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Doc. 245.] 369
SWEDENBORG TO BEYER.
V.
SIXTEENTH LETTER OF EMANUEL SWEDENBORG TO DR. BEYER, *2
"Reverend Doctor,
"I received your letter dated March 18, to
gether with a copy of the one which you submitted to His
Royal Majesty [Document 245, 0]. You mention also that
information had reached Gottenburg of a resolution which had
been projected in the Privy Council ; the subject, however,
was re-considered, after a copy of the letter which I had
written to you [Document 245, R], was sent to Senator Eke
blad200 and the Chancellor of Justice,196 and the final re
sult is contained in the letter addressed by the Chancellor to
the Consistory of Gottenburg [Document 245, T], of which
you will kindly let me have a copy. Had they retained the
first project, according to which Swedenborgianism was not to
be talked of or mentioned in conversation, when yet it signi
fies the worship of the Lord, what would have been the re
sult, but a fear in the clergy to speak about Christ and His
care for humanity ; for by doing so they would in this case
have run the risk of a public admonition, for supporting
’Swedenborgianism,’ and in consequence thereof Christianity
would have declined in Sweden, and the country would have
lapsed into Socinianism, and finally into heathenism, as may
be concluded from Matt. xii, 30, and Mark ix, 40. Such an
offspring would have been born from the first project. For
this reason also, when certain clergymen of this town, who are
animated by a genuine zeal, first heard of this report, they
were astonished, thinking that thus Christianity would die out
in our country. I have heard that the bishop and many
members of the venerable House of the Clergy expressed
* The Swedish original of this letter is preserved among the Sweden
borg MSS. in the Library of the Academy of Sciences in Stockholm. It
was printed in the " Samlingar för Philantroper," for 1788 as Letter XIII.
An English translation appeared in the "New Jerusalem Magazine" for
1790, p. 239, whence it was transferred as Letter IX to the editions in
English of the " Swedenborg Documents" published in England and
America.
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