Notes on Lewis C. Strang and Rudyard Kipling

The First Church of Christ, Scientist by Mary Baker Eddy – the book for June, 2015

Joyce Voysey writes:

First up.  Thank you Julie, for your introduction.  Great definitions of “fortify.”

I noticed that the Foreword was not signed by Mrs. Eddy, so I looked it up on JSH-Online.  The article begins with this:

 

“Lest we forget”

By LEWIS C. STRANG

From the April 28, 1906 issue of the Christian Science Sentinel

 [It is a pleasure to give prominence in our columns to the following letter, which emphasizes so clearly and in few words Mrs. Eddy's leadership of the Christian Science movement, and the reasons therefor; the right relationship of Christian Scientists to her, to Science and Health, to the Church Manual, and to The Mother Church of Christ, Scientist, which she has founded "on the rock, Christ." It is a just tribute to the magnitude and success of her labors for this Church and for humanity.—EDITOR.]

And it signs off with Lewis C. Strang, Pleasant View.  Of course, Lewis Strang was one of the secretaries working for Mrs. Eddy at Pleasant View, her Concord home.

In my JSH-Online hunt, I looked first for ‘Kipling’ regarding the introductory quote mentioned by Julie.  I will have to go back and read some of the items.  They looked interesting.  I will report.

Meantime, Lewis Strang:

There are no reminiscences of Lewis Strang in the We Knew Mary Baker Eddy books. Here is an interesting insight -

Pleasant View, Concord, N. H., Oct. 22, 1906.

Dear Mr. McLellan:—Will you through the periodicals kindly impress upon those who contribute to such funds as the Concord Street Fund just closed by our Leader, that they should never make out their checks, drafts, etc., payable to Mrs. Eddy. Checks, etc., payable to Mrs. Eddy, require her personal endorsement, and this labor, insignificant in a single instance, becomes, when the instances are multiplied, a serious encroachment upon her time and attention.

Sincerely yours
Lewis C. Strang, Associate Secretary

I had to consult Robert Peel’s Years of Discovery to find out more about Mr. Strang. Hello!  He had been a drama critic before coming to Pleasant View (p.258).  He was one Mrs. Eddy’s students named in the Next Friends suit (p. 280).   

Oh dear!  On page 388, note 3, we find a mention of our book and its Foreword by Strang.  The sad bit, “Strang…later left the church and became bitterly hostile to her.”  I can only feel great compassion for him.

 

And now Kipling –

Signs of the Times

with contributions from Arnold J. Walker
From the March 18, 1967 issue of the Christian Science Sentinel

From an article in The Cadle Call Indianapolis, Indiana

He is a very intelligent, cultured, normal sort of a man. Coming in for an interview he said, "I don't know what's wrong with me. I have plenty of friends; ... I have an enviable job; I have a nice home; I am free to go where I want to and yet I am wretchedly unhappy. Something is missing ... that is all-important but I don't know what it is." I ... said, "My friend, I know what is missing in your life. ... You have everything but love, and the only source of love—that is, satisfying, eternal love—the only source, is God."

Years ago the inimitable Rudyard Kipling was very ill with typhoid fever. ... As he lay there he kept mumbling something to himself. The family tried to find out what he wanted, but with no success. One morning the nurse bent over his frail form and said. "Mr. Kipling, what do you want?" For a few moments the restlessness left him, he opened his eyes slowly and said feebly, "I want God." Undeniably this is the cry of a restless bewildered age. Everybody needs God. And God is love.

Our sophisticated age praises the mind, but the mind without love is a curse capable of a thousand selfishnesses and ten thousand evils. ... When Jesus [taught] that God is love, he meant that love is the characteristic and principle by which He acts.

 

The following item is excerpted from April 6, 1899 Christian Science Sentinel. The article, Interesting and Suggestive, included a Letter to the Editor of the New York Times and this letter quotes an article titled The World of Doctors. The letter apparently appeared in the New York Times March 22, 1899.

Interesting and Suggestive
with contributions from John C. Turner, Thomas W. Organ
From the April 6, 1899 issue of the Christian Science Sentinel

EXCERPT -

The Work of the Doctors.

To the Editor of the New York Times: — Your editorial on "Pneumonia and the Doctors" has, I am pleased to note, incited much comment more or less suggestive and instructive…It is more than probable that Mr. Kipling would have recovered had there been neither doctor, nurse, nor drug within a thousand miles of his rooms. Mr. Kipling is "tough" and fortunately survived the attack of both disease and doctors. I am speaking from experience, for I have been "attacked" both by the pneumonia and by the doctors, and consider an attack by the former far less dangerous than the latter…Years ago I became convinced that a doctor is no more a therapeutical necessity than is a saloon a social necessity…The coming man will neither drink wine nor swallow drugs. He will know better…

Thomas W. Organ.
New York City, March 19, 1899