Article October 17, 1914 Issue

A friend has sent me for comment or reply a letter which...

Judge Clifford P. Smith

Atlantic City (N. J.) Review

A friend has sent me for comment or reply a letter which was printed in the Review of recent date, in which a minister endeavored to justify his statement that Mrs. Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, was actuated by the love of money. To justify this statement, our brother quoted a part of a notice written by Mrs. Eddy to her students and published in 1897, in which she admonished them to circulate and sell the Bible and her published writings. It was perfectly natural that the author of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" should regard this book and her other writings as beneficial to the human race, and her faith is amply sanctioned by the results shown in the lives of those who have studied her writings on Christian Science in connection with the Bible.

The other item of proof adduced by our friend in support of his statement was that a judge at Philadelphia refused a charter to a Christian Science church on the ground that it was a matter of business and not of religion, which decision, he said, was confirmed by the supreme court of Pennsylvania. The fact is, that the judge did give such a reason for his refusal, but the supreme court held that the evidence did not justify that conclusion. Whether a church has a formal charter or not, is of little consequence; but the fact that there are churches in Philadelphia, Atlantic City, and elsewhere whose religion heals the sick, reforms the sinner, and betters every phase of human life, is of vast importance to the world.

So far as Mrs. Eddy's desire for money is concerned, her motive is most clearly evidenced by the use which she made of her money. Throughout her career as the Leader of the Christian Science movement, she lived simply, gave liberally, and finally left the bulk of her estate to be used for extending the world's knowledge of the religion which she taught. Which of her critics has wrought so much or so well?

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