Inasmuch as—in my belief—the
very first editions of the book Science and Health
were far above the reach of Mrs. Eddy’s mental
and literary abilities, I think she has from the very
beginning been claiming as her own another person’s
book, and wearing as her own property laurels rightfully
belonging to that person—the real author
of Science and Health. And I think the reason—and
the only reason—that he has not protested
is because his work was not exposed to print until
after he was safely dead.
That with an eye to business, and by grace of her
business talent, she has restored to the world neglected
and abandoned features of the Christian religion which
her thousands of followers find gracious and blessed
and contenting, I recognize and confess; but I am convinced
that every single detail of the work except just that
one—the delivery of the Product to the
world—was conceived and performed by another.
ORIGINAL FIRST PREFACE TO SCIENCE AND HEALTH
There seems a Christian necessity of learning God’s
power and purpose to heal both mind and body.
This thought grew out of our early seeking Him in
all our ways, and a hopeless as singular invalidism
that drugs increased instead of diminished, and hygiene
benefited only for a season. By degrees we have
drifted into more spiritual latitudes of thought, and
experimented as we advanced until demonstrating fully
the power of mind over the body. About the year
1862, having heard of a mesmerist in Portland who
was treating the sick by manipulation, we visited him;
he helped us for a time, then we relapsed somewhat.
After his decease, and a severe casualty deemed fatal
by skilful physicians, we discovered that the Principle
of all healing and the law that governs it is God,
a divine Principle, and a spiritual not material law,
and regained health.
It was not an individual or mortal mind acting upon
another so-called mind that healed us. It was
the glorious truths of Christian Science that we discovered
as we neared that verge of so-called material life
named death; yea, it was the great Shekinah, the spirit
of Life, Truth, and Love illuminating our understanding
of the action and might of Omnipotence! The
old gentleman to whom we have referred had some very
advanced views on healing, but he was not avowedly
religious neither scholarly. We interchanged
thoughts on the subject of healing the sick.
I restored some patients of his that he failed to heal,
and left in his possession some manuscripts of mine
containing corrections of his desultory pennings,
which I am informed at his decease passed into the
hands of a patient of his, now residing in Scotland.
He died in 1865 and left no published works.
The only manuscript that we ever held of his, longer
than to correct it, was one of perhaps a dozen pages,
most of which we had composed. He manipulated
the sick; hence his ostensible method of healing was
physical instead of mental.
