10、我还从天上得知来自水星的灵人与巨人有什么样的关系，也就是说，他们与记忆有关；不过，这是一种对从尘质和纯物质的物体中抽象出来的概念的记忆。然而，蒙允许与他们交谈数周，获知他们的性质和品质，并探究了该星球居民的具体情况后，我想讲一下自己的亲身经历。
10. What spirits from the planet Mercury relate to in the universal human has been disclosed to me by a heavenly source. It is the function of memory, but specifically the memory of abstract concepts, apart from things that are earthly and merely physical. 1
Since it has been granted to me to talk with the spirits of Mercury for many weeks and hear about their nature and explore what things are like for the people who live on that planet, I wish to relate my experiences with them.
Footnotes:
1. In Secrets of Heaven 7358, Swedenborg indicates that the spirits of each planet have reference to some location in the universal human. However, to the spirits of Mercury, Jupiter (Other Planets 64[2]), Saturn (Other Planets 102:1), Venus (Other Planets 107), and Earth itself (Other Planets 64:2, 122) Swedenborg assigns a function of the human mind, rather than an organ of, or location in, the human body. Despite this anomalous treatment, it may be possible to glean some information on the physical location in the body that corresponds to the mental function assigned to Mercury (memory) by reference to Swedenborg’s unpublished anatomical work Draft on the Fiber (= Swedenborg 1976a) 520. There Swedenborg says, “Memory is a state induced on the organic substances or corticals [specific features of the outer layers] of the cerebrum.” Therefore it would seem that he intended the spirits of Mercury to correspond to part of the cerebral cortex. [LSW, SS] Swedenborg’s description of the spirits from Mercury bears a general resemblance to traditional astrological descriptions of the planet’s influence, which emphasize its role in mental acuity. One of the leading authorities on astrology from antiquity, Claudius Ptolemy (around 90-around 168 C.E.), writes that the influence of the planet Mercury leads those who are born under it to acquire wisdom and experience, and to display inquisitiveness about nature, among other cerebral qualities (Ptolemy Tetrabiblos 3:13 [= Ptolemy 1940, 359-361]). The Renaissance occultist Henry Cornelius Agrippa (1486-1535) also connects Mercury with memory: “[The ancient wise men] used to make an . . . image of Mercury when it was rising in Virgo, for obtaining benevolence, genius, and memory” (Agrippa De Occulta Philosophia 2:43 [= Agrippa 1992, 361]; translated by RS). [RS]
10. I have also had disclosed to me from heaven the part played by the spirits from the planet Mercury in forming the Grand Man. It is the memory, but it is the memory of ideas abstracted from earthly and purely material objects. However, having been allowed to talk with them over a period of many weeks, hearing what they are like and how things are with the inhabitants of that world, I should like to relate my actual experiences.
10. It was also disclosed to me from heaven, in what relation to the Greatest Man the spirits from the planet Mercury stand, namely, that they have relation to the memory, but to the memory of things abstracted from terrestrial and merely material objects. Since however it has been granted to speak with them, and this during many weeks, and to learn their nature and quality, and to explore how the inhabitants of that earth are particularly circumstanced, I will adduce the experiences themselves.
10. Quid Spiritus e Planeta Mercurii referunt in Maximo Homine, mihi quoque e Caelo detectum est, quod nempe Memoriam, sed Memoriam rerum abstractarum a terrestribus et mere materialibus. Verum, quia cum illis datum est loqui, et hoc per plures septimanas, et audire quales sunt, et explorare quomodo cum illis, qui in Tellure illa sunt, se habet, velim ipsas experientias adducere.