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182 DOCUMENTS CONCERNING SWEDENBORG.
faction. A persecution was excited by the dean of Got
tenburg, in Sweden, and some of his clergy, against the
Rev. Drs. Beyer and Rosen, members of the Ecclesiastical
Consistory of that place, in consequence of their having
read with approbation the theological writings of their
eminent countryman, Emanuel Swedenborg. The object
of the dean’s mistaken zeal was, to obtain a prohibition
of the reading of those writings as heretical, and to inflict
upon those who favoured them the severe penalties, which
the laws of the kingdom then allowed in cases of dissent
from the Swedish Lutheran Church. The affair came
under the cognizance of the supreme council of the state,
called, under the form of government at that time estab
lished, the senate, in which the king himself presided :
and it was in obedience to a mandate issued from this
authority, requiring of Dr. Beyer an explicit statement
of his sentiments respecting the writings of Swedenborg,
that the following paper was drawn up. It had con
siderable weight in preventing the government from
coming to a rash and unjust conclusion respecting the
subject of it ; and it is well calculated to have a similar
influence upon those into whose hands it may now fall.
When it is known that the effect of a condemnatory
sentence would have been the banishment of the writer
from his native land, every candid person must admire
the modest constancy which this document evinces ; and,
independently of this consideration, must be disposed to
think favourably of sentiments which could inspire so
steady a conviction of their truth in a mind evidently so
well qualified to form a correct judgment on such subjects.
We behold in the author of this paper a pious and learned
man, who, amid the utmost respect for the institutions
of his country, discovers an understanding and temper
superior to common prejudices and well adapted for the
right apprehension of sacred truths, ability to explain
and defend them, and a courage prepared to suffer any
thing rather than renounce or disguise them. We also
are presented with some of the reasons which led him to
his conclusions, and which will be found well worthy of
the most serious consideration.
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