Editorial May 7, 1910 Issue

AN INALIENABLE RIGHT

Archibald McLellan

In a testimony which appears on page 714 of this issue of the Sentinel, Judge Rufus D. Smith of Santa Barbara, Cal., who for nearly thirty-five years before he came into Christian Science was a great sufferer from diseases contracted during his service in the Civil War, states that the best physicians obtainable by him considered his case hopeless; that they "were all agreed that there was no permanent help" for him.

To one who could see no hope of relief save in materia medica, and who, notwithstanding the kindly efforts of skilled physicians during the many years that he was under their care, felt himself going from bad to worse, so far as his physical condition was concerned, the outlook of continued invalidism must have indeed seemed dreary. He also refers to his attitude toward religion, and says that he called himself an infidel and was proud of it. One can hardly conceive of a more pitiable condition than is his who, wearied in body and mind, finds himself at last among those "having no hope, and without God in the world."

Fortunately for Mr. Smith, when the time came that his attention was directed to Christian Science as a means of relief from his sufferings, he was led to accept it, and as a consequence he was healed of his sickness and converted from his infidelity. And yet, notwithstanding his eloquent testimony of gratitude for restoration to health, and of happiness in the study of the Bible and the Christian Science literature, we have no doubt that some of the captious critics of Christian Science who may read this testimony will ignore these patent facts and fail to find any value in it because the writer is not able to state that a leg which was amputated by the surgeons has been replaced through Christian Science treatment. Jesus illustrated this condition of unbelief by the parable of the "certain rich man" to whom Abraham said, "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."

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