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548 [Doc. 265.
TESTIMONY OF CONTEMPORARIES.
to his writings, by persons of a bigoted and contracted spirit.’
Mr. Shearsmith has been dead now for some years. I saw
him not long before his death ; and he continued to bear the
same testimony which he had so often repeated in my hearing
during the thirty years that I had known him.
B.
FROM HIS POSTHUMOUS WORK ENTITLED, “rise and progress oF THE
NEW JERUSALEM CHURCH," PUBLISHED IN LONDON, 1861.*
29
2. I have frequently heard Mr. Shearsmith226 say, that
every thing went on prosperously with him, while Swedenborg
lodged at his house. When I resided at 32 Clerkenwell Close,
from 1783 to 1793, I employed him in the way of his profession,
and consequently had many opportunities of gaining information
from him concerning Swedenborg and his habits of life. As
Mr. Shearsmith advanced in years, his business declined ; and
I have heard him, with much feeling, regret the loss of one,
whom he always considered as his best friend. "If I have not
a friend in this world," said he, "I know I have one in the
other" (meaning Swedenborg).
3. On the arrival in London of the vessel [in which
Swedenborg sailed from Holland in 1771 ], he took a hackney
coach, and directed the coachman, as well as he could, to
Mr. Shearsmith’s in Great Bath Street, Clerkenwell, where he
had before lodged. Mr. Shearsmith was going out on business,
when he heard behind him a voice calling out of the coach
window, in broken English, "Dat be he! Dat be he!" The coach
stopped, and Mr. Shearsmith, coming to the door, immediately
recognised his former noble lodger, Emanuel Swedenborg, whom
he assisted to alight from the coach, and conducted into his
house. On Swedenborg’s telling him that he was come to
lodge with him again, Mr. Shearsmith informed him, that his
apartments were at that time occupied by a family : "but," saye
he, "I will go upstairs to them, and ask them if they will
* This work was published under the editorship of the Rev. Edward
Madeley, who added valuable notes to it.
† See p. 21.
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