This wonderful, wonderful book

Finished!

 

William Rathvon passes on advice from Mrs. Eddy about handling church matters.  We often hear it said, “What would Mrs. Eddy say?” or “Mrs. Eddy would not approve of that,” whereas Rathvon reports that she said, “If an issue comes, it must be decided for God.  You must not put upon me the burden of deciding what Science and Health (S&H) declares” (p. 530).

 

The answers are always in the books – the Bible and Mrs. Eddy’s writings.

 

I think we have all wondered just what Mrs. Eddy thought when she healed Mr. Clark.  See S&H 192-3.  “Mr. Clark lay with his eyes fixed and sightless.  The dew of death was on his brow.  I went to his bedside.  In a few moments his face changed; its death-pallor gave place to a natural hue….In about ten minutes he opened his eyes and said: “I feel like a new man.  My suffering is all gone.””

 

It seems to me that the “I” that went to the bedside was the “I” defined in the Glossary to Science and Health p.588:  “I, or Ego.  Divine Principle; Spirit; Soul; incorporeal, unerring, immortal, and eternal Mind.”

 

The second paragraph goes on: “There is but one I, or Us, but one divine Principle, or Mind, governing all existence; man and woman unchanged forever in their individual characters, even as numbers which never blend with each other, though they are governed by one Principle.  All the objects of God’s creation reflect one Mind, and whatever reflects not this one Mind, is false and erroneous, even the belief that life, substance, and intelligence are both mental and material.”

 

Rathvon confirms that, in her early healing, Mrs. Eddy did not have to work or argue to bring about the healing.  “I reached the result without the intermediate steps.  If anyone was said to be ill in the next room, I would not have to treat.  I would just know the truth about them, and they would seem to be no more sick or dead than you are” (p. 539).  It seems to be that she didn’t so much think the truth, but could be the truth.

 

I love this from Rathvon: “I was brought up to believe that religion should always be solemn and altogether dolorous.  I know now that it should be just the opposite, and we should have good cheer” (p. 549).

 

And this on page 552 about a group singing in the evenings: “Mrs. Hoag and Mrs. Rathvon sang soprano.  Mr. Dickey stumbled along under a heavy load of base, while I clawed the scales toward the high notes, trying to contribute a thin tenor, and the Reverend (as we called Mr. Tomlinson) wobbled around in every direction.  If we didn’t make music, we certainly did produce a joyful noise.”

 

A bit more about music re space for a choir in the new First Church Chicago building: Mr. Kimball – “We are engaged just now in fighting the world, the flesh, and the devil.  When we get through with them, we will be qualified to take up the church music problem” (p. 556).

 

p. 560: “Only nothing can come from nothing, or better still, nothing but nothing can come from nothing.”  An echo maybe of a song from The Sound of Music?  I wonder….

 

And so, I finish this wonderful, wonderful book, remembering that Mary Baker Eddy was the deepest student of her work Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures.  Rathvon finishes his contribution with a reminder that we are indebted to Mrs. Eddy for every aspect of our church life in Christian Science, for she is the light through which it comes to us.  His final sentence regarding her belonging to the present and not the past: “One does not think of sunshine or light, truth or love, as pertaining to the past, but to the everlasting present” (p. 588).

 

Joyce Voysey

The mount of revelation

How wise Adelaide Still became!  She says that Mrs. Eddy told the workers “that she found herself on the mount of revelation where all was good [and] there was no evil in her consciousness, but she did not know how she got there.  In order that the revelation should be proved practical in redeeming mankind, she had to come down from this mount and seek the way to demonstrate it daily” (p. 454).  What a work this was and is for mankind!

Adelaide records Mrs. Eddy’s words: “Whenever there seems to be a need or lack in your experience, this simply indicates the scientific fact that this seeming need is already supplied by God’s gracious abundance.  Then give thanks with your whole heart because you have learned in Christian Science that God’s supply is on hand” (p. 484).

This reminds me of a set of wonderfully descriptive nouns in a favourite passage in Eddy’s book Science & Health with Key to the Scriptures: “Through the magnitude of his human life, he demonstrated the divine Life.  Out of the amplitude of his pure affection, he defined Love.  With the affluence of Truth, he vanquished error.” (p. 54:1-5)

Magnitude (Noah Webster): Greatness; grandeur.  Greatness, in reference to influence or effect.

Amplitude (ibid) Largeness; extent of capacity or intellectual powers; as, amplitude of mind.

Affluence (ibid) Literally, a flowing to, or concourse. (rarely used).  Figuratively, abundance of riches; wealth

 Joyce Voysey

Adam Dickey's account is wonderful

I love this explanation of the genesis of the much loved article by Adam Dickey God’s Law of Adjustment:

“Dickey’s well-known article “God’s Law of Adjustment” was published in 1916, inspired in part by these remarks Eddy made to him: “To-day divine Mind adjusts me to my work and adjusts my work to me.  Under the law of adjustment, God’s law, my work must be successful.  Through steadfast declaration, work and worker, buyer and seller, are brought together[,] … and God’s perfect law is brought into manifestation.”  Dickey strove for many years to understand and demonstrate the truth of these remarks before writing about them.” – see p. 385 of We Knew Mary Baker Eddy, Amplified Edition Vol. II

Dickey records Mrs. Eddy’s change of thought about the Board of Directors’ idea of placing a marble statue of a woman kneeling in prayer above the organ in The Mother Church.  Her final word was: 

“No picture of a female in attitude of prayer or in any other attitude shall be made or put into our Church, or any of our buildings with my consent.  This is now my request and demand: Do nothing in statuary, in writing, or in action to perpetuate or immortalize the thought of personal being; but do and illustrate, teach and practice, all that will impersonalize God and His idea man and woman.  Whatever I have said in the past relative to impersonation in thought or in figure, I have fully recalled, and my Church cannot contradict me in this statement” (ibid Endnote 100 p. 613-4).

My question is: Should we take down any photos of Mary Baker Eddy that we may have displayed anywhere in our churches or reading rooms?

Here is a profound statement from Mrs. Eddy to Dickey: “Remember that the so-called human mind is expected to increase in wisdom until it disappears and Divine Mind is seen to be the only Mind” (ibid p. 428).  I do not know if it is relevant or not, but I am reminded of a remark my aunt (born 1890) often made about babies – that these days they are born with much more evidence of intelligence than in years gone by.

Adam Dickey’s account is wonderful!

Joyce Voysey

Just love

Have we not all asked the question, “What is the difference between human affection and divine Love?”  Mary Eaton records Mrs Eddy’s reply given at the “Class of Seventy” in 1898: “In human affection, you seek something to love, but in divine Love, you seek nothing, but everything”; and then she said in a commanding tone, “Just love!”” p. 336 We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Amplified Edition Vol II.

Miss Eaton also records: “Mrs Eddy gave us her concept of God.  She said, “It is like the father protecting and caring for his child; it is like the mother taking the little one in her arms and feeding it with the milk of the Word; it is like the tender shepherd caring for his flock, going out into the marshes after the lost lamb, calling, calling – listening for its little plaintive voice, taking it in His arms, carrying it home, and doing it over and over again”” Ibid p. 337.

“Have more faith in God – talk with Him” Ibid p. 343.

Joyce Voysey

Three times a day

27 August 2013

I was "off the air" all day yesterday.  Did the “unplug and re-plug the modem” this morning  and it worked.

Are we inclined to think we pray a lot for ourselves because we read the Lesson each day without fail?  Spend time on the Internet looking up lectures and articles?  Reading the periodicals including The Christian Science Monitor? Yes, we need all these.  But on p. 315 of We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Amplified Edition Vol II, Anna B. White Baker records Mrs Eddy as saying, “Students do not pray enough.  They should go by themselves at least three times a day to pray.  Their prayers should consist of much giving thanks, more realization of the perfect as well as the denial of error.  There is too much denial of error and too little realization of the perfect.” 

There is no doubt about it – ‘The song of Christian Science is, “Work – Work – Work – watch and pray.”’  Message to The Mother Church for 1900.  

Now, why is that phrase given inverted commas?  Is it the name of the song?  A quote from somewhere else?  I must seek info on Concord.  When I get back on line – have been off most of the day!

Finally got back on line, to find no references elsewhere to “Work – Work – Work – watch and pray”.  So the inverted commas must signify the name of the song.

Joyce Voysey

____________________

Books as Pastor; Unlabored Motion and Mr Norwood's watch

In 1892 Septimus J. Hanna (referred to as Judge Hanna) and his wife Camilla were called by Mrs Eddy to be Editor and Assistant Editor of The Christian Science Journal.  They had not been class-taught by Mrs Eddy, so she gave them private instruction to ready them for this important task.  Mrs Eddy’s instruction was in the form of seven two or three hour sessions (p. 235). 

Judge Hanna was also the First Reader of The Mother Church at the time of Mrs Eddy’s ordaining the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures Pastor over The Mother Church. (ed. See Church Manual p. 58:6.) 

Hanna makes a point of interest about the Christian Science Pastor: “In 1894 I was called to the pastorate of The Mother Church, continuing in this capacity until the change in the method and order of church services occurred, when I became [the] Reader, conducting two services as such and reading discourses made up of alternate Biblical and correlative references from Science and Health.  It was extremely interesting and instructive to find what a consistent and harmonious discourse could thus be prepared.  Then came the order for two Readers and sermons compiled substantially as they are now” (p. 236).

I hadn’t realised that there had been that interim period after the declaring of the Pastor to be the two books.  How grateful we must continue to be for this faithful follower of Mary Baker Eddy for the foundation work he carried out in these two areas!  What a servant!

Edward Norwood gives us a definition of activity.  When, during class with Mrs Eddy, he had a new vision of reality, he was able to write: “I understood somewhat what our Leader means by the “unlabored motion of Mind” [see Science and Health, p. 445].  And [I saw] that what mortal mind calls activity is lethargy, inaction, inertia, and is the seeming obstruction in the way of the operation of divine law” p. 271.  There are some beautiful thoughts on pages 270-271.

Our editor will be interested in Mr Norwood’s comments about overseeing the re-printing of Science and Health in 1906; I certainly am, having had much to do with printing in our family business.  Norwood writes: “We had to correct some paragraphs as many as thirty times”!!  See beginning page 276.

On page 280, Norwood adds a delightful note on regulating: “It may be of interest to note that during this time, my watch, a very good one, began to gain in time, until it was three hours a day.   Regulating did it no good, so I let it go, and as soon as the work was finished, it resumed its normal condition.  Mr. Armstrong told me he had the same experience in the building of The Mother Church, and the jeweler told him, “It is you, not the watch.”  [See Mr.Armstrong’s book Building of The Mother Church.]

The reader will surely love this quote from Mrs Eddy: “Mrs Eddy told a student that if he desired his neighbor’s children to succeed and prosper at school and elsewhere, his own would also” p. 183.

And another note regarding weather: “The weather expresses our concept of it and can be handled as any claim if you do not hold it as something apart from you, governed by some other power or almanac.  God governs all.  This is the way Jesus stilled the tempest.”

Joyce Voysey

Earthly honors and accepting rebuke

The Christian Science Board of Directors wished to present the Original Mother Church to Mrs Eddy as a gift.  She declined.  Clara Shannon gives an insight into Eddy’s response on page 198 of our book (We Knew Mary Baker Eddy, Amplified Edition Vol II): “To Calvin Frye and me, our Leader said that she would reject all earthly honors and adulation, that she did not forget that on one day Jesus went up to the temple riding on an ass and the people spread their garments and palm leaves before him on the way, and the next week he was crucified on Calvary.”

Clara gives a detailed description of Mrs Eddy’s visit to the new Mother Church edifice, including her overnight stay in The Mother’s Room.  She says of the visit: “I looked upon Mother’s visit to the Church as its real spiritual dedication and consecration to the Cause of Christian Science” (pp. 202-3).

We have spoken of self-justification recently.  Here is a record of Mrs Eddy’s explanation of that aspect of mortal mind: “At any time, if we make a mistake and do not detect it as a mistake, and we are shown that it is a mistake and rebuked for it, [yet] we justify ourselves in what we have done, this is taking sides with error and is a proof that we are being governed by error.  But if, when the error is uncovered to us, we see our mistake, accept the rebuke, and condemn the error in ourselves or to someone else, then we are governed by Truth, and rise, and have overcome the error, and become more spiritually minded.  We have gained a step in Christian Science” (pp. 215-6).

Joyce Voysey

 

Do as we say we believe or else

Page 132¹ gives us a deep challenge where it quotes Mrs Eddy as saying:

“We must be Christian Scientists and do as we say we believe or else be hypocrites.  We say Spirit is all, and then when we have to take our choice between Spirit and the flesh, we cry, “The flesh, the flesh.”  God is coming very near to us, is making demands on us. Mr Frye made his choice twenty-one years ago and since then has been having his experiences, and if he should pass now, [he] would waken to glorified being.  Those who choose the flesh will yet have all the experience to go through.” 

What is “glorified being”? I went on a search, and there it is in Science and Health p. 291:5

“The suppositions that sin is pardoned while unforsaken, that happiness can be genuine in the midst of sin, that the so-called death of the body frees from sin, and that God’s pardon is aught but the destruction of sin, — these are grave mistakes. We know that all will be changed “in the twinkling of an eye,” when the last trump shall sound; but this last call of wisdom cannot come till mortals have already yielded to each lesser call in the growth of Christian character. Mortals need not fancy that belief in the experience of death will awaken them to glorified being.”

The only Bible reference given in Concord is from Luke 4:15: “And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified of all.”  This is speaking of Jesus.  But is it not the Christ which he represented that he wished to be glorified, just as Mary Baker Eddy wished Christian Science to have the glory, and not Mary?

Am I getting myself bogged down here?  I just read this morning about the Way-shower (pages 134 and 136¹). 

“What is a way shower?  There is a human and a divine meaning.  A way shower is that which shows the way; it must be some thing or some one.  Jesus was the Way-shower, the Christ with him, and if he had not been, where would we be?  He showed the way as the masculine idea of Principle; then woman took it up at that point – the ascending thought in the scale – and is showing the way, thus representing the male and female Principle (the male and female of God’s creating).”  And,

“Follow the Way-shower, and you will follow the divine idea; turn away from the Way-shower, and you turn away from the divine idea – like [when] turning away from the window pane, you turn away from the light.  It is not my personality you are following or that you love.  You are being turned from the person to the idea.  When this is accomplished, then you will be free in health to go on and do for the world.”

It seems obvious that Calvin Frye was a consummate follower of Mrs Eddy’s way-showing.

Any discussion on this, as with everything I write, is very welcome.

Joyce Voysey

¹We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Amplified Version Vol II

Duty to lttle ones

As a great-grandparent 5 times over this year, making a total of 8, I ask myself: How can I better do my duty to the little ones?  And I find this instructive from page 135 of our book, We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Expanded Edition Vol. II:

“We must be resurrected from the dead – dead in trespasses and sins; the belief of life in the body, or matter, of life, substance, and intelligence in matter; the proclivities of the parents manifested through a belief in heredity, etc.  We must be resurrected from all this, for what does Paul say, “Except ye have part in the resurrection, my preaching is vain [see I Corinthians 15:12-14].”

It seems obvious that everything Mrs. Eddy explained to her students can be related directly back to the Scriptures or to Science and Health.  Of course, she illustrated this constantly by turning to one or both of the books to confirm her points.  Joseph Mann says this of Mrs. Eddy: Her “every breath overcame the human with the divine” p. 146.  What an example! 

I found a delightful poem on JSH Online when looking up “tears.” It gives us courage to keep aiming high. Here’s the link - http://sentinel.christianscience.com/issues/1981/3/83-10/the-high-goal

The High Goal

 

No fears,

No tears,

No years

Can fetter climbing feet

Man is God’s ever child –

Serene,

Secure,

Complete.

 

Lily Gray

Christian Science Sentinel 9 March 1981

 

This reminds me of the statement in Science & Health (p. 426:5-8),

“The discoverer of Christian Science finds the path less difficult when she has the high goal always before her thoughts, than when she counts her footsteps in endeavoring to reach it.”  

Joyce Voysey

Antidote to malice

I hope this brings out something of what I have been seeing -

What a book¹ this is!  I find so much that stops me in my tracks.  For example: page 33 talks of animal magnetism and why it is now malicious.  Animal magnetism is all of error; and it is now malicious animal magnetism because it is fighting the Truth.

I vividly remember reading later in the book that Mrs Eddy classified extreme weather conditions as the effect of malice.  I’ll keep looking for that reference².  Meanwhile, this idea is developing in consciousness.  I think I can see that there is no difference between the fury of mortal mind expressed in the “earthquake, wind, wave, lightning” (see Mary Baker Eddy’s Science &Health with Key to the Scriptures p. 293:22) of those extreme weather conditions, and the tumult of mortal mind expressed in confused mental and physical conditions.  The antidote is the same in each example: “Truth…says to disease, “Peace, be still” (ibid p. 144: 22).  Just so, Jesus said to the storm of wind and sea, “Peace, be still” (Mark 4:39).

Is it not that the animal magnetism presenting itself as mortal mind is what is to be combated through our understanding of the great Science of Being which is Christian Science?  It is to be reduced to its native nothingness through knowing that God is the only power and presence, and that all Mind is Spirit, good.  This precludes any possibility of there being a mortal mind having any power over man and nature.

Joyce Voysey

¹We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Expanded Edition, Vol II

²Lida Fitzpatrick is the one who records Mrs. Eddy’s remarks about the “malice” of extreme weather conditions.  On page 110 we find recorded under the date May 18,1903

“We are told the world will be destroyed; how?  By malice.  By cyclone, electricity, and be burned up.  What is a cyclone?  It is a condition of mortal mind-malice.  What burns up?  Malice.  It is all malice, and our textbook tells us, Christian Scientists will hold such things in check.  God never made them and they can be overcome just the same as sickness.  It is all within.” 

Self justification, revenge, and Love’s strong demands

Self-justification.  Here is a different angle on it – Page 54 of We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Amplified Edition, Volume II (Janette Weller) “During these years, I was constantly tormented with a burning desire to be justified before the world.  It seemed to me that I could not endure to be misjudged and misunderstood.  This intense longing for self-justification kept up for many months [until], suddenly at a Sunday service, the thought came to me that my justification would mean another’s condemnation, and a new light dawned in my consciousness.  I was then and there convinced that a desire for self-justification was the highest sense of revenge one could entertain.”

We find self-justification in evidence a lot in these records of folk who were learning to practise Christian Science.  And do we not have to meet this error in our own experience?

On page 126, Lida Fitzpatrick records Mrs. Eddy as saying, “The preachers speak of Jesus as though he was always so placid, never ruffled, while really he was very stern.  The Scriptures speak of him as saying to his disciples, “Get thee behind me, Satan”; and just before he ascended, he called them “fools” [Luke 24:25].  I used to be very amiable before coming into Christian Science – was a peacemaker at home when arguments about temperance, politics, and philosophy would arise – but now I am stern.”

This reminds me that recently I read aloud the whole of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew Chapters 5 - 7). Then I continued on with a few of the following chapters.  I found that Jesus was speaking very strongly and emphatically, and with great authority.  It made me wonder if as Readers in Christian Science churches we are too soft in reading Jesus words; and Mrs. Eddy’s words in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures as well. 

Somewhere it is recorded that Mrs. Eddy used the phrase “kid gloves”, the inference being that error must not be handled gently.  I have searched for the quote but with no result so far¹.  However, I did find this delightful poem on JSH Online [http://journal.christianscience.com/issues/1951/8/69-8]:

In the Temple

RITA BERMAN

From the August 1951 issue of The Christian Science Journal

 Strong, Jesus' words,
Stinging, like lash of whips.
To the dulled ears of those who bought and sold,
And those who would handle with kid gloves,
Delicately, with compromise, false tact—
Considerate of favor, richer tithes—
The sheep-clothed traffickers
In impure thoughts and aims,
Whom he named thieves.

Let none such motives, God, in whom I dwell,
Despoil the house of prayer that is my mind!
As servitor and minister let me
Be swift to discern the intents that are pure,
Swift to cast out the traffickers in self
That would aggrandize² man by matter limned³.
Seeking by theft of truth some spurious gain!

I was also reminded of what Robert Peel has quoted in his Mary Baker Eddy-Years of Authority.  “But she had small patience with Christian Scientists who were so intoxicated with the vision that they failed to take imperatively needed footsteps towards reifying⁴ it in experience.  “Your head is way up there in the stars,” she admonished one student, “while the enemy is filling your body with bullets.” (Quoted from Powell’s Mary Baker Eddy p. 52)”

On the other hand we find this about love (Mary Baker Eddy’s Miscellaneous Writings p. 250:14) -

“Love is not something put upon a shelf, to be taken down on rare occasions with sugar-tongs and laid on a rose-leaf. I make strong demands on love, call for active witnesses to prove it, and noble sacrifices and grand achievements as its results. Unless these appear, I cast aside the word as a sham and counterfeit, having no ring of the true metal. Love cannot be a mere abstraction, or goodness without activity and power. As a human quality, the glorious significance of affection is more than words: it is the tender, unselfish deed done in secret; the silent, ceaseless prayer; the self-forgetful heart that overflows; the veiled form stealing on an errand of mercy, out of a side door; the little feet tripping along the sidewalk; the gentle hand opening the door that turns toward want and woe, sickness and sorrow, and thus lighting the dark places of earth.”

Joyce Voysey

¹Ed: I am reminded of this quote from Mrs Eddy’s Miscellaneous Writings p. 177: 14 “Will you doff your lavender-kid zeal, and become real and consecrated warriors?”

 

^Ed:

² aggrandize  https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/aggrandize

If you are a window washer, but you refer to yourself as a "vista enhancement specialist," then you are aggrandizing your job title — that is, making it sound greater than it is.

The verb aggrandize not only means "to make appear greater"; it can also be used to mean simply "to make greater." If you buy an estate and sink millions of dollars into its improvement, then you are actually aggrandizing the estate. If you are making yourself seem greater, then people may say you are "self-aggrandizing."

³ Limn  https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/limn?family=limned

Limn is a verb that means to represent or portray. It is most often used to describe the act of drawing or painting a portrait, but it can also refer to describing or outlining a scene or event.

The verb limn evolved from the Latin lumināre, "to illuminate." The word referred originally to coloring (illuminating) manuscripts. The sense of "portray" or "depict" did not come into use until the late 16th century, but that meaning is close to the original, since someone who paints a portrait usually illuminates something about the subject's character. The word is less often used of written description, as in "Her reviews tended to limn the worst aspects of the performance, ignoring the best."

⁴  reify  https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/reify

When you reify something abstract, you make it real. You might reify your affection for Italy by hanging posters of the Italian Riviera on your wall and cooking Italian food every night.

Reify, which is three syllables — ree-uh-fye — comes from the Latin word res, which means "thing," with the suffix -fy, meaning "make into" or "produce," which you know from verbs like "horrify" and "falsify." You may already know the Latin word res, too. From your study of literature, you've probably encountered the phrase in medias res, "in the middle of things," used to describe a story that begins in the middle of the action.

Old claim - new name

Jennie says her experience of Christian Science class instruction with Mrs Eddy was like being born again.  I have a thought about this being “born again” idea and wonder: Are we born again when we know that we have never been born into matter?

The partnership of Jennie and her husband Silas in the practice of Christian Science seems to me to be unusual.  How they must have strengthened each other!  Silas seems to have been a major figure in the beginnings of the Christian Science movement, though we do not hear about his quiet accomplishments at Mrs Eddy’s direction.

Page 27 gives us a reason perhaps for why we have a medical up-date in the news so often. Mrs Eddy required "practitioners of Christian Science to keep informed of the new names that the medical world is constantly giving to the different ailments the human body is subject to, for each name conveys to the mind of the patient an increased sense of fear and danger….  The Christian Scientist, knowing that the name imparts added fear, must...meet and undo the old claim under its new name,..."

Joyce Voysey

Remarkable reading experience

August Book Club 2013.  Book: We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Expanded Edition Vol. II

I read this book through earlier this year.  What an experience that was!  I have never marked so many remarkable paragraphs or phrases in a book before.  And I am looking forward very much to thinking more deeply about those passages.

Of course, on second reading, more ideas are taking my attention.  For instance:

I like the way Jennie Sawyer was introduced to Christian Science when in an extremely serious physical and mental condition: “…a mental method of healing which included no medicine and no physical exertion on the part of the patient – and even mentally they did not require the patient to accept it until relief came and [he or she] could better understand it.” p 9

Isn’t that wonderful – not required to accept it until relief came and the person understood it better?

We read that not everyone who had class teaching with Mrs. Eddy, came to understand it, and so did not go on to be Mrs. Eddy’s loyal student.  However, Mrs Sawyer and her husband Silas went on to be stalwarts of Truth in those early days of the Christian Science movement.

Another newly marked passage contrasts the old with the new way of praying: “Our former faith had led us to plead and beg for help and salvation from sin, sickness, and death, while those false methods were to be replaced by a faith that took hold on God’s promises without faltering because of a firm reliance on Christ’s redeeming grace and a recognition of God’s ability to save to the uttermost.”  p.14

How well Jennie writes!  This is something to be remarked upon I reckon – how well the writers have expressed themselves in these recollections.

Joyce Voysey

A mother's counsel

I like that Prov 31 begins (The Message): "The words of King Lemuel,
    the strong advice his mother gave him"

And, as this week's Bible Lesson on LOVE is all about family, to realize that this chapter is about a mother's counsel to her son is beautiful, especially when we realize that we are all mothered by God, our heavenly Father-Mother.

Julie Swannell

Printing and publishing

I recently found The Printing Revolution in early modern Europe (New Edition) by Elizabeth L. Eisenstein on the shelf.  My husband was a printer and we had a printing business for many years, so printing is very much appreciated in this household. 

It is rather heavy going and I will not read it through, but I did check to see if Benjamin Franklin is mentioned...yes, he is.  Here is the passage, which includes a surprising fact:

“Authors who “composed” their work with a composing stick in hand were not uncommon in the age of Erasmus – nor in that of Benjamin Franklin.  Indeed, the simplicity of the early press made it possible for American men of letters to act as their own printers – much as Italian humanists had acted as their own scribes.”

Karl Mannheim’s Essays on the Sociology of Culture is quoted too:

“A literate person – man or woman by the way – with a copy of Moxon’s Mechanick Exercises (1683) in hand could teach himself or herself the trade, from beginning to end.  Simplicity of operation was not a factor of prime importance in London…But it was crucially important in the provinces and colonies, where printing-houses were small and pressmen few.  There, if necessary, one man who knew his business could mix his own ink, compose his folio halfsheet page at type cases, operate the press himself, dry the pages and even take the papers in his own hands to the neighboring taverns and coffee houses for sale and distribution if he did not have a printer’s devil and could not find a boy who would do it for him for a penny.  The process was a natural school for the autodidact and the way was open for the development of authors who could complete the process by actually composing their work, in both senses of the word with the composing stick.  Two who did so were those autodidact printers Mark Twain and Benjamin Franklin.

So, what do you know: printing and publishing have, to some extent, gone full circle.  Not that today’s author has a composing stick in hand!  Rather, the computer is his joy.  My husband and I have done just this with the setting and printing, and binding of my little book A Girl from Bribie Island.  My expertise (?) comes from being a “typiste” – a designation from my time working at the Commonwealth Bank designation.  Ken put the text into pages and then added appropriate photos.  We printed it at home and collated it and then (in the first edition of 20 copies for family) Ken stitched it, and bound it.  But we didn’t go to the taverns and coffee houses to sell it!  Ken’s own book is still in the setting stage.

Joyce Voysey

PS

Oh dear.  I sent that bit off to the editor and now I have found another interesting titbit in the before-quoted book: Even in the early nineteenth century, a professional man of letters such as Sir Walter Scott could write:  ‘I love to have the press thumping, clattering and banging in my ear.  It creates the necessity which always makes me work best.’