Testimony of Healing July 31, 1915 Issue

When I was about seventeen years old I had an attack of...

Annie L. Walters

When I was about seventeen years old I had an attack of measles, and the doctor said if I drank water or became chilled in any way, blindness might result. I did drink some water, and grew much worse, but was afraid to tell what I had done. The doctor was sent for, and he said at once that if I ever got well I would be blind or deaf. When I finally recovered, the sight of the left eye was nearly gone, and as the years passed the right one became affected also. I went to a celebrated oculist, who said that in time I would be totally blind. It seemed strange that with the exception of the left eyelid drooping, my eyes did not look badly, and although I suffered I did not complain, as it was necessary for me to continue teaching music or to sing in public when called upon, for I was dependent on my own exertions. When standing before the footlights, however, at the opera house, sometimes I could not see a note, and I had to arrange with the leader of the orchestra to take up my solo as a violin obligato when I gave him a signal agreed upon. Everything was done for me materially, but without avail.

About this time an intimate friend was healed through Christian Science, and she told me my eyes could be healed in the same way. The bishop of the church to which we both belonged had spoken very bitterly of Christian Science and warned the people against it as the work of the devil. Nevertheless, my friend insisted on my trying it, and my mother joined with her, saying if healing the sick was the work of the devil why did Jesus command it.

That night my friend came and I consented to let her give me a treatment. The first thing I noticed was that I had an impulse to look up (previously I had no control over my eyelids). I was startled; then I picked up a newspaper and found I could read. I exclaimed, "Oh, I can see!" and my friend fervently replied, "Thank God!" Now the best doctors had said the optic nerve was almost paralyzed, so how could I see? But my friend was patient with my ignorance. The next day the bishop called to ask me if it were true that I was practising this fearful heresy against the teaching of the church, and I told him I was like the man in the Bible,—once I was blind, but now I could see. I took up a copy of Tennyson's poems in fine print and read for him, then handing the book to him, asked, "Can you do that, even with your glasses on?" He made no reply. This occurred about twenty-five years ago, and since then I have used my eyes constantly in reading, writing, and sewing, without the need of glasses.

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