Article January 30, 1915 Issue

Referring to an editorial from an American medical journal...

Frank Bell

The Reading (Pa.) Eagle

Referring to an editorial from an American medical journal as quoted in a recent issue, the British committee of ten medical physicians and ten orthodox clergymen whose inquiry failed to convince them of the general efficacy of healing by spiritual means, is scarcely to be regarded as a wholly unprejudiced jury. Christian Science could hardly have come to be the great world-wide movement that it is today, if it had waited for the recognition and endorsement of adherents of systems in the light of whose theories the daily and hourly achievements of Christian Science are impossible.

In the report of the aforesaid committee it is admitted that the only testimony accepted was that which was based upon the conclusions of medical men, of whom it should be said that with all due respect to their sincerity of purpose, they might find it extremely difficult to discern a healing process which they were thoroughly convinced, in advance of their inquiry, had no existence in fact. An American medical publication need not have waited for England to produce twenty gentlemen of the clerical and medical professions who take no stock in that which they believe Christian Science to be. As many at least might have been found on this side of the Atlantic. It is pertinent also to observe that in a court of justice a juror whose opinion is found to be determined in advance of the hearing is not permitted to sit in the case, but no such rule appears to have been employed in the selection of this body of eminent professionals.

Fortunately the continued progress of the Christian Science movement is not dependent upon the endorsement of a self-appointed committee. The average lay citizen nowadays knows enough of what Christian Science has done for one or more individuals of his acquaintance to be fairly well convinced that he, too, may share its blessings whenever he is ready to meet the moral requirements that are inseparable from its successful application. That organic disease yields to this form of treatment as well as functional disorder is a matter of common knowledge, supported by abundant evidence of a character that could not be ignored by an open-minded observer. Forms of so-called faith-healing may be, as the committee inclines to believe, the effect of suggestion, but this has nothing to do with Christian Science, as any one would discover who tried by means of suggestion to duplicate the good work that is being accomplished by Christian Science.

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