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HANDLINGAR TILL GEORGE SCOTTS VERKSAMHET I SVERIGE I 6 7
giving the »lie direct» and till the proof righteously demanded is
produced, the charge of bearing false witness against your
neighbour remains at your door. I am aware that you only borrowed
your notices of Methodism & Chartism from the veritable historian
Hauswolff though by your manner of using the loan, you made the
charge your own, and it may be asked why I did not reply to him,
to which my answer is, that as a foreigner I felt the delicacy of so
refuting a member of the Swedish Diet as he merited and from
what I heard under the diverse discussions in the house I saw it to
be unnecessary, though I have no objection whatever, should my
declaration have a reactive &: retrospective influence on Mr. H., and
I ought to thank you for the opportunity of this indirectly exposing
his falsehoods; for a more barefaced and malicious lie, than the
connecting Methodism & Chartism never was ventured before a
civilised public.
I possess neither the power nor the right of questioning the
purity of your motives, in the present instance I am bound to
believe your statement, that an honest desire to preserve the Swedish
community from what appears to you a dangerous influence prompts
your pen; but it may • be questioned whether you have carefully
endeavoured to collect sufficient impartial information ere throwing
down the gauntlet, ex parte statement you are well aware cannot
advance your object among thinking men; and it may be questioned
too (presuming that you are fully and correctly informed) whether
the rudiness of the attack may not prevent its producing the
designed effect, and on the contrary lead to an opposite result. There
is an imperishable principle in human nature, which leads the
majority to take part with the weak and oppressed, and this sympathy
is often spontaneously shewn without much exercise of discriminating
judgement; so that really the best way to make a dangerous book
or association more dangerous is to make a great outcry & say all
manner of evil against them, for in proportion to the virulence of
the attack will the amount of compassion excited generally be. If
the talented & never to be forgotten Wallin had not got ruffled &
composed his violent attack in impassion, it would have been much
more favourable to his object; in like manner Ternström has gained
me numerous friends among clergy & laity, who felt it a duty to
inform me, that »tho’ belonging to the same church as him, they
could not but sympathise with the object of his abuse», and the
unhappy man himself was necessitated in presence of many
witnesses in Hudikswall, to eat up his own words, and promise never
to do so again. Your article has, I can prove to you, the same
effect, and persons who really know that the Wesleyan Methodists
are not the contemptible wretches which some represent them to be,
feel intense interest in the belied, and indignation against the beliers.
Did I really seek an influence in Sweden dangerous to the com-
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