methods, and with them bring different ideas.
It is too early to predict where this movement will go, and how greatly it
will affect the well-established methods. That it has produced a sensation
in religious circles, and called forth the implements of theological
warfare, is very well known. While it has done this, it may, on the other
hand, have brought a benefit. Ere this many a new project in religious
belief has stirred up feeling, but as time has gone on, compromises have
been welcomed.
The erection of this temple will doubtless help on the growth of its
principles. Pilgrims from everywhere will go there in search of truth, and
some may be satisfied and some will not. Christian Science cannot absorb
the world's thought. It may get the share of attention it deserves, but it
can only aspire to take its place alongside other great demonstrations of
religious belief which have done something good for the sake of humanity.
Wonders will never cease. Here is a church whose treasurer has to send out
word that no sums except those already subscribed can be received! The
Christian Scientists have a faith of the mustard-seed variety. What a pity
some of our practical Christian folk have not a faith approximate to that
of these "impractical" Christian Scientists.
* * * * *
[_Jackson Patriot_, Jackson, Mich., January 20, 1895]
[Extract]
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
The erection of a massive temple in Boston by Christian Scientists, at a
cost of over two hundred thousand dollars, love-offerings of the disciples
of Mary Baker Eddy, reviver of the ancient faith and author of the textbook
from which, with the New Testament at the foundation, believers receive
light, health, and strength, is evidence of the rapid growth of the new
movement. We call it new. It is not. The name Christian Science alone is
new. At the beginning of Christianity it was taught and practised by Jesus
and his disciples. The Master was the great healer. But the wave of
materialism and bigotry that swept over the world for fifteen centuries,
covering it with the blackness of the Dark Ages, nearly obliterated all
vital belief in his teachings. The Bible was a sealed book. Recently a
revived belief in what he taught is manifest, and Christian Science is one
result. No new doctrine is proclaimed, but there is the fresh development
of a Principle that was put into practice by the Founder of Christianity
nineteen hundred years
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