Article October 23, 1909 Issue

That portion of this work [Faith and Works of Christian Science]...

B. O. Flower, editor.

Twentieth Century Magazine

That portion of this work [Faith and Works of Christian Science ] which deals with Christian Science as a religion, its genesis, and the life of its Founder, is so crowded with misstatements, misinterpretations, inuendoes, exaggerations, distortions, and strained and unwarranted interpretations advanced to give sinister meaning where there is no warrant for the inferences conveyed, together with the restatement of falsehoods, calumnies, and slanders that have time and again been refuted and disproved, that it would take a volume to expose them. Want of space compels us to notice only a few typical exhibitions from the host which crowd these pages and render the book worthless for thoughtful lovers of fair play.

(I) Our author is greatly exercised over Mrs. Eddy's revisions of Science and Health. He gravely informs his readers that she has "endlessly revised and expurgated, without sense, without conscience"—a very sweeping and reckless charge but very characteristic of this writer. On another occasion he speaks of her "innumerable changes and expurgations." The aim of the doctor is clear. He would intimate that Mrs. Eddy has no well-defined religious philosophy; that she is constantly changing her views and is as unstable as water. Those who know her and her teachings will understand that the very reverse of this is true. Moreover, in the light of the simple facts, the absurdity of such silly carping is manifest. All students of metaphysical or idealistic philosophy know full well that the great prophets, mystics, and leaders have at all times experienced the greatest difficulty in making spiritual truths discernible to the minds of those steeped in materialism. The great Galilean found even his own students listening to his luminous spiritual truths with uncomprehending ears. To them many of the Nazarene's words were as utterances in an unknown tongue, and he had constantly to explain and interpret his truths. Even to Confucius, the lofty idealism of Lao-tze was incomprehensible. Plato's noble edealism has had to be explained and reexplained before it has been comprehended by the many. Kant and all the great transcendental philosophers have found the same difficulty in translating idealistic and spiritual concepts into language that could be comprehended even by ordinary schoolmen. Says Prof. Herbert E. Cushman, Ph.D., of the chair of philosophy in Tufts College: "I do not find the difficulty with Mrs. Eddy's literary style that others find, for one gets used to lack of style in philosophical writings where the thought is difficult to express."

Now, what Mrs. Eddy has striven to do in her revisions has been to make clearer and more readily comprehensible to the many who have long been accustomed to think along materialistic lines, the spiritual truth she believes to hold redemptive power for the children of earth the power to bring them into rapport with the cosmic Mind, or to awaken in them the Mind that was in Christ Jesus. When this fact is understood, how pitifully puerile is the attempt to discredit the author of Science and Health by inferences intended to prejudice and poison the minds of those who know nothing of Science and Health: and yet this is merely one of many similar examples of unfairness that bristle from the pages of this work.

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