office, the soul's universe. It is engaged to the service of the soul; shaped into usefulness by the soul's ministrations. As the hand shapes the pen, and then writes with it, so the soul forms the body, and then makes use of the properties resulting from the form. The connection between the soul and the body is not more mysterious than the connection between the pen-maker and the pen, excepting that our knowledge of the pen is so much more