law of correspondence

proper noun

The principle that any material thing or circumstance is the effect or reflection of a spiritual or celestial counterpart, and vice versa.

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Meanings

proper nounthe law of correspondence
  1. lifestyleThe principle that any material thing or circumstance is the effect or reflection of a spiritual or celestial counterpart, and vice versa.

    At almost every turn the heavenly world informed, illuminated, and affected the earthly world and vice versa, what some term the metaphysical law of correspondence.

    [2012, Samuel Morris Brown, In Heaven as It Is on Earth: Joseph Smith and the Early Mormon Conquest of Death, →ISBN, page 11
    3 more examples

    And we look about us, and see what kind of things the law of correspondence has filled the world with. For we know that the things of this world are such as they are, that they may correspond with the things of our souls.

    1839, Theophilus Parsons, Sunday Lessons for the Instruction of Children of the New Church in Schools or at Home, pages 103–4

    In the light of these disclosures we see that all the splendid habitations and magnificent palaces of heaven are but pictorial representations, under the law of correspondence, of the ruling loves of the angels.

    1885, Benjamin Fiske Barrett, Heaven Revealed: Being a Popular Representation of Swedenborg’s Disclosures About Heaven […], 4th edition, page 243

    Corroborating the theosophic law of correspondence, Duby declares that the first aspect of the “system,” was a “coherence between heaven and earth, two parts of one homogeneous world, built to a single plan and hence reciprocally related.”

    1997, William W. Quinn, Jr., The Only Tradition, →ISBN, page 215

Origin

Originally after the works of Emanuel Swedenborg. See correspondence.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

law of correspondence. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/law%20of%20correspondence

MLA

“law of correspondence.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/law%20of%20correspondence. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “law of correspondence,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/law%20of%20correspondence.

Source: law of correspondence on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.