called an internal church. Still it was not so called because it had no sort of external worship whatever; and this it could not have without representatives as its vehicle. For the Lord, who was worshiped, could be only representatively present, and therefore the worship of him must needs have been a representative one.

We see, then, that the argument from the fact that the most ancient church had no external ritual and formal worship like ours, is shorn of its power in respect to the New Jerusalem. For that church had an external worship of its own, consisting in its observance of the natural things by which its members were surrounded, and by which, as representatives, the minds of its members were led upwards to spiritual, celestial and divine things, and by which, as objects of thought their minds were kept in the contemplation, love and practice of the things which they represented. And, as we have clearly and fully shown, there was no other possible way by which beings on this, or any other, earth, could have divine, celestial, or spiritual things presented and kept exhibited to them for their apprehension and appropriation. Hence we have expressly shown, that the members of the most ancient church had "the significative or enigmatical representations of terrestrial objects." (A. C. 920.) Thus they had representatives in their external worship, which was in the external of their minds, and therefore was wholly internal in comparison with ours. But still it was an external worship in them; for terrestrial objects are truths in the ultimates of order in which the spiritual and celestial things of heaven, and the divine things of the Lord, terminate, and by which those things are continually presented to the minds of men. So that in the external region, in the imaginative faculty, of the celestial members of the most ancient church, they formed a living internal ritual of ideas of thought. And that church had no external ritual worship, merely because the minds of its members did not at all rest in the objects of sense. The objects of sense, however, were present to their senses, and furnished, as we have shown above, the temple of their internal worship. Thus they were like the angels of heaven, who, having the exact corresponding effigies of what is in their minds always out of them, have, as is now known, temples for worship, as well as houses and palaces-but never let their minds rest in the things which are objects of sight in them.*

Now, thus we argue. The same would be the character of christian

*Moreover, the most ancient church had no external ritual worship like ours, because, as we have before shown, its members had no external respiration and speech like ours. Of course, they could have no such prayers, praises, or preachings as we have. And does it not devolve on those who maintain that the New Jerusalem, as a celestial church, is to have a divine worship "exclusively internal, and in no respect external," like that of the most ancient church-to prove that the members of the New Jerusalem, in her celestial stage, will also have no external speech or respiration? At any rates, we can very confidently maintain, that the New Jerusalem must have an external ritual worship now, while the physical constitution of her members is so different from that of the most ancient people. And we can quite as confidently argue, that she will at all times, even in her highest celestial stage, continue to have such an external worship, because she will perpetually differ from the most ancient church in this respect.

worship, if, whatever external forms and ceremonies were performed without them, Christians did not at all rest in those externals, but passed through to the perception, love and practice of the internal things which they signified. Hence the New Jerusalem will become a celestial church, not by putting off entirely all external forms and representative ceremonies, but, as we have now so fully shown, by fulfilling them, that is, by infilling them with the spiritual and celestial things to which they correspond. In short, it will become celestial, when its chief characteristic is the celestial principle. Hence, as the only difference between the most ancient church and those that succeeded it, in regard to representatives, was, that in the latter representatives became more and more dead, while in the former they were vital, therefore the New Jerusalem will become the celestial church restored when she too makes dead representatives alive. In the most ancient church representatives were "real things" from the Lord, and the temple of their worship was the universe of nature. But, in succeeding churches, men came at last to the imitation of terrestrial objects in temples made by their own hands. This, however, does not alter the principle: for it matters not whether the man looks at the real thing in nature, or at the imitation of it in art; it is in both cases the idea of his mind with which spirits and angels are consociated; and thus it is the thought, perception, or affection of his mind in regarding that thing which determines the nature and quality of his worship. For all worship consists in the acknowledgment of the Divine Being, the prostration of self before him, and conjunction of man thereby with him and heaven. Hence, if a man, when he sees an object of nature, or of factitious formal worship, thinks not at all of the object of sense, but regards in it only the Lord and what belongs to him and heaven, and proposes to himself no selfish end whatever, but only looks to the universal good, then his worship is not at all representative, is not at all external, is wholly internal; because it is wholly characterized by what is internal, and worship is called by its chief characteristic.

We conclude, then, that even the celestial church must have an external representative form appropriate to its internal celestial essence. And, therefore, every church must have representatives as the external of its worship. Consequently the New Jerusalem, even when she becomes, in her most consummate advancement, a celestial church, must still have an external, celestial, representative worship. Much more must she have a true, spiritual, representative worship, before she becomes celestial, and when she is passing through her spiritual stage. And still more must she have an external representative ritual worship, when she is only in the sensual, scientific and natural degree.

And the New Jerusalem, as a celestial church, will always differ radically from the most ancient as a celestial one, in this-the most ancient people were born celestial, that is, with celestial instincts. Hence that church could fall by becoming merely natural. But the people of the New Jerusalem are born natural, that is, in total ignorance and impotence as to all spiritual things, and only with a

capacity of becoming celestial. And hence, as the New Jerusalem rises from the lowest plane to the highest, by a free and rational putting off of the evils and fallacies of the one, and a free and rational putting on of the goods and truths of the other, she, as a celestial church, can never fall away by becoming merely natural again.* Hence, as the New Jerusalem will at all times have the whole of the three degrees opening in her, because she incessantly begins in the natural plane, and will always have infants, children, youth and adults amongst her members, she will at all times, throughout her unending existence and her ever advancing perfection on this earth, have constantly an external ritual worship, formed from true representatives in the letter of the Word. (See the first note, or that with an asterisk, at the bottom of page 433.) These representatives will be the means of introducing and developing internal principles in the minds of children, born still in ignorance, and of containing and securing them in the minds of intelligent manhood and wise old age. And her advancing stages will be marked by deeper and deeper insights into, and more and more interior apprehensions of, the infinite divine things which will have been lying stored up from the first in her external rituals. So that, as the internal principles of the Word, having now come down to the lowest plane, and, resting on that plane as a house on its foundation, is" for ever established in heaven" and in all worlds, so the church, which is founded, like the Word itself, upon representatives in its letter, is for ever established, and can never again be destroyed. The church at first was instituted in internals alone, and fell away by coming into externals alone; but now the church is to be restored

This subject may be illustrated by what Swedenborg says of angels deriving a power of subsistence from having been first born men, in the Tract on Divine Wisdom, VIII. If angels had been created such, that is, had been formed men in the spheres of the spiritual world, they could not have subsisted, because their bodies would have been, like all the subsistences there, perpetually changing in correspondence with the changes of the state of their affections. He says-substances in the spiritual world appear as if they were material; but still they are not so; and inasmuch as they are not material, therefore they are not constant, being correspondences of the affections of the angels, and being permanent with the affections of the angels, and disappearing with them. Similar would have been the case with the angels, if they had been created there." Thus, as angels would not have subsisted, if they had been first created men in the celestial heaven; so men on earth, who were created with celestial instincts, could not subsist in their celestial state, for the want of a suitable celestial-natural ultimate as a continent and defence of their intimate celestial principles; so that the church in them inevitably became extinct, whenever they became natural. But an angel and a spirit, in consequence of being first born a man in the world, derives subsistence; for he derives from the inmost principles of nature a medium with himself between what is spiritual and what is natural, by which he is bounded to subsistence and permanence, having relation by the latter to those things which are in nature, and having also a principle corresponding to those things." And thus, as angels are bounded to subsistence and permanence by having a natural substratum for their internal substances and forms, and a perfect reciprocal correspondence between them, so the members of the New Jerusalem as a celestial church, will be bound to subsistence and permanence, in consequence of having been first born natural, and having become celestial by divine recreation or regeneration, so as to take with them, into the highest celestial elevation of their church, an external ritual worship, as a truly representative form, and a celestialnatural correspondent, of their internal celestial principles.

from externals alone, and, having " its externals correspond with its internals so as to make one," and so as to have " its external worship serve as a plane to its interiors," its internal or celestial essence is so to be encased in and defended by its celestial, spiritual and natural formularies, that it can never fall away again.

Thus, to recapitulate and conclude, the perfection of the New Jerusalem, over the most ancient celestial church, will consist in this— that the New Jerusalem will be as fully in externals as she is in internals; whereas the most ancient church was not in externals at all. Hence the most ancient church could fall away, by coming into externals and resting in them alone. But the New Jerusalem begins in externals and rises to internals, without putting the externals wholly off; but, on the contrary, retaining them as the continent of her internal principles. Hence she will never fall away again, after she has once become celestial; for she will never be tempted to go out into externals alone, inasmuch as she has been in them, come out of them as the principle of her worship, and still holds them as the safeguard and defence of her celestial powers and privileges. It is equally impossible for her to fall away from her celestial state, when once she has risen from the natural degree through the spiritual degree into it, as it is for the celestial angels to fall from their empyrean; for however high may be her elevation, she will still have an involucrum from the natural degree, which will cause her to be still representative in form, however celestial she may become in essence; and, therefore, she will always be a true representative church, so far as to have her "internal in an appropriate external," and thus to have "upon all the glory a defence, or covering-a tabernacle for a shadow in the day time from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and for a covert, from storm and rain."

It is high time to bring this head of our report to a close. The great importance of the subject has seemed to us to demand thus much of our attention. But, although it is far from exhausted, enough is here advanced to show, most conclusively, that the New Jerusalem is to have representatives in an external ritual worship, and therefore must have representative priestly offices for its administration. Hence there must be in the New Jerusalem a priesthood strictly representative of the Lord in his work of redeeming and saving men. And as the Lord saves men in three discrete degrees, that is, in the natural, the spiritual, and the celestial heavens, consequently there must be three grades of priests to represent him in these three degrees of his divine operation. For, as he has now come fully into ultimates, so as to operate in saving men "from himself in first principles and from himself in ultimates ;" and "the ultimates, through which the Lord operates, are upon earth, and indeed with men," (Ap. Rev. 798;) therefore there cannot be a trine of priestly uses alone, but there must also be a trine of priestly men, as ultimates by whom the Lord may operate in the performance of those uses; "because the love of the Lord is to perform uses to the community, and to each society in the community, and he performs these by means of men who are principled in love to

him." (Ap. Rev. 353.) And such we confidently maintain is the true nature of the ministerial trine as it must exist in the New Jerusalem on earth.

VIII. AUTHORITIES FOR THE TRINAL ORDER IN THE NEW CHURCH AND HER MINISTRY.

It is not our purpose to give all the authorities for the trine which the Word and the writings of our church are supposed to contain. The ecclesiastical council of the Central Convention has not done its duty in making a thorough search for those authorities. All we propose to do, and all we can do, is to collate the chief of the authorities previously advanced, and to offer such as have occurred in our own reading, or have been presented to us by the members of the council, with such remarks upon the most prominent ones generally acknowledged, as the objects of this report may seem to require.

We are required "to determine the trine in the ministry as taught in the Word, and from thence in the writings of Swedenborg." This requisition presents two questions for consideration and determination-Is there a trine? and what should that trine be? The first comes under this head, the second will come under the next.

The duty enjoined on us indicates two sources to which we should go in search of our authorities-the Word, and the writings of Swedenborg. To the first source, Mr. Cabell has professedly gone; to the second, Mr. Powell. Under the present head, the design is to go to the Word as explained by Swedenborg, that is, to the Word as it is expounded in his writings. To this there may be some exceptions, in regard to authorities drawn from the New Testament; but it is the general law by which the matters under this head are to be governed.

First, as to the trine in the church. In proof that there is a trine in the church, we shall advance but one passage from Swedenborg's writings; because this is so express, clear and conclusive, that the presentation of any others is wholly unnecessary.

In explaining Rev. xvii. 14-particularly these words, "and they that are with him are called, and chosen and faithful"-Swedenborg says, "by the called, chosen and faithful are signified they who are in the externals, internals and inmost principles of the church": and adds, "The reason why it means those who are in the externals, internals and inmost principles of the church, is, because the Lord's church is distinguished, like heaven, into THREE DEGREES: in the ultimate degree are they who are in its externals, in the second degree are they who are in its internals, and in the third degree are they who are in its inmost principles." Further, "It is here said, 'They that are with him are called, and chosen and faithful,' because it was said before, that they shall fight with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, that they may know that such as the Lord overcomes, that is, convinces, by the Word, are with him in heavensome in the ultimate heaven, some in the second, and some in the third, every one according to reception." (Ap. Rev. 744.) A thou