Page:Swedenborg, Harbinger of the New Age of the Christian Church.djvu/156

 in various ways by evil spirits when I was in temptations; and afterward when writing anything to which the spirits had an aversion, I was almost possessed by them, so as to feel something like a tremor. Flamy lights were seen [confirming what was written] and conversations heard in the early morning, besides many other things." "For nearly three years"—he writes in August, 1747—"I have been allowed to perceive and notice the operation of spirits, not by a sort of internal sight, but by a sensation which is associated with a sort of obscure sight, by which I noticed their presence, which was various, their approach and departure, besides many other things."

For some years his dreams had been growing more remarkable and more significant, so that he had been led to keep a record of them. The earlier records, beginning as early as 1736, were cut from his Diary for preservation in the family and now are lost; but there is still preserved a minute account of the dreams that he had at Amsterdam and London in the spring and summer of 1744, the critical period of his spiritual experience, together with a brief memorandum of those that