Page:Swedenborg, Harbinger of the New Age of the Christian Church.djvu/292

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EMANUEL SWEDENBORG

quite so; many thoughts have been, and many an action has been, not perfectly straight; yet I have tried to do as well as I could. And as a child, who in the beginning spells out his words, and stumbles often before he can read, provided he goes to work lovingly and cheerfully and strives hard to do better, is loved by his father, so also it may have been with me; at least I pray and hope that it may be so. But you will remain with me?'

"'Yes, master Assessor, until our death.'

"'Thank you, my friends; I knew it would be so. Let people say what they please about my teachings, but do you judge them by my life: if they agree, then all is right; but if there is the least disagreement between them, then one of the two must be wrong.'

"When the little old woman had finished her story, which she had told after the manner of her people, by constantly repeating 'said the Assessor,' and 'said I,' her eyes were glistening with emotion, and she added—'God, indeed, must have forsaken us when He allowed us to go astray so far as to suspect our own Assessor of not being a Christian.'

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