Most Reverend Herr Doctor:

I received the Herr Doctor's letter of April 18, together with that which was communicated by the Herr Doctor to His Royal Majesty, and, with this, that stories had come to Gothenburg concerning a decision that had been projected in the Council Chamber. But after the copies of the letter I sent to the Herr Doctor had been sent to R R* Ekeblad and to the Herr Chancellor of justice, the matter has been taken up again, and the result was the conclusion contained in the letter which the Chancellor of justice wrote to the Consistory in Gothenburg, and of which I beg of the Herr Doctor a copy.**

Had it stopped at the first project, that Swedenborgianism and this signifies the worship of the Lord-should not be mentioned or talked about, what other effect would it produce than fear on the part of priests to speak of Christ and His care for human beings. Because of this, there would be the fear of being arraigned on the ground that this was a Swedenborgianism; and, in consequence, Christianity would decline in Sweden and lapse into Socinianism, and finally into heathendom. This can be concluded from Math. 13: 30; Mark 9: 40.*** Such is the progeny that the first project would have given birth to from itself. For this reason, when certain clergymen here in the city, who love progress, first heard rumors of it, they were astonished and thought that thus Christianity would die out in our land.

I have understood that during the Diet,**** the Bishops and many members of the Most Rev. House of Clergy expressed themselves handsomely and reasonably upon the doctrines that were there dealt with.

Not a thing of what the [Gothenburg] Consistory submitted against my writings was communicated to me, so that I was in total ignorance of what passed in the Privy Council.

Next June I go to Amsterdam where I intend to publish the Universal Theology of the New Church. Worship of the Lord is the foundation, and if the true house or temple be not built thereon, others will build thereon lupinaria or brothels.

As regards Dragonists, they are all removed far off to the south. There the learned get a certain location, and there each individual has his own cell wherein to confirm justification by faith alone; and those who confirm it by God's Word go from there into a desert and beyond. The others, after they have escaped, get no place wherein to abide. Whither they then take their way I do not yet know. There is no place for them in heaven. What happens to them accords with the description in Apocalypse Revealed no. 421; but the abyss which is there described, is now, as was said, removed further to the south.

I remain, with all friendship and trust, the most Rev. Herr Doctor's obedient servant Emanuel Swedenborg * Riks Rad = Member of the Privy Council. ** Swedenborg is here referring to the condemnatory decision of the Privy Council which was dispatched to the Gothenburg Consistory on April 26. He was ignorant of the nature of this decision, and was under the impression that the letters sent to Hermansson, Stockenstrom Ekeblad and Rosir, had had a favorable effect. *** "He that is not with me is against me," and "He who is not against us is on our part." **** The Diet had come to an end January 30, 770,