Article September 14, 1907 Issue

The public as a whole cannot but be gratified by the...

Grand Rapids (Mich.) Evening Press

The public as a whole cannot but be gratified by the determination of the "next friends" to drop the legal inquiry into the mental competency of Mrs. Mary Baker G. Eddy to care for her property....

Public sentiment will approve of the refusal by the commission to inquire into Mrs. Eddy's religious beliefs. Such matters are not properly a subject for courts to pass upon. This is a Christian nation, yet no court would hold that a Mahometan's religious beliefs indicated insanity or mental incompetency. Neither Protestants nor Catholics, though regarding the beliefs of Buddhists as serious error, would argue that Buddhists are mentally incompetent. There are many thousands of Christian Scientists who hold firmly to Mrs. Eddy's doctrines. Courts can no more undertake to say that they are insane or mentally incompetent because of their beliefs than are Mahometans. Allopathists believe homeopathists to be fundamentally wrong in their ideas of disease and medicine, yet they do not regard homeopathists as insane. Under the circumstances further prosecution of the suit would have appeared like persecution and the "next friends" showed good judgment by dropping the case.

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