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Doc. 270.] MATHESIUS’ ACCOUNT OF SWEDENBORG. 597
very strongly, in 1796 he was more reckless in this respect,
and laid on his colours much more thickly.
Yet this is not the only difference; the two accounts are
also contradictory in some respects : In 1781 Mathesius states
that Swedenborg from his visit to the Swedish Ambassador,
which is recorded in no. 8, returned to Brockmer’s house, and
that "Mr. Brockmer being apprehensive that he might hurt
himself, had the lock taken off. " In the account of 1796 all
this happened in another house to which Brockmer had removed
Swedenborg.
Again, according to the account of 1781 , Dr. Smith "took
a lodging for Swedenborg at a peruke-maker’s in Cold Bath
Fields ;" and this peruke-maker, as Mr. Hindmarsh no doubt
was informed by Mr. Brockmer himself, was Shearsmith; for
he says in Document 270, D, p. 605 : " Mr. Brockmer died a
few months after he made the declaration above recited : but
the peruke-maker alluded to by Mr. Welsey, namely, Mr. Richard
Shearsmith, who lived in Cold Bath Fields, Clerkenwell, and
at whose house Swedenborg afterwards lodged and died, sur
vived Mr. Brockmer many years." Besides, the Rev. S. Noble
declares (Preface to the second edition of his translation of
"Heaven and Hell," p. xxviii) that "it is actually said in a
manuscript copy of the statement in the ’Arminian Magazine,’
which was seen by himself
, that Swedenborg did reside with
Shearsmith in 1743." As to the mode, however, in which
Swedenborg came from Mr. Brockmer’s house in Fetter Lane
to Shearsmith, this latter gentleman made the following explicit
statement to Mrs. Shaw (Document 266, nos. 1, 2), " Sweden
borg left Fetter Lane, because the persons he lodged with
used to meddle with his papers. Shearsmith was a peruke
maker. Mrs. Cartwright, a lady of property, knew Sweden
borg, and he complained to her. She recommended Shear
smith’s lodging. Shearsmith used to dress her hair. The
other people were so angry at his leaving them, that they
spread a report that he was mad." From all this it seems
very plain that when Swedenborg left Brockmer in Fetter
Lane, he removed to Mr. Shearmith in Cold Bath Fields.
There is but one statement conflicting with this, viz. that
made by Henry Peckitt in Document 263, where we read,
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