"Reverend Doctor:

"I received your letter dated March 18, together with a copy of the one which you submitted to His Royal Majesty [Document 245, O]. You mention also that information had reached Gottenburg of a resolution which had been projected in the Privy Council; the subject, however, was reconsidered, after a copy of the letter which I had written to you [Document 245, R] was sent to Senator Ekeblad and the Chancellor of Justice, and the final result 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 signifies the worship of the Lord, what would have been the result, but a fear in the Clergy to speak about Christ and His care of humanity; for by so doing 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. 12:30, and Mark 9:40. 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 themselves handsomely at the Diet upon the doctrines, discussed there. "Nothing of what the Consistory submitted against my writings has been communicated to me, so that I am totally ignorant of what passed in the Privy Council. "Next June I will travel to Amsterdam, where I intend to publish the 'Universal Theology of the New Church.' The worship of the Lord is the foundation therein, and if upon that foundation the true house or temple be not built, others will erect upon it lupanaria or brothels. "With respect to the dragonist spirits, they are all removed far away to the south, where certain places are assigned to the learned, to each his own cell, where they may confirm themselves in justification by faith alone, and those who confirm themselves therein by the Word of God, depart thence into a desert, and so on farther; and the rest, after making their escape, receive no homes; whither they direct their way, I do not yet know; in heaven there is no place for them. Their fate will be, as described in Apocalypse Revealed (n. 421). But the abyss which is described there is now removed farther towards the south, as has been observed.

"I remain with all friendship and trust, "Your most obedient servant, "Em. Swedenborg" "Stockholm, April 30, 1770." * Documents Concerning Swedenborg, Vol. 2, pp. 369-370