Brockton, Mass.

Nearly one thousand people, constituting one of the most satisfactory audiences ever assembled in City Theatre to listen to a lecture, heard Mr. Bicknell Young of Chicago discuss Christian Science there last evening [September 30]. Some of the best-known people in the city were present and its wealth and culture were exceptionally well represented.

Hon. L. E. Chamberlain introduced the speaker.

Brockton Enterprise.

The introductory remarks by Mr. Chamberlain were in part as follows:—

In the human conflict constantly being waged between right and wrong, between the constructive forces and those destructive forces whose operation is to disorganize and weaken society, any man, any organization of men, any institution whose fundamental basis and purpose is the uplifting of mankind, should be welcomed as a valuable reinforcement to the forces contending against the common enemy,—evil and error.

The world is engaged to-day in the same occupation it was yesterday, the same it has been engaged in for the past hundreds of years,—a search for truth. If it is honest it is ready and anxious to receive light from any source. It will not reject a new thought simply because it is new, nor retain an old simply because of its antiquity. It will not readily cast aside the old for the untried new, neither will it permit apparently fixed beliefs to stand as obstructions in the advanced thought of the world's progress. Bigotry and a stunted growth have marked those periods in the world's history where light was refused and reason stifled; while the arts and sciences flourished and the most pronounced progress has been made when a broad charity and liberality of thought flourished most. A frank recognition and acknowledgment of the fact that each man can help his neighbor and from him receive help if he will, is a position precedent to that right mental attitude so vitally essential to the solution of those mighty questions involving our higher and better life.

The nineteenth century contributed much that was new in material knowledge and in religious and scientific thought. New alignments became necessary, new vistas were opened up, new fields explored and life and thought quickened all along the line. Birth was given to a new thought, or there appeared a new expression of an old, known to the world as Christian Science. Promulgated in 1866, it has had a most practical application. Given to the world in 1875, some scoffed at its teachings, many of us read it with indifference, a few embraced it. These few saw in it at once a realization of longings hitherto almost unfashioned, hopes put into words and made to breathe, the blending of a religious and scientific thought,—a Christian Science,—and expressed as a practical reality. They embraced it with a warmth of love, it became a living force.

I do not know its personal worth. I am not a believer in its doctrines. I have casually read its "Key." I have never turned its searchlight on myself and therefore know it not. But what do we see? A great multitude of earnest, ardent believers, spread all over the world, working out, in this attractive and beautiful new expression, a new life and experience. The living of it makes for its followers a sweeter life. It helps them to bear the cares and burdens of every-day life; it brings comfort to the sorrowing and health and healing to the sick; it gives cheerful assurance of the future and dispels doubting and darkness. It gives to us all better citizens, better neighbors, better friends, better men and women. It is a great uplift in the world. Believing in it they want to enlighten men, and I am honored in being selected for the purpose of presenting the lecturer of the evening, Mr. Bicknell Young of Chicago.

Correspondence.

Arkansas City, Kan.

Yesterday afternoon [October 9] at the Opera House a lecture on Christian Science was delivered by Edward A. Kimball of Chicago, under the auspices of First Church of Christ, Scientist.

Rev. W. F. Harding of the Congregational Church introduced Mr. Kimball, in a neat but brief talk.

Arkansas City Traveler.

The introductory remarks of Mr. Harding were in part as follows:—

As civilization advances it becomes increasingly apparent that thought is a revelation of power. Indeed, it is this power which moves civilizations forward. The aborigines of America and Africa are unchanged for generations until the missionary goes among them and teaches them to think aright.

The trouble with many in our midst is that they do not think. That is their excuse for their mistakes. They acknowledge a greater truth than they may be ready to recognize. If they would think, they would save themselves blunders, at least they would not blunder twice in the same way. Thinking would save them from many troubles. Thinking would open the door and let in the sunlight with its healing, radiant glory. Thinking transforms lives.

True religion is based upon the power of right thinking. Such a religion has been, is, and always must be progressive. He who was the world's greatest religious Teacher began his work by setting an old truth in a new mounting when he said, "Change your mind [i.e., your thinking, incorrectly translated, 'Repent'], for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."

Someone has said, "The habitual thought that we bring with us to each day, colors the hours black or golden far more surely than anything the day brings to us." The habit of right, great, and good thinking makes us God-like.

Correspondence.

Chicago, Ill.

Mrs. Livingston Mims of Atlanta, Ga., lectured last evening [October 23] at Third Church of Christ, Scientist, Washington Boulevard and Leavitt Street. In the course of her remarks she paid the following tribute to Mrs. Eddy: "Mrs. Eddy is not only one of the world's greatest religious teachers and reformers, but through her discovery of the Science of Mind,—that Christianity is a demonstrable science,—she has made the sublimest and most practical discovery of the modern world, and is therefore rightly entitled to as high a place among scientists and discoverers as among the spiritual teachers and reformers."

The Record-Herald.