One
indication of the significance of the significance of William Dana Orcutt's
1950 book Mary
Baker Eddy and Her Books may be deduced from a review by Alice
Dixon Bond in the Boston
Sunday Herald and subsequently reprinted in the April 7, 1951 edition of the Christian
Science Sentinel, available at Christian Science Reading Rooms
worldwide.
The
review notes that Orcutt's book is '[o]ne of the most distinctive, and
distinguished, biographies of the year...by one of the world's great makers of
books as well as a renowned author...' She continues:
During [his 18-year association with her], Mr. Orcutt came to know at
first hand the rare quality and the genuine greatness of Mary Baker Eddy, and
in this book he has made the lay reader, as well as the Christian Scientist,
realize both her essential humanness and her extraordinary ability...
It was Mrs. Eddy who answered her youthful publisher's earnest desire
to leave printing and devote himself "to something in which there is
beauty" with the quiet truth which was to remain with him always: "If
a man has beauty in himself," she said, "he can put beauty into
anything." ...
Beauty...is in this book; beauty—and truth. Mr. Orcutt brings facts to
bear on the many false stories which have grown up about Mrs. Eddy's work, has
untangled crossed lines, and makes us understand as nothing else has done the
woman back of the mission— her humanity and her dedication.
Writing
a few years later, a student of Christian Science pointed out a lesson gleaned
from Orcutt's book. Louise Wheatley Cook
Hovnanian’s article, ‘The Sun Never Sets’, appeared in the December 11, 1954 Christian Science
Sentinel:
...something very interesting appears in a book, which may be found in
Christian Science Reading Rooms, entitled "Mary Baker Eddy and Her
Books," by William Dana Orcutt. On pages 86 and 87, the author tells of an
interview he had with Mrs. Eddy at Concord some ten years after his first visit
there.
He was impressed with the fact that few changes had been made in the
room which was her study, but especially was he impressed with the lack of
change in our Leader herself. He writes: "When she entered the room, just
as she had done on that first visit of mine, she seemed just as she had always
seemed: the same bright smile of welcome, the same penetrating, assessing eyes,
the same alertness of manner, the same clear, musical voice, the same physical
vigor I had always remembered—yet the ten years that had been added to the
history of the world had added the same number of years to this slight little
woman—years of conflict and triumph, years of disappointment and gratification,
years of consecration and of arduous labor, years of achievement and
accomplishment—and had left no visible mark. Mrs. Eddy was eighty years old at
the time."
Orcutt's
recognition and declaration of beauty and truth are inspiring, in a world where
these qualities sometimes seem to be overshadowed or overlooked.
One
indication of the significance of the significance of William Dana Orcutt's
1950 book Mary
Baker Eddy and Her Books may be deduced from a review by Alice
Dixon Bond in the Boston
Sunday Herald and subsequently reprinted in the April 7, 1951 edition of the Christian
Science Sentinel, available at Christian Science Reading Rooms
worldwide.
The
review notes that Orcutt's book is '[o]ne of the most distinctive, and
distinguished, biographies of the year...by one of the world's great makers of
books as well as a renowned author...' She continues:
During [his 18-year association with her], Mr. Orcutt came to know at
first hand the rare quality and the genuine greatness of Mary Baker Eddy, and
in this book he has made the lay reader, as well as the Christian Scientist,
realize both her essential humanness and her extraordinary ability...
It was Mrs. Eddy who answered her youthful publisher's earnest desire
to leave printing and devote himself "to something in which there is
beauty" with the quiet truth which was to remain with him always: "If
a man has beauty in himself," she said, "he can put beauty into
anything." ...
Beauty...is in this book; beauty—and truth. Mr. Orcutt brings facts to
bear on the many false stories which have grown up about Mrs. Eddy's work, has
untangled crossed lines, and makes us understand as nothing else has done the
woman back of the mission— her humanity and her dedication.
Writing
a few years later, a student of Christian Science pointed out a lesson gleaned
from Orcutt's book. Louise Wheatley Cook
Hovnanian’s article, ‘The Sun Never Sets’, appeared in the December 11, 1954 Christian Science
Sentinel:
...something very interesting appears in a book, which may be found in
Christian Science Reading Rooms, entitled "Mary Baker Eddy and Her
Books," by William Dana Orcutt. On pages 86 and 87, the author tells of an
interview he had with Mrs. Eddy at Concord some ten years after his first visit
there.
He was impressed with the fact that few changes had been made in the
room which was her study, but especially was he impressed with the lack of
change in our Leader herself. He writes: "When she entered the room, just
as she had done on that first visit of mine, she seemed just as she had always
seemed: the same bright smile of welcome, the same penetrating, assessing eyes,
the same alertness of manner, the same clear, musical voice, the same physical
vigor I had always remembered—yet the ten years that had been added to the
history of the world had added the same number of years to this slight little
woman—years of conflict and triumph, years of disappointment and gratification,
years of consecration and of arduous labor, years of achievement and
accomplishment—and had left no visible mark. Mrs. Eddy was eighty years old at
the time."
Orcutt's
recognition and declaration of beauty and truth are inspiring, in a world where
these qualities sometimes seem to be overshadowed or overlooked.
