608 (Documents Concerning the Life and Character of Emanuel Swedenborg / Volume 2:1-2 1877)

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608 REFUTATION OF FALSE REPORTS. [Doc. 270.
1
translation of the "True Christian Religion," (see Document
259, no. 30). For the convenience of our readers we shall
reproduce this paragraph here:
E.
REV. T. HARTLEY ON MATHESIUS’ CHARGE AGAINST SWEDENBORG IN 1781.
"The unchristian spirit of calumny and detraction here
mentioned, leads me to observe in this place, that some have
taken pains to represent our author as mad, in order to dis
credit his character and writings, grounding their charge on
the following circumstance : He was seized with a fever, attended
with a delirium, common in that case, about twenty years be
fore he died and was under the care of a physician, and they
have gone about to pick up what he said and did, and how
he looked at that time, and have propagated this both in pri
vate and in print, a proceeding so contrary to common humanity,
that one cannot think of it without offence, nay even horror.”

This probably happened in 1749, thus twenty-three years
before Swedenborg died; for he arrived in London in No
vember 1748, and left it again in 1749 for Aix la Chapelle,
a celebrated watering place in Germany where he spent the
winter. It is quite possible that he was advised to go there
by his London physician. The next time he visited London
must have been in 1756, or in 1757, when he published there
five works which he had brought with him from Sweden.
The slander of Mathesius consists in his antedating this
occurrence seven years, in order to connect it with the open
ing of Swedenborg’s spiritual sight. That he altered dates to
suit his own purposes appears also from this consideration ,
that he placed his whole account in the year 1743, when yet
Swedenborg did not arrive in England until May , 1744
(see p. 193).
The results of B. Chastanier’s 222 investigations are con
tained in the Preface to his " Tableau analytique et raisonné
* See Document 136, and also "Spiritual Diary," nos. 3422 to 3427.
See Documents 210 to 213.

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