Article December 4, 1902 Issue

In Answer to Criticism

Alfred Farlow

Chicago Record-Herald

Mr. Editor.

A recent essay on Christian Science by Rev. Luther T. Townsend, D.D., is presented as an "answer by an expert." The gentleman admits that Mrs. Eddy, the Leader of the Christian Science movement, is a woman of more than ordinary ability, and that her writings "contain sentences and aphorisms that in wisdom and rhetorical excellence would not suffer in comparison if placed alongside of some of the sentences of Arnold or Emerson." Since Dr. Townsend is a professor of rhetoric, we note the value of this admission. He also declares that a great and important truth lies at the basis of Mrs. Eddy's Christiar: Science theories. That he indorses the basic lesson of Christian Science is noted in the following statement: "She says correctly that God is supreme, the only Life, Substance, and Intelligence of the universe and man." Having admitted this premise, it seems strange that the gentleman could not indorse the whole of Christian Science, since every statement contained in the Christian Science textbook is a consistent deduction from that which he acknowledges to be true. Unfortunately, however, he has misconstrued a large portion of the teachings of Science and Health, and, as a matter of course, has not been able to indorse his misconception. In this, however, he does not differ from Christian Scientists, for what he has condemned is as offensive to them as it is to him. His general treatment of the subject leads us to believe that the opinion of an "expert" on Christian Science is not worth as much as the absolute understanding of a practising Christian Scientist who may not be so expert in other matters.

Mrs. Eddy has given to the world ideas which are new, but in so doing she has been careful not to intrude them upon ears which do not welcome them, nor to speak disparagingly of the good works of others. On this subject she teaches in her book, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," p. 444: "Students are advised by their teacher to be charitable and kind, not only toward differing forms of religion and medicine, but to those who hold these opinions."

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

Article

Judge Fair Judgment