Still vivid in memory is the picture of our loved Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, as she addressed the March Primary class of 1889. This class assembled on Monday, February 25, at 10 a.m., at 571 Columbus Avenue, in the house which was known as "The Massachusetts Metaphysical College." A limited number might board and room there during class, and my parents and I were happy to be among the number.

The class was held in a large room at the rear of the house. The sixty-five students were representative of our Cause at that time, coming from many parts of the United States and Canada. Some had already been taught by Mrs. Eddy in a Primary class; some had been through a Normal class; some had studied under qualified teachers, and others, like ourselves, had not studied under a teacher.

Our Leader's appearance at that time was of a woman many years younger than the recorded number. The hair was still dark, the eyes glowing with the inner fire of spiritual inspiration. The delicate complexion permitted her color to vary in response to her thought. The reproduced photograph used in the latest edition of "The Life of Mary Baker Eddy" by Siby1 Wilbur gives a good idea of her appearance at that period. There could be incisiveness when occasion demanded. One member of the class, a retired minister inclined to controversy, asked Mrs. Eddy how, if people took cold mentally, his little two-year-old child could get cold by walking about with bare feet when too young to be conscious of breaking a so-called material law. Mrs. Eddy vehemently replied, "You took cold for him." She asked one woman what she would do if she were treating a case that did not yield. The answer was, "I would examine my own thought." Mrs. Eddy then asked her what she would do if she were treating a case that did not yield. The woman answered she would handle animal magnetism. Again Mrs. Eddy repeated her question, and the woman said, "I suppose I'd give it up." "And that," Mrs. Eddy said, "is just what you should not do." Of course no notes were tolerated, and she questioned each one individually.

As a young girl I kept a diary. On February 26, the second day of class, is this entry: "Mrs. Eddy is wonderfully clear, and we are enjoying the class beyond anything we ever expected."

Her ready wit was well known to all who enjoyed her friendship or sat under her teaching. She was illustrating the point that "matter and mortal mind are one" (Unity of Good, p. 35), and that mortal mind is the only factor to be considered. She said, "It is like the man who said, 'My wife and I are one—and I am that one!'"

One day after announcing that the subject of that day's teaching would be animal magnetism, she said, "Today we will talk something up to talk it down." It impressed me deeply at the time, and the thought has remained with me that, for lucidity and brevity of statement regarding her teaching of that which claims to be power but in reality is not, these words are unsurpassed: "Today we will talk something up to talk it down."

We all have the benefit of our Leader's own resume of this class in "Miscellaneous Writings." Here she speaks of the autograph album in which we wrote our names. My father made the presentation, in response to which she said, "Among the gifts of my students, this of yours is one of the most beautiful and the most costly, because you have signed your names" (ibid., p. 281). In emphasizing the necessity for unity among her followers she used solemn words. To quote again from the resume (ibid., p. 279), she said, "We, to-day, in this class-room, are enough to convert the world if we are of one Mind; for then the whole world will feel the influence of this Mind." In view of present seeming world conditions, how intensified should be our prayer that we, her followers of today, may demonstrate that one Mind. We cannot question that a burdened world awaits our fulfillment of her promise and prophecy. The great and lasting imprint on memory left by our Leader's teaching in the two classes in which I had the privilege to be enrolled, as well as that received in private conversations, is the fact that, while erroneous situations may be considered and discussed, error must never be accepted as real; that error must never have the last word. Always she lifted one's thought to a higher level, and when so lifted she required that there should be no return to the previously discussed discord.

Her choice of words in which to clothe her ideas in her classroom work was as distinctive and thought-arresting as in her writings. Years later a distinguished professor of Harvard University, George Herbert Palmer, wrote: "In the writings of Mary Baker Eddy there is this great quality of spontaneous expression. There was somewhat to say that must get said. The freedom and power, the unconventionality and fearless handling of her too to the end she sought, are slowly vindicating themselves in the case of this great writer, and the world is beginning to admit that in the writings of the greatest woman Leader and organizer the world has ever seen, is the enduring vitality of great literature.... It [her style] is beautiful and strong, and moves with a marvelous celerity to its point; yet it is so weighted with meaning that one may well lift every word as if it were a treasure casket. In this age when a certain smooth propriety of speech is reducing to deadly levels of commonplace countless pages of print, Mrs. Eddy's writing stands out as individual as the brushwork of some medieval scribe and illuminator of the days before machine-made books... There are no extra words to veil thought or to cover vacancy. She has achieved the great thing: her thinking stands forth in its naked sincerity as if she had done away with the medium of speech and had brought forth the Word itself which is one with thought and deed.... She is herself what she says, she has lived it out, and so it is that her words live and kindle life in others." (From The Christian Science Monitor, March 3, 1911, by Miss M. Louise Baum.)A correction was made in the September 28, 1940 Sentinel: ""Through an error, a quotation from 
The Christian Science Monitor  International Edition, March 3, 1911, which appeared in the 
Christian Science Sentinel   of July 6, 1940 (page 901), was attributed to Professor George Herbert Palmer, whereas it should have been credited to Miss M. Louise Baum."

To follow Peter's counsel, "Use hospitality one to another without grudging" (I Peter 4:9), was no task to the mistress of Pleasant View. The cheer, daintiness, and order of the home radiated its owner's individuality. Above all, she gave of herself freely. In June, 1893, during my father's pastorate of The Mother Church in Boston, we received an invitation written by her own hand, firm and character revealing as were all the letters we received from her. The invitation was to my parents and myself, and we were to arrive in the middle afternoon and remain overnight. With what joy we went you can well imagine. We were met at the station and driven to Pleasant View, where Mrs. Eddy received us almost immediately. We were with her practically all the time until eight in the evening, when she excused herself. I was struck by her loving manner towards those who served her. She addressed them usually as "dear," and they addressed her, lovingly, as "Mother." Even in ordinary conversation error was gently rebuked. Someone had spoken of a rather flagrant mistake some Scientist had made. She remarked on how easy it was to uncover other people's errors.

She was a remarkably good listener, but above all one realized that she listened to God; that she walked with her hand in God's hand; that, as Professor Palmer wrote, "She is herself what she says." She had written to my father when he began his pastorate: "I found it essential, when the pastor of this church, to lead them by my own state of love and spirituality. By fervor in speaking the Word, by tenderness in searching into their needs—and specially by feeling myself and uttering the spirit of Christian Science —together with the letter." (From a letter to the Rev. David A. Easton, March 10, 1893.) Her commendation produced the effect of causing one to see one's shortcomings and at the same time determine to overcome them. When she spoke of Christ Jesus, it seemed as if time and space, the barrier of two millenniums and two hemispheres, were swept away. She spoke at this time with ardor of her work on her illustrated poem, "Christ and Christmas." It was evidently dear to her heart. The verse (p. 39),

shows her utter realization that the human self was not a factor in her writing, but, rather, that it was set aside that the revealed Science of Christianity might freely flow.

The following morning of this visit we were called to breakfast about seven-thirty. Mrs. Eddy greeted us and sat at the head of her table, but she explained that she had breakfasted much earlier and that she would talk while we ate. Again she gave us generously of her time until our departure, about eleven o'clock. It was like class teaching all over again, and impressions deeper than words remained and governed thought. On leaving Pleasant View we drove through Concord and on a few miles to Boscawen to call on my grandfather's cousin, Bartlett Corser. For the first time we heard with great interest from him of his father's and his own intimate friendship with the Baker family, his father being the Rev. Enoch Corser spoken of by our Leader (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 14; Message to The Mother Church for 1901, p. 32). Cousin Bartlett was about three years older than Mrs. Eddy, and his memories of her girlhood were beautiful and distinct. Much of this has been recorded in Sibyl Wilbur's biography of our Leader (pp. 31-33). On our return to Boston my mother wrote to Mrs. Eddy of our deep gratitude for the precious hours spent with her, and also told of the call on the cousin and of his treasured memories of her and her home and family. Immediately a reply was received which contained this paragraph: "Your letter was an oasis. It was like lying down in green pastures beside still waters.... Nothing could have given me more pleasure, that pertains to earth, than your account of seeing Mr. Bartlett Corser and of his relationship! I remember him as an ideal man, a scholar, a great hearted and great minded man. And his father, Rev. Enoch Corser, I used to think was the most naturally eloquent gifted preacher I ever heard speak. It was the sweet memory of girlhood days that your letter awakened which rested me. Thank you for it. I shall certainly try to have him visit me." (From a letter to Mrs. Margaret Easton, July 2, 1893.) A few months later Mrs. Eddy wrote a lovely expression of her thanks to my father for a sermon of his which was published in the Journal of October, 1893. It read: "God bless you and every day show you a little more of Infinite Love. Just your daily bread, more you will not digest." (From a letter to the Rev. David A. Easton, October 18, 1893.)

On the twenty-seventh of December, 1895, came the invitation to New Year's luncheon, with the admonition not to speak to anyone about it until it was consummated—a very usual request from her. We were no sooner ushered into the living room at the left of the entrance hallway than we heard a light, swift step on the stairs, and Mrs. Eddy was taking her guests by the hand and saying, "How good God is to give me this pleasure!" We hardly knew what to say, because we were so conscious of God's goodness to us in permitting us to be there. She explained that she so often had to see people for some specific reason, but that we were "just company."

During the visit she said there were things she wanted to tell her church, and that she should come again soon. The fulfillment of this promise was her delivery of the Communion Address in the same month—January, 1896. (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 120, and Journal, Vol. 13, p. 441.) In referring to her first time of addressing us in The Mother Church, May 26, 1895, she said, "I discerned every mentality there, but saw no personality." This gave us an enlarged and wonderful sense of what spiritual discernment was, in contrast with the earth-weighted sense of personality. At the table there were five guests, besides the beloved hostess and members of the household. Mrs. Eddy keenly enjoyed a story which illustrated mortal mind's absurdity. Someone told a story of two men in a hotel room. One wanted air and the other did not. Finally, the one wanting air got up, and failing in the dark to open a window broke a pane of glass. Then he could sleep comfortably, but the other man took cold. In the morning it turned out that he had broken a pane of glass in a bookcase!

We were telling her of some of the splendid healings reported at the testimony meetings, and she was listening eagerly, as she always did to any demonstration of the healing power of the Christ, Truth. I said, "Oh, Mother, you should be there to hear them." She smiled so sweetly, and said that she wished that she might. One realized that her retirement from public life in Boston came just at the time the persecutions were lessening, but that had she stayed to enjoy these fruits of her labors she might not have gone on to higher heights of demonstration and worked out the God-ordained plan by which what she called the "stately goings of Christian Science" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 245) would be forwarded.

On the afternoon of November 19, 1898, I received a telegram reading, "Be at Christian Science Hall at Concord tomorrow afternoon at 4.00" (signed) "M. B. Eddy." In response to similar calls many of us took the train from Boston for Concord that evening. We were all very happy to be called, but distinctly human in our speculation as to the reason for the call. The personnel of this class was much like that of the March class in 1889, except that, indicative of the growth in our movement, there were those from greater distances. England, Scotland, Canada, and our Far West were well represented. Those at greater distances were, of course, notified in time to make the journey. Much of interest has been written of this last class taught by our Teacher and Leader. One of the definite memories is the loving way in which she spoke of children. She said that she loved them, that theirs was the white unwritten page, and that it was because of her love for them that they came to greet her as she went on her daily drive. There was the time when she called for a volunteer to read Luke's account of the resurrection. We were all silent until a young man said, "I will, Mother." She said he was her Nathaniel, always ready. She asked us, each one, how we would heal a case of sickness. She listened lovingly and patiently, but she seemed disappointed that more was not said about the healing power of Love, and then she gave us her answer in words which lifted us to a higher vision of what Christian healing really was.

In reviewing the life of the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, one sees that dissatisfaction with scholastic theology only drove her closer to God and the revelation of Christ Jesus. Instead of forsaking the Bible, she searched it more diligently, looking for the vital spark which had kept its teachings intact in spite of persecution, skepticism, human philosophies, and counterfeit presentations of Christianity. She lived the Christly teachings in unselfed labors for family and friends, in working for temperance reform, emanicipation of the slaves, and higher education for women, until these gleams of light merged into the glory of revealed scientific Christianity. Mary of old said, Rabboni; which is to say, Master" (John 20:16). Mary of our day said (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 23): "When the door opened, I was waiting and watching; and lo, the bridegroom came! The character of the Christ was illuminated by the midnight torches of Spirit. My heart knew its Redeemer."

The singing of Hymn No. 65, "From glory unto glory," brought the meeting to a close.