3190. EBB to Arabella Moulton-Barrett
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 19, 49–60.
Florence.
April 12. [1853] [1]
My ever dearest Arabel, here I am again. Rap, rap– If I were a spirit I could’nt haunt you much more. Mr Lytton has most graciously bethought him of the possibility of our caring to send a letter by his special messenger, [2] on thursday, so I hope he may repeat this civility. Mr Stuart seems to me in a scrape with the Legation past recovering from, [3] and although Mr Lytton comes here frequently, I dont know how it was, .. I fell into a convulsion of shyness & could’nt utter a request about special messengers, as he seemed never to think of them. I got from him a right of entrance to the Boboli gardens on private as well as public days—& the other petition ‘stuck in my throat.’ Well—he has thought of it himself at last. I like him all the better for that, & so will you. But really he is interesting on other accounts, full of good & talent, it seems to me. I only wonder how his father submits to be separated from his only remaining child, particularly as I think he is not happy here nor strong in health, nor with any leaning to diplomatic pursuits, nor with the least social necessity on him for doing uncongenial work– I heard the other day that the chargé d’affaires [4] here was complaining of him for not working enough, .. for “just going about dreaming over Mrs Browning’s poems.”! He writes poems of his own too, I fancy, & is about to print them. And as he is now borrowing Swedenborg from somebody,! I fancy that Sir Edward Lytton wont gain his point of “making him less visionary by sending him into the world.” That’s why the father parts with him. I would’nt part with my Wiedeman for such a reason, no, indeed. A violent plunge into the world, to an uncongenial temperament, is followed by a violent reaction of the inner life. The young man has taken a villa in the neighbourhood, [5] in an utter state of disgust at the society of Florence, and there he dreams his heart full I dare say. He likes us both, I am sure. He squeezes my hand almost off; & he told Robert the other day that he was the “least like an author” of any man of the pen he ever knew .. which was intended as an immense compliment, whichever way you may understand it, you–
Thank you, darling Arabel, for your welcome little note by Mr Kenyon. Little note, say I. I deserve a long letter from you by this time. Mr Kenyon wrote most kindly to us, & I had enclosures from Miss Bayley who does not deign to mention the spirits, & Mrs Jameson who does. Mrs Jameson says that they are much talked of in London, & “taken up by the dreamers,” but that the nonsense talked about them would not, if I heard it, commend the subject to me. I shall tell her that no amount of nonsense talked, ever dis-commends any subject with me. The most nonsense is talked always of the most important subjects—such as religion, & politics. People dont talk nonsense about poonah-painting, for instance.
Let me not forget to tell you that Mr & Mrs Clarke, who had that supposed manifestation from their child, you will remember, [6] .. and Mr Spring, have returned from Rome. They stay a few days in Florence & then go north. Mr Spring was Madme Ossoli’s great friend– [7] I think I told you—& how he came here on his way to Rome & spent an evening, & expressed a very sceptical opinion about the “spirits” generally, … yet could’nt believe that the whole affair was imposture, .. but concluded that the most of it was. Well—he told me yesterday that he had changed his views since he saw me. He had had letters from America. The Lowerings, [8] connections of the Greenhoughs & intimate friends of his own, had become mediums, and that was a testimony which it was out of his power to reject. I was to set him down therefore as a believer from henceforth. Then Mr Clarke had heard a letter read at Rome from Mrs Child [9] .. Maria Child .. you may have heard of her perhaps, (I have) as an American author. The first part of her letter expressed her incredulity about the spirits—she thought the whole might be deceptive—she was unbelieving altogether. Then, suddenly came a passage … “Since writing the above I have had an experience which changes my views” … going on to narrate a manifestation she had been witness to, & a communication which she herself received from a departed friend of her own. This & the fact of the mediumship of the Lowerings, .. (Miss Lowering is one of her favorite friends, to whom she dedicated a book of hers, [10] ..) had entirely convinced her. As to the moving of tables, nobody wonders at it even, it has grown to be so common. Indeed, the will of persons in a peculiar mesmeric state, is said to be sufficient to produce it. Some people talk of it as a “new law, issuing from the intellectual development of the race, & showing the influence of spirit upon matter,” … not necessarily connected therefore with disembodied spirits at all—these things are explained differently by different thinkers, you see.– Then there is a case which has just occurred, of a Dr Tims, [11] whom, it appears everybody knows in America. He is a clergyman of the episcopal church, of evangelical principles, & widely respected. Well—this man has been investigating the spirits, & they have made a sort of onslaught on him it appears—and he has just entreated the prayers of his congregation, feeling himself in danger of insanity or possession. There is a calvinistic minister [12] too, a good deal vexed by the spirits—not that they do him any harm, .. but they teaze him, put him out of temper, dash about his lamps & furniture generally, & rap the patience out of him, poor man. Tell me if it tires you to hear of these things. As I am not going to write a book about them, Arabel, (oh, there’s no danger at present) I tell you everything in my letters. Does it teaze you? tell me. Oh—and you have given me a fright about borrowing Swedenborg– Dont do it, till you have me back—mind you dont. I am frightened. Because, you see, I dont want you to recoil, to misapprehend—and Swedenborg is a writer hard to do justice to. By “looking in to him” you see neither form nor colour. You catch up sentences perhaps which will make you conclude .. “he is a heretic on this point, on that point, .. & you, Ba, if you listen to him will go to the devil straight.” Then, read by glimpses, he is fanatical, fantastical, say mad. If you take him, on the other hand, in a firm grasp, give him your full consideration, and carry his whole system into your comprehension, he is a wonderful writer,—I know of none like him for my part, .. Plato was never so grand. Also, the system of the universe, as he gives it, seems to stand out in its own light of self-evidence; one thinks, ‘I wonder I never thought of that before”. But you learn nothing by an odd volume, or the rapid reading of a volume. You dont understand the parts except by the whole. Milton caught sight of his system when he said .. “What if earth
Be but the shadow of Heaven” &c [13]
Swedenborg does not hold the received view about the Trinity—but he holds by the Trinity. He objects to the phrase “three persons” (not to be seen in Scripture certainly) but he believes in the three Divines, the Father, Son, & Holy Ghost, the Divine Esse, the Divine Existere, & the Divine Proceeding. [14] He considers that this Trinity is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. He objects to the ordinary form of application to God “for the sake of Jesus Christ,” because he says it makes separation in the human mind of what is One, & because no human being can approach God except in His manifestation of Jesus Christ. He magnifies the work of Christ everywhere, though not accepting the usual explanation of the word “propitiation” [15] .. holds that without Christ’s work on the earth, all were lost, & except by it, none are saved. He believes in universal redemption [16] .. (just as your Plymouth brethren do, Arabel, so dont frown too much), .. & maintains that Christ “stands at the door & knocks” [17] while every man lives. He rejects the idea of “instantaneous mercy”, [18] .. because without regeneration, a man could not breathe in Heaven .. he would “writhe as a serpent before the fire.” [19] He rejects the idea of ‘arbitrary punishment’ here or hereafter. The Lord wills the spiritual death & damnation of no man. In the next world, men cast themselves down into Hell, simply because their love is there. [20] Finally he rejects the resurrection of the body as usually understood, [21] holding the doctrine of a spiritual body in all points similar to this—so similar, that men when they are first dead have to be told they are dead, there is so little apparent change in their state. [22] Then, those who are in union with the Lord, grow gradually into an ineffable youth & beauty. [23] He does’nt believe in angels or devils as a distinct race or species. He says they are all taken out of human nature. [24] The fall of man he receives literally, but the account of Adam & Eve in the garden, he says, is symbolical of the state & fall of the “most ancient church.” [25] His views of the Church generally, I think very beautiful & scriptural—but I am not going to send you an abstract of Swedenborg. These are the points, (these which I have written about) on which chiefly he is peculiar, doctrinally speaking. His philosophy of the universe is rather a philosophy than a theology, and I consider it very grand, & probably true. You are to consider that the worst said of this man in his life was, that he was mad. But there is strong evidence to show that he was a calm strong-headed man, a man in strong health. His honesty & piety were unimpeachable. Oberlin [26] was a disciple of his. He predicted the day of his death a month at least before in a letter still extant, [27] .. and he solemnly declared just before he died, as he received the Lord’s supper from a Swedish clergyman, that he had seen these things in real vision. [28] I am inclined to think that he had a veritable spiritual insight, & was admitted into much that is divine. At the same time, I deduce no belief in his infallibility– It seems to me that he mistook the representatives of things for the things themselves sometimes, & made other mistakes. Still he should be honored[,] in my opinion, as a great Christian visionary. If not a true visionary, he is one of the greatest geniuses that ever wrote among men. Take your choice.
But dont read him just now, Arabel. Wait till I come. Robert says that when he is rich he will buy a Tuscan villa. And I say that when I am rich I will buy a complete edition of Swedenborg. One of his books is in twelve thick volumes. [29] And that’s nothing to the rest. So wait, Arabel.– Meanwhile neither Robert nor I are likely to be rich, I assure you .. unless we make fortunes with our new books. No Rome for us, it seems to me. Not a word,—perfect oblivion! The dividend must be paid to us in a day or two, & then we shall see if Robert is right or if I am.– It is bearable & healthy at Rome till the end of May, if we choose our situation carefully. Till the end of June, some of our friends swear—but we must be on the prudent extreme side for the sake of our Penini.
Such a darling that child is. He loses none of his grace & prettiness indeed, & his hair gets longer & thicker which improves him. The waterfall of golden ringlets under the little green hat is lovely in my eyes, & in other people’s too, for Wilson says he never goes out without audible admirations on all sides. His friendship with Girolama continues fast. It’s difficult to get him past the street where she lives with her mother & friend, Anina, & the doves (a great attraction) up a dark pair of stairs. Wilson gets out of patience sometimes. “Its nothing but Girolama, Girolama!’[’] said she– ‘I am quite tired of Girolama.’ “O naughty, untind Lily! Mates me twite ill if you peat so. Mates me cly. Poor litty Olam! (Girolama)– Poor litty tiney Olam!”—— I must tell you one thing of him– The day before yesterday or the day before that, (I forget) he was very anxious to go out, but the skies were lowering & threatening a ‘bur[r]asca’. [30] He ran out on the terrace & looked up at the clouds– “Gentle Jesus, you not going to send the rain when poor Penini wants to go out so velly mush? Wait till tomollow.” Then, he came in to Wilson who was listening– “I asked gentle Jesus not to send the rain,—and I sint he wont.” He has such winning little ways, more & more. He comes to me when I am reading, & kisses my sleeve (to make the interruption as gentle as possible) & then begins … “Dear Mama, .. you dive me” … this or that– Sometimes when there’s a decided intention of coaxing, it’s “mine dear Ba”, or “mine darling”. Robert is generally “mine dear Wobit”. Oh, Robert keeps his advantages I assure you. I have reason to be jealous.
As to Girolama’s doves they are objects of deep interest. He prays for them occasionally, & always sends them lumps of sugar by poor Girolama, who probably turns the sugar to more personal uses. He told us the other day, that “now,” the “papa-dove had done an egg,” over which Penini was greatly rejoicing. He is in supreme joy at having his “tittet” (ticket) besides, and having the right of entrance to the Boboli gardens at all days & hours. These, I think you know, are the Grand ducal gardens, close by, & magnificent .. rich with trees, & bowering walks & fountains, & with splendid views of Florence from the upper part of them. At first he expected, he said, that the soldiers would salute him from the drums, as they did the Grand Duke himself. And now he is hoping that he shall be allowed to play with the “Lan Dute’s litty boys” [31] which of course is a very moderate expectation. I have just had to get six new pinafores for that child. The diaper we bought, Arabel, has worn very badly indeed, English as it is. I have bought too, some embroidery for a little muslin polka jacket for him for the summer, at a reasonable price for Italy—it is from a convent. Perhaps we are rather extravagant about Penini’s dress, but the temptation is too strong for me––I cant resist what is to add a touch to his prettiness.
Arabel! here’s a good thing done by Louis Napoleon. He got out the Madiai. Mark that. It was always said here that he had done it, but I did not know for a certainty until yesterday that it was he. Mr Hanna has returned from Rome. We heard him preach on sunday, & yesterday, monday, he paid us a visit in the morning. He says he believes it to be an incontrovertible fact that Louis Napoleon liberated the Madiai. Whatever that man undertakes to do he does it with his hand, observe .. while other people talk, he acts. And he has better & nobler intentions, as always I have maintained, (have’nt I?) than his critics have an inkling of. You see, after all the talk there has been about his supposed intention of abolishing civil marriages, the Moniteur comes out with the declaration that he never contemplated such a step. [32] Of course he never did. I have been swearing he never did, ever so long! Mr Stuart is one of his foes to the death—he goes a mile or two on the other side of Robert. Robert & I, by the way, are rather on better terms, with regard to Napoleonism, rapping spirits & the rest. But if I wrote a book on the rapping spirits, or Swedenborgianism—oh poor, darling Robert. How I remember he was vexed in Paris, when Madme Thiebault cried out across Lady Elgin’s drawingroom, “I think, Mrs Browning, you dont believe in matter at all.” [33] —— Ah– Robert & all of you set me down as wild & headlong & the rest—but there’s considerable reason in my wildness, & thought in my head-longness. My creed is, that we have not so much wisdom in the world as to afford to leave off learning, .. & I try to keep myself open to truth let it come from what quarter it may.– Mr Hanna had heard a good deal at Rome about the American manifestations. “He is much interested in general about superstitions,” he said, “but not in these– First, they are not poetical, & then they are contradictory to Revelation”– He went on to explain that the state of the spirits was’nt satisfactory– Evidently he was uneasy because the questionable sorts of spirits were much too easy & said nothing about fire & brimstone! I answered meekly [‘]‘that the thing to ascertain was whether or not the manifestations were facts. No fact could contradict revelation, though it might contradict a specific interpretation of revelation—as Geological science does the common interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis.” Mr Hanna & I never get into an argument—oh no– He is a Calvinist of the highest—and I am content to sympathize with him where we are agreed. [34] By the way, Arabel, dont ruffle Mr Stratten with any mention of Swedenborg– It would just ruffle him, & he would misapprehend a good deal. Men who teach, are so used to contemplate a truth in a form, that they are always apt to confound the form & the thing, giving an incommensurate importance to the form. Only what is in me I let out naturally to you. I want you to understand that with all my madness, I am not likely to go far from you in belief & love. Let us all hold fast by the scriptures. Indeed I do try not to let go.
I should like to see Faber’s book. [35] Does he take the view of “suspended consciousness,” or does he admit the “spiritual body” from the first. Frederic Tennyson is vehemently in favour of Faber’s view of the prophecy. You should hear Mr Tennyson talk. When we knew him first he gave ear to Swedenborg. But now he has thrown off Swedenborg, & takes the most earthy-of-the-earth view of the body & state of things which shall be. You should hear him talk. He said quite seriously the other night, that the sea would be abolished to make more room, & that Christ would reign at Jerusalem & carry on the government throughout the world by means of the electric telegraph. I want to know what Swedenborg has said, wilder than that! Mr Tennyson & I fight a little sometimes, & confute one another out of your testament, Arabel– Robert leans to his side of the argument, but helps me generously now & then. Oh—that you were here for a righteous umpire, dearest, darling Arabel! As for Robert, I have a trick of fancying that he is half agreeing with me in his heart, when he is bumping me most about the head.
It grieves me, what you said about Storm. But then I comfort myself with the idea that if he talks only as he used to talk to us, a stranger would conclude him to be a Roman Catholic without waiting for more evidence. [36] Still, it is sad enough that he should not have put away those fancies after so many years. Fancies fashioned according to the process we know! Arabel—dont forget to give my true love to Storm when you write to him. I dare say he has left off thinking of me altogether—but I have not left off loving him dearly—& you must say so–
Mr Lytton has come in suddenly to apprize us that the special messenger goes away tomorrow instead of thursday, so I cant write the letter I meant to send to dearest Henrietta. Well—I must write to her next time. Meantime I rather grudge all this abstract meditation which I have bestowed on you, since the rest of my letter must be shortened.
Arabel—Chapman sends a note today to say, that the second volume of my poems is in the press, & that the proofs will be forwarded duly to “Miss Barrett.” Really——ought’nt I to be ashamed of myself for troubling you so? It seems to me impudent, to use a mild word. As you said nothing of any proofs in your last note, I began to conclude that Chapman had taken the correcting of the press on himself—but no, not he. Dearest Arabel, if you should have much to do, or not feel well .. what then? Write to me & say how it is– Oh, if you can do it, I know you will not grudge the time or the pains, but if I helped to tire you it would vex me in the thought even. And this cold, Arabel——you have had a bad cold. I had a presentiment about your having a cold. You have been out in all sorts of weather, at the chapel, at the Refuge, everywhere where you ought’nt to be, & you have a dreadful cold as the consequence! Mention yourself particularly when you write—& write, I beg of you. Remember with regard to the proofs, to have enough of them––send for another & another, if not correctly printed. I have swept away heaps of stops because there were too many. George will be so very kind as to explain where anything is doubtful. Tell George he does’nt write to me, & he ought. And Robert ought to write to you, & he does’nt– He cries out against himself every now & then, for really he loves you Arabel, & is always praising you. Did’nt he say once that you suited him as a wife better than I did. Oh—something that came to the same thing, he said! I remember it! I upbraid him for it! at intervals .. when hard pressed for something to quarrel about!–
After all, Arabel, Robert & I get on very well together considering, dont you think? We are actually in the seventh year of marriage, and he pretends to love me better than at first––and, what is extraordinary, I believe it, Arabel. He bids me tell you too, Arabel, that “we are very happy in our little child.” I should think we were, indeed. May God be praised for all He has done for us–
Miss Sandford comes to us tonight. She & her family are about to leave Florence, & I shall miss her, & so will Robert. We like her much. The Hedleys spent thursday evening with us, & left Florence yesterday– They are of opinion .. at least Kate is .. that Italy is considerably colder than England–!! You cant think how many English say the same thing– The Olives, the vines, & myself are of a different mind– Robin talks of buying an estate in the isle of Sky[e] .. or an encumbered estate in Ireland, & devote himself to farming—which, poor Kate very reasonably & naturally objected to .. but he really seemed to have it in his head. He discussed, too, patriotically about the duty of living in one’s own country, & spending one’s money there, .. which drew a round of applause from the galleries as a noble sentiment, until we discovered that he had invested his cash, in the meantime, in the Marseilles railroad! So ends patriotism, now a days– I do like Robin– He is so frank & cordial & sunshiney. They go to Paris for a fortnight, & then to England for her confinement [37] .. they dont know where—perhaps to Tunbridge Wells.
I wish I had been there .. at dearest Trippy’s “festa”; as Penini would say! God bless her. Give her some good warm kisses for me.
Arabel, Robert makes the modest request to you that you will go to see his play at the Haymarket. [38] Of course you will. Seriously speaking, tell George & all of them from me that, if they go to anybody’s play, they are to go to ours, & clap & shout & save us from damnation,—for really I am anxious about it, seeing that I cant believe that the subtlety & refinement & poetry of Colombe’s Birthday will not baffle an English audience– It frightens me a little. Perhaps we may be damned enough to satisfy even Mr Hanna!——
Dont think that’s a malignant cut against Mr Hanna, .. whom I respect & regard with my heart as a true, honest, disinterested Christian man. Would that the church had many such men.
As to the play, a hideous rumour reaches us that it has been “adapted to the stage by the author.” Robert referred them to his new edition, if that’s “adapting to the stage”!–
Best love to everybody. Tell me all about Papa—& how long he stayed in to avoid the cold, .. & if it did him any harm. God bless you all– Dearest darling Arabel’s Ba.
Will you put Robert’s notes into envelopes & send mine to post with his. He pretends to be “horribly ashamed.” [39]
Publication: EBB-AB, I, 560–570.
Manuscript: Gordon E. Moulton-Barrett.
1. Year provided by EBB’s reference to being “in the seventh year of marriage.”
2. By virtue of Robert Lytton’s attachment to the British Legation.
3. EBB provides an explanation of the “scrape” below, which we are unable to amplify. However, according to Simonetta Berbeglia in “James Montgomery Stuart: A Scotsman in Florence” (Exiles, Emigrés and Intermediaries: Anglo-Italian Cultural Transactions, Amsterdam, 2010), Stuart had been “unofficially employed” at the end of 1851 by the British Legation “as a translator, clerk and secretary” (p. 122). In May of the following year he wrote to Henry Bulwer, the British Minister to Tuscany, asking to be “officially recognised as ‘regularly employed in the service of the Mission’ to mitigate the severe state of his ‘pecuniary circumstances’” (p. 122). Apparently, Stuart’s request was denied.
4. Peter Campbell Scarlett, secretary of the legation since 1844, was chargé d’affaires in the absence of the British minister, Henry Bulwer.
5. Villa Brichieri at Bellosguardo; see letter 3173, note 8.
7. Marcus Spring (1810–74) and his wife Rebecca (née Buffum, 1811–1911) had invited Margaret Fuller (afterwards Ossoli) to accompany them to Europe in 1846 (see letter 2630, note 9).
8. Edward Greely Loring (1802–90), a Massachusetts judge, and his wife Harriet (née Boott, 1808–90) married in 1829. Mrs. Loring was the sister of Frances Boott, wife of Henry Greenough, brother of the sculptor Horatio Greenough. Edward Loring’s cousin, Charles Greely Loring (1794–1867), a Boston lawyer, was the business agent for the Greenoughs. Another Loring cousin, Sarah Dana Loring, married Richard Saltonstall Greenough (also a sculptor) in 1827.
9. Lydia Maria Child (née Francis, 1802–80), writer, abolitionist, and advocate for women’s rights, as well as American Indian rights. Her early anti-slavery treatise, An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans, published at Boston in 1833, was roundly condemned for advocating immediate emancipation of all slaves, in addition to other radical pronouncements. She also wrote numerous children’s stories and romances, including Philothea (Boston, 1845).
10. Fact and Fiction: A Collection of Stories (New York and Boston, 1846). It was dedicated to “Anna Loring, The Child of My Heart.” Miss Loring (1830–96) was the only child of Ellis Gray Loring (1803–58), Boston lawyer and abolitionist, and his wife Louisa (née Gilman, 1797–1868).
11. Sic, for Tyng; Stephen Higginson Tyng (1800–85), an Episcopalian clergyman from Massachusetts, whose preaching skills intimidated Henry Ward Beecher. The DAB describes him as “a typical low churchman. Trained in the straitest school of the Evangelicals, he never faltered in his allegiance.”
12. Eliakim Phelps (1790–1880), Presbyterian minister, who lived in Stratford, Connecticut, with his wife and their four children. In March 1850, the Phelps family began to suffer from a plague of strange disturbances such as moving furniture, flying objects, shattering window panes, and loud raps. Henry Spicer gave an account of their ordeal in his Sights and Sounds (1853, pp. 101–110). It included a letter from Phelps to a Boston periodical answering charges that the disturbances were caused by members of his family. “The troubles at my house continued for at least seven months. During that time, events which cannot be accounted for occurred, to the number of two or three thousand. Many of them, to be sure, were of such a nature that they might have been done by human agency. But, in multitudes of instances, they have taken place in a way which rendered all trick or collusion utterly impossible. … There have been broken from my windows seventy-one panes of glass; more than thirty of which I have seen break with my own eyes” (pp. 107–108).
13. Paradise Lost, V, 574–575.
14. Swedenborg claims that “the one God, who is the Creator of the universe, is Esse and Existere in itself, thus God in himself. … Therefore to introduce into the church a belief that there are three divine persons … is utterly to destroy the idea of God’s unity” (Emanuel Swedenborg, The True Christian Religion, 1847, p. 29). Further on he writes: “When it is said that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are the three essentials of one God … it may appear to human reason as if those three essentials were three distinct persons, which yet cannot possibly be true; but when it is understood that the divine of the Father … the divine of the Son … and the divine of the Holy Spirit, or the divine proceeding … are the three essentials of one God, this the understanding can apprehend” (p. 216).
15. “Propitiation signifies the operation of clemency and grace, to prevent a man from falling into damnation by sin” (The True Christian Religion, p. 135).
16. i.e., universalism—the idea that all humanity is saved by Christ’s redemption and that there is no eternal punishment. “The Lord, after having wrought universal redemption, reduced to order all things both in heaven and in hell” (The True Christian Religion, p. 598).
17. Cf. Revelation 3:20.
18. In Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Providence (Boston, 1840), Swedenborg suggests that “instantaneous salvation from immediate mercy is not possible … that the operation of the Divine Providence for saving man commences from his birth, and lasts even to the end of his life, and afterwards to eternity; also that that operation is continually effected through means from pure mercy: from these it follows, that neither instantaneous salvation, nor immediate mercy is given” (p. 378).
19. According to Swedenborg, “with those, however, who are in evils and untruths [i.e., without regeneration], it is allowed to go up into heaven as a favour; but when they enter they begin to catch their breath or breathe with difficulty, … and in that condition they writhe like a serpent brought to the fire” (Emanuel Swedenborg, The Apocalypse Revealed, trans. Frank F. Coulson, 1970, II, 581).
20. EBB refers to Swedenborg’s opinion expressed in A Treatise Concerning Heaven and its Wonders, and also Concerning Hell (1823): “The genuine doctrine of the church, which is from the spiritual sense of the Word, teacheth otherwise, viz. that the Lord never turns away His face from man and rejects him from Himself, that he doth not cast any one into hell, and that He is not angry with any one. … man is the cause of his own evil … therefore also he brings himself into hell … all of man’s will and love remains with him after death” (pp. 402–404).
21. At this point EBB has obliterated the following passage: “(so did the apostle Paul long ago, I maintain).”
22. “That man, when he passes out of the natural world into the spiritual, as in the case when he dies, carries along with him all things that appertain to him, or which are proper to him as a man, except his terrestrial body … for man, when he enters the spiritual world, or into the life after death, is in a body as in the natural world, without any difference as to appearance, since he is not sensible of, neither doth he see the difference … hence man, when he becomes a spirit, knows no other than that he is in his own body which he had in the world, and hence he knows not that he is deceased” (A Treatise Concerning Heaven and … Hell, p. 319).
23. In A Treatise Concerning Heaven and … Hell, Swedenborg states: “They, again, who have regarded adulteries as enormous, and have lived in the chaste love of marriage, are above all others in the order and form of heaven, and hence in all beauty, and continually in the flower of youth; the delights of their love are ineffable, and they increase to eternity” (p. 355).
24. “In the universal heaven there is not a single angel who was created such from the beginning, nor in hell any devil who was created an angel of light and cast down, but that all, both in heaven and in hell, are formed from the human race” (A Treatise Concerning Heaven and … Hell, pp. 201–202).
25. “Adam and his wife mean the most ancient church that existed on our earth” (The True Christian Religion, p. 466).
26. Johann Friedrich Oberlin (1740–1826), a well-known Protestant Alsatian pastor and reformer, for whom Oberlin College in Ohio is named, “is said to have remarked respecting Swedenborg’s Heaven and Hell: ‘I know from my own experience that everything in this book is true’” (George Trobridge, A Life of Emanuel Swedenborg, 1912, p. 244).
27. A story is told that Swedenborg wrote to John Wesley in regard to a proposed visit by the latter, warning that “Mr. Wesley would then be too late, as he [Swedenborg] was to enter the world of spirits on the twenty-ninth of the next month, never more to return” (Cyriel Odhner Sigstedt, The Swedenborg Epic: The Life and Works of Emanuel Swedenborg, 1952, p. 431).
28. In preparing to administer communion to Swedenborg on his death bed, Arvid Ferelius (1725–93), minister in the Swedish Church at London, suggested that if Swedenborg had delivered his “new theological system” only “to make a name for himself,” that now was the time “to deny either the whole or part of what he had presented.” Swedenborg replied, “with great earnestness: ‘As truly as you see me before your eyes, so true is everything that I have written; and I could have said more had it been permitted. When you enter eternity you will see everything, and then you and I shall have much to talk about’” (The Swedenborg Epic, p. 432).
29. Arcana Cœlestia. A few twelve-volume English editions had been issued in London prior to this time, the most recent being that published by the Swedenborg Society in 1848. It originally appeared in Latin (8 vols., 1749–56).
30. “Storm.”
31. The two youngest sons of Grand Duke Leopold II and his second wife, Maria Antonia, were Louis Salvator (1847–1915) and Johann Salvator (b. 1852).
32. The Times of 9 April 1853 ran the following item from the 7 April issue of Le Moniteur, the French government’s organ: “Attempts have been made to circulate in public the rumour that the Government contemplated proposing a modification in the conditions of civil marriage. The rumour is without foundation. The experience of 60 years has sanctioned the wisdom of our civil legislation in this important matter” (p. 6).
33. The Brownings had met Mme. Thiébault in Paris the previous June at Lady Elgin’s (see letter 3049). Presumably, the incident occurred then.
34. Cf. Amos 3:3.
35. The Many Mansions in the House of the Father (1851). We take EBB’s comments to refer to Faber’s description of man in his resurrected state, in which “the Spirit will be rëunited to the Body: and thus each individual man will exist, through all eternity, in the condition of a Spirit, combined, indeed, with the solid corporeal Matter, but yet with Matter so refined and etherealised as to constitute what the Apostle comparatively calls a Spiritual Body” (The Many Mansions, 2nd. ed., 1854, p. 66).
36. EBB had alluded to Charles John’s attraction to Roman Catholicism in letter 2645. He was baptized in that religion at Retreat Pen, St. Anne’s, Jamaica, in 1862.
38. We have been unable to determine whether or not Arabella attended the play. It appears, however, that George did (see letter 3198).
39. Two of the letters the Browning sent along with this one to Arabella were letters 3188 and 3189. We have been unable to trace any others. Preserved with this letter is an envelope, which evidently contained “Robert’s notes” and upon which RB wrote: “Dear Arabel—with Robert’s kindest love.”
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