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TESTIMONY OF THE CELEBRATED OBERLIN. 153
instructed his people, and had brought them, by a superior
system of agriculture, by forming roads across the most
accessible parts of the mountains, and by introducing
the manufacture of some of the most useful articles of
domestic and agricultural economy, to a state of com
fort and comparative independence, although inhabiting
the wildest and most ungenial districts of France, where
the winter is said to be as cold as in the latitude of St.
Petersburg, and where only three months of fine, warm,
genial weather can be expected. The fact that Oberlin
rendered this dreary solitude, in which a few wild, bar
barous hordes of men barely existed, a comparative
garden, abounding with all the necessaries of life, and
that he trained his flock to the knowledge and practice of
evangelical truth and virtue, and opened their minds to a
perception of heavenly realities, through the knowledge
contained in Swedenborg’s work On Heaven and Hell, is
the cause of his wide-spread celebrity among the con
tinental nations of Europe. This would be the proper
place, if time and space permitted, to describe some of
those acts of eminent usefulness, which Oberlin performed
in agriculture and the arts, which were not only so
beneficial to his immediate vicinity, but also to his
country at large. His country acknowledged his services,
and honoured his name, by presenting him with a gold
medal.
"Having received a few explanations from Oberlin
respecting the diagrams, models, &c., which I observed in
his library, I prepared myself to converse with him on
things of a more exalted character-on his manner of
perceiving the truths of the Word, as well as his con
ceptions respecting the realities of heaven, and the
spiritual state of man in general. I at once asked him
whether he had read any of the works of Swedenborg ?
Without replying, he immediately reached a book, and
clapping his hand upon it, expressive of great satisfaction,
told me, that he had had this treasure many years in his
library, and that he knew from his own experience that
every thing related in it was true. This treasure was
H 2
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