MARY BAKER EDDY.

Evening Star, Issue 22684, 25 June 1937, Page 14

MARY BAKER EDDY.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —In your issue of June 14 you. report an address delivered in the Spiritualist Church in which the speaker assumes that Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science, “prior to organising the Christian Science movement, had been a public medium in New York.” I should be glad if you would grant me the privilege of replying to this remark. Mrs Eddy never was a medium. There is ample evidence to prove this. She certainly investigated the claims of Spiritualism, as did almost every cultured person in the middle of the nineteenth century. Orthodoxy was loosening its hold, and Spiritualism and its phenomena were the talk of the hour. It was natural that Mrs Eddy should look into Spiritualism, but her interest in it was only superficial and temporary. Her Puritan upbringing _ had taught her that men can communicate directly with God without the agency of electricity, wires, or the spirits of the departed. Even in Mrs Eddy’s day Spiritualists took pleasure in claiming her as a medium, but she disclaimed her association at any time with Spiritualism. In Tremont Temple, Boston, in 1885, Mrs Eddy answered the question “ Aro you a medium?” as follows:—“I am not, and never was. I understand the impossibility of between the so-called dead and living.” —Miscellaneous writings. Her research proved to her that there was no analogy between Christian Science and Spiritualism, and caused her to include a chapter in the Christian Science text book, ‘ Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures,’ covering 30 pages, entitled ‘ Christian Science Versus Spiritualism,’ in which she exposes Spiritualism and shows it to be the antipode of Christian Science. The following quotations, which clearly show her thought, are from this chapter:— “ When the science of mind is understood Spiritualism will be found mainly erroneous, having no scientific basis nor origin, no proof nor power outside of human testimony. It is the offspring of the physical senses. There is no sensuality in spirit. I never could believe in Spiritualism.” “ I entertain no doubt of the humanity and philanthropy of many Spiritualists, but I cannot coincide "with their views. It is mysticism which gives Spiritualism its force. Science dispels mystery and explains extraordinary phenomena; but science never removes phenomena from,

the domain of reason into the realm of mysticism.”—l am, etc., Edgar G. Harris Committee on Publication for the Soutli Island of New Zealand).