Conjugial Love (Chadwick) n. 206

Previous Number Next Number Next Translation See Latin 

206. (xviii) This happens because the child's soul is from the father, and its clothing is from the mother.

No wise man can doubt that the soul is from the father. This is also plain to see from the characters, as well as the faces, which are marks of character, of descendants proceeding in a direct line from the head of each family. For the father is repeated as it were in a copy, if not in his sons, at least in his grandsons and great-grandsons. This happens because the soul constitutes the inmost part of a person, and although this may be covered up in the immediate offspring, it still comes to light and is revealed in later progeny.

The fact that the soul is from the father and it is clothed by the mother can be illustrated by analogous facts in the vegetable kingdom. Here the earth or soil is the mother all share, which as it were receives seeds in itself as if in a womb and clothes them; in fact, so to speak, it conceives, carries, gives birth to and brings them up, just as a mother does the father's offspring.

* * * * *


This page is part of the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg

© 2000-2001 The Academy of the New Church