Testimony of Healing July 29, 1911 Issue

From 1898 to 1908 I suffered a great deal from heart...

WILLIAM BAXTER

From 1898 to 1908 I suffered a great deal from heart disease, supposedly the result of a fever contracted when ten years of age. I had paid slight attention to it until after being examined by a doctor for an appointment, in 1897, when I was eighteen years old. The doctor pronounced my complaint an organic disease of the heart, and then the trouble grew worse, as my thought was centered upon the complaint. Being unable to secure the appointment (the doctor had kindly said that owing to my circumstances he would pass me for it, but I refused as it did not seem wise to go farther), I borrowed some money and went to South Africa in October, 1898.

In three months I was in a hospital in Cape Town, with the first acute attack of heart trouble. For the next three years I had occasional attacks, until in 1902, when in Pretoria, I was several weeks in a hospital. It was thought that Johannesburg would suit me better, so my employers arranged for me to take up an appointment there; but the day after leaving the hospital I was taken back. I had a relapse, and for several days my condition was extremely critical. This resulted in losing my appointment, as it was considered advisable for me to get back to sea-level; so I returned to Cape Town. In a few weeks I was again in a hospital, after which I obtained work, only to be laid up again in about two months. By this time my savings were almost gone, and I decided to return to England while I had the money, so I came home in March, 1903. For the next four or five years there was no improvement, and during this period I wrote to a friend to send me some money to have by me for funeral expenses, as funds were at bed-rock and doctors gave me no hope of improvement.

While in South Africa I had been interested in Christian work, and one day a lady visitor to the house where I was staying spoke about the power of faith. The subject interested me, as a couple of years before I had heard a slight reference to Christian Science and I had often pondered, while lying ill, about the healings of the Master; but no one could give me any light. In 1907 I had begun to take a more independent line of reasoning, the conflicting nature of the medical opinions in my case confirming me in the thought of the unsatisfactory understanding of disease and how to deal with it which all the doctors had exhibited, as compared with the healings of Christ Jesus.

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