Page:Swedenborg, Harbinger of the New Age of the Christian Church.djvu/297

 description of the spiritual accomplishment of the judgment, and of its effect in dissipating the clouds of heaven.

In deducing from the Word under guidance of the Holy Spirit the doctrines of the New Jerusalem, the tabernacle of God among men, Swedenborg contemplated no new outward church organization. He describes orderly church government, but in no new form. His expectation seems to have been that the light of the new heaven, such as had been revealed to him, would gradually permeate the whole Christian Church and regenerate it. Such is the expectation of all who are so happy as to be familiar with his theological works. But naturally those who accept these doctrines as Divinely revealed through Swedenborg, unless specially attached to some existing church, believe it most suitable and most useful to organize together as a distinct body. This they have done first in England, then in America, and in smaller numbers in various parts of the world, under the title of the New Church, the New-Jerusalem Church, or the Church of the New Jerusalem—known more generally as Swedenborgians. In England the