Travels—Becomes Author—Is crossed in Love.
Having completed his university education, Swedenborg entered on his travels. In his journal, he thus briefly describes a four years’ absence from Sweden.
“In the year 1710 I set out for Gottenburg, that I might be conveyed, by ship, thence to London. On the voyage, my life was in danger four times: first on some shoals, toward which we were driven by a storm, until we were within a quarter of a mile from the raging breakers, and we thought we should all perish. Afterwards we narrowly escaped some Danish pirates under French colors; and the next evening we were fired into from a British ship, which mistook us for the same pirates, but without much damage. Lastly, in London itself, I was exposed to a more serious danger. While we were entering the harbor, some of our countrymen came to us in a boat, and persuaded me to go with them into the city. Now it was known in London that an epidemic was raging in Sweden, and therefore all who arrived from Sweden were forbidden to leave their ships for six weeks, or forty days; so I, having transgressed this law, was very near being hanged, and was only freed under the condition that, if any one attempted the same thing again, he should not escape the gallows.
“At London and Oxford I tarried about a year. Then I went to Holland and saw its chief cities. At Utrecht I tarried a long time, while Congress was sitting and ambassadors were gathering there from nearly all the courts of Europe. Thence I went into France, and passed through Brussels and Valenciennes to Paris. Here and at Versailles I spent a year. At the end of this time I hastened, by public coach, to Hamburg, and thence to Pomerania and Greifswalde, where I remained some time, while Charles the Twelfth was coming from Bender to Stralsund. When the siege began, I departed in a small vessel, together with a lady named Feif, and by Divine Providence was restored to my own country after more than four years’ absence.”
While traveling he was not idle; for we find that in 1715, while at Greifswalde, he published an oration on the return of Charles XII. from Turkey, and a small volume of Latin prose fables. On his return to Sweden, he issued, at Skara, a little book of poems, written for the most part during his journeyings. These have been republished at various times; but, as poems, much cannot be said of them. Wilkinson, in his “Biography of Swedenborg,” remarks: “These poems display fancy, but a controlled imagination. If we may convey to the English reader such a notion of Latin verses, they remind one of the Pope school, in which there is generally some theme, or moral, governing the flights of the Muse.” Indeed, it was well that Swedenborg was but slightly endowed with the poetic faculty. Much of his future mission lay in fields which require the coolest and calmest of minds to describe; the sight and contemplation of which, would have sent a Shaksperian or Byronic temperament into extatic frenzies.
Swedenborg, himself the son of a bishop, was connected with high and influential families in Sweden. One of his sisters was married to Eric Benzelius, afterwards Archbishop of Upsal; and another to Lars Benzelstierna, governor of a province. Other members of the family held high and responsible offices in the kingdom. A young man thus situated would find little difficulty in settling for life in a sphere of usefulness adapted to all his tastes. While on his travels on the Continent he wrote letters to Eric Benzelius, detailing every novelty in mathematics, astronomy, and mechanics, which came under his observation; besides sending home models of all such inventions as he thought might be useful to his country. These letters and services won for him considerable notice; and on his return to Sweden, he assumed the editorship of a new periodical work, entitled “Dædalus Hyperboreus.” Among the contributors to this magazine, was the celebrated mathematician, Christopher Polheim, who has been called the Swedish Archimedes. Swedenborg’s connection with Polheim seems to have led to his appointment to the office of Assessor of the Board of Mines, which he held with distinguished honor for many years.
In the year 1716, Polheim invited him to go with him to Lund, on a visit to Charles XII., who had just escaped from Stralsund. He was very kindly received by the King, and obtained from him his official appointment as Assessor. He was to assist Polheim in his undertakings, to have a seat in the College of Mines, and to give his advice, especially when any business of a mathematical nature was on hand.
Charles seems to have at once discerned the rare abilities of Swedenborg, and with a desire of uniting him in still closer bonds of amity with his favorite Polheim, he advised Polheim to give him his daughter in marriage. To this proposal Swedenborg appears to have been in nowise averse. He lived with Polheim, at once as his coadjutor, and as his pupil in mathematics; and having thus constant opportunities of seeing the fair Emerentia, Polheim’s second daughter, had become enamored of her graces. In one of his letters, he remarks: “Polheim’s eldest daughter is promised to a page of the king’s. I wonder what people say of this in relation to myself. His second daughter is, in my opinion, much the handsomest.” The attachment, however, was not mutual, and the lady would not allow herself to be betrothed. Her father, who deeply loved Swedenborg, caused a written agreement to be drawn up, promising his daughter at some future day. This document, Emerentia, from filial obedience signed; but, as ladies generally do, when forced to love in this way, took to sighs and sadness, which so affected her brother with sorrow, that he secretly purloined the agreement from Swedenborg. The paper was soon missed; for Swedenborg read it over frequently, and, in his grief at its loss, besought Polheim to replace it by a new one. But as Swedenborg now discovered the pain which he gave to the object of his affections, he at once relinquished all claim to her hand, and left her father’s house. This was his last, as it was his first endeavor after marriage. In after years, when jocosely asked whether he had ever been desirous of marrying, he answered: “In my youth I was once on the road to matrimony.” And on being asked what was the obstacle, with his characteristic simplicity he said: “She would not have me.” Considering the studious and abstracted life which he eventually led, it is not to be regretted that he remained unwedded. That he was no harsh despiser of the sex, we know well from his writings; and that his life was in agreement with his books, we also know. The loveliest descriptions of female grace and beauty we have ever met with, are contained in his works, chiefly in his treatise on “Conjugial Love.” M. Sandell, a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences in Sweden, who pronounced a magnificent eulogium on his fellow-member, Swedenborg, shortly after his death, says: “Though Swedenborg was never married, it was not owing to any indifference toward the sex; for he esteemed the company of a fine, intelligent woman as one of the most agreeable of pleasures; but his profound studies rendered expedient for him the quiet of a single life.”
Swedenborg seems to have had much intercourse with the King. In one of his letters, he says: “I found his Majesty very gracious to me; more so than I could expect. This is a good omen for the future. Every day I laid mathematical subjects before his Majesty, who allowed everything to please him. When the eclipse took place, I had his Majesty out to see it, and we reasoned much thereupon. He again spoke of my ‘Dædalus,’ and remarked upon my not continuing it; for which I pleaded want of means. This he does not like to hear of; so I hope to have some assistance shortly.” But assistance did not come, and “Dædalus” went the way of many such undertakings. Talking of mathematics one day, Charles remarked that “he who knew nothing of mathematics, did not deserve to be considered a rational man;” a sentiment which Swedenborg thought “truly worthy of a king.”[1]
Charles XII. was now engaged in the siege of Frederickshall, and Swedenborg’s aid was called in. He very ingeniously planned rolling machines, by which two galleys, five large boats, and a sloop, were conveyed from Stromstadt to Iderfjol, overland; a distance of fourteen miles. Under cover of these vessels, Charles was enabled to transport his heavy artillery under the very walls of Frederickshall; but it availed little, for at the siege of this town, on November 30, 1718, (old style,) this inveterate warrior received the fatal blow which ended his troublous and eventful career. He was struck in the head with a cannon ball, and though death must have been instantaneous, he was found with his right hand firmly grasping the handle of his sword; so prompt was he to put himself in an attitude of defence.
“His fall was destined to a barren strand,
A petty fortress and a dubious hand;
He left a name at which the world grew pale,
To point a moral or adorn a tale.”
In 1719 the Swedberg family were ennobled by Queen Ulrica Eleonora, and Swedenborg from that time took his place with the nobles of the equestrian order, in the triennial Assemblies of the States. This distinction conferred little else than a change of name. He was neither a Count nor a Baron, as has very commonly been supposed.
Emanuel Swedenborg was rapidly winning for himself the name of a deep thinker and a ready writer. In 1717 he published “An Introduction to Algebra,” under the title of “The Art of the Rules.” It was highly praised for its clearness, and the order and force of its examples. The first portion of the work, however, was all that was published. The second, containing the first account given in Sweden of the differential and integral calculus, still remains in MS. His second publication this year was, “Attempts to find the Longitude of Places by Lunar Observations.” Both works were written in Swedish.
In 1719 four works proceeded from his increasingly fertile pen. “A Proposal for a Decimal System of Money and Measures;” “A Treatise on the Motion and Position of the Earth and Planets;” “Proofs derived from Appearances in Sweden, of the Depth of the Sea, and the greater Force of the Tides in the Ancient World;” and “On Docks, Sluices, and Salt Works.”
His work on the Decimal system of coinage and measures was republished in 1795. Swedenborg’s ideas on this and most other subjects were far ahead of the times in which he lived. In one of his letters he thus alludes to the discouragements he met with on this account. “It is a little discouraging to me to be advised to relinquish my views, as among the novelties the country can not bear. For my part, I desire all possible novelties; aye, a novelty for every day in the year; for in every age there is an abundance of persons who follow the beaten track, and remain in the old way; while there are not more than from six to ten in a century who bring forward innovations founded on argument and reason.”