Swedenborg was a vegetarian, but this seems not to be a necessary
characteristic of those possessing illumination, although, when cosmic
consciousness shall have become almost general, vegetarianism must
inevitably come with it, as animal life will disappear from the earth.
Swedenborg, like many others who have perceived the cosmic light, evidently
believed that he had been specially selected and consecrated for the work
of the new church. That is, he took his illumination, not as an initiation
into the higher degrees of cosmic truth, but as a special and personal
revelation. This view characterizes those who founded a new, or a reformed
religious system, while as a matter of truth, the light that comes is a
part of the cosmic plan, and not, as Swedenborg and others imagine, as a
personal revelation.
However, Swedenborg considered himself a direct instrument in the hands of
God, and God is alluded to as a personality. He believed that his great
mission was to disclose the true nature of the Bible, and to prove that it
was actually the inspired word of God, having an esoteric meaning, which
has wrongly been interpreted to apply to the creation of a material world,
and to its history and its people, but that when understood, it explains
clearly, the nature of God, and the nature of man, and their relation to
each other.
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