4722. About Engineers, Polhem 1
He was an engineer because in his bodily life he was always thinking about how to build moving machines and was more successful at this than others were because he had this kind of genius. In his bodily life he had convinced himself that there is no God, that nature is everything, that the living element in man and beast is something mechanical filled with air that has been fashioned in this way according to the nature of air and the laws of order, and that their life comes from this. What the life after death is, what the inner man is, what heaven and hell are, what the Divine is other than lifeless nature, what Providence is other than nature's blind fate or chance, he did not want to know. He had convinced himself against them.
[2] But because the power of imagination he possessed in the body lives on, he is learning and teaching how various things can be created, such as birds, mice, cats, and even little children, human beings. This he does by kneading and shaping some doughy material and then by means of thought's mental images. It is from this that such things appear, for with everyone in the other life thought can display such things. However, it is an airy something that is appearing in this way and not something real. He was shown that using imagination and fantasy everyone can produce such things and that it is illusory. But still he stupidly continues to fashion the doughy mass into such things and new ones. He was also in a dark Chamber 2and was showing off his trick, and was even seen in the dark Chamber, sitting on dead bones in a coffin, since such a person does not acknowledge the living, just the dead.
Footnotes:
1. Christopher Polhem (1661ֱ751), distinguished Swedish scientist, inventor and industrialist.
2. The camera obscura (Latin for "dark room", literally "darkened chamber", is a dark room with an optical device in one wall, either a pinhole or a lens, that projects an image of the scene outside onto the facing wall.
4722. CONCERNING MECHANICIANS. POLHEM.
That mechanician, inasmuch as, in the life of the body, he constantly mediated how to construct moving machines, and succeeded therein above others, because he was endowed with such a genius, had, in the life of the body, confirmed himself in the belief that there was no God; that everything was from nature; that the living [soul] in man and beast is something mechanical, which, being filled with air, is thus formed according to its nature and the laws of order; and that those creatures thence live. He did not wish to know what is the life after death, what the internal man, what heaven and hell, what the Divine is other than dead nature, what Providence is other than the blind fate of nature and chance. He had confirmed himself against these. But, because the imaginative power which he possessed in the body still remains, therefore, he learns and teaches, there, how various things can be created, such as birds, mice, cats, also human infants. He does this by a working-up and formation of some mass, and then, by means of ideas of thoughts, there thence appear such things. For, in the other life, thought can represent such things with anyone; but it is a something aerial that appears thus, and nothing real. He was shown that all others, by means of imagination and phantasy, can present a similar effect, and that this is child's play: but, still, he continues, as if stupid, to fashion such things, and new ones, from his mass. He, also, was in the dark chamber, and showed his art; and he was also seen in the dark chamber sitting upon the dead bones which were in the coffin. This, also, was because he was of such a character that he had not acknowledged what was living, but what was dead.
4722. De Mechanicis, Polhem
Mechanicus ille, quia in vita corporis continue mediatus est construere machinas mobiles, et hoc illi prae reliquis successerat, quia tali genio fuit, is in vita corporis confirmaverat se in eo, quod nullus Deus esset, quod natura esset omne, quod vivum in homine et bestia sit quoddam mechanicum, quod ab aere impletum sic formatum est secundum ejus naturam et leges ordinis, et quod inde vivant, quid vita post mortem, quid internus homo, quid coelum et infernum, quid Divinum praeter mortuam naturam, quid providentia praeter fatum caecum naturae, et casum, non volebat scire, confirmaverat se contra illa; sed quia usque vis imaginativa quae ei in corpore perstat, idcirco ibi discit et docet, quomodo creari possint varia, sicut volucres, mures, feles, etiam infantes, hominis, quod facit per subactionem et formationem alicujus massae, et dein per cogitationum ideas, inde apparent talia, nam in altera vita cogitatio apud unumquemvis talia potest repraesentare, sed est aereum quoddam ita apparens, et nihil reale, ostensum ei quod omnes alii per imaginationem et per phantasiam possunt simile sistere, et quod hoc sit lusorium, sed usque continuat sicut stolidus ex massa fingere talia et nova. Fuit etiam ille in Camera obscura, et ostendebat suam artem, et visus est etiam in Camera obscura, sedens super ossibus mortuis, quae in loculo, quia etiam talis quod non vivum agnoverat sed mortuum.