Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/197

Rh The hunger of this shoe-worker was such that Mary Baker saw she must provide mental food.

She began to systematize her ideas and to write out a new manuscript, not entirely different from those she had prepared for Quimby. She still believed Quimby had shared the truth of divine healing with her, but her writings were now entirely based on her own experiences. These were written that Hiram Crafts might have something to study. The writings were exceedingly simplified, they were brief summaries, a primer of the simplest statements. Hiram Crafts in describing his pupilage years afterwards said:

“Mary Baker G. Eddy, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science, was not a Spiritualist when she taught me Christian Science in the year 1866. At that time I was a Spiritualist, but her teachings changed my views on that subject and I gave up Spiritualism. She never taught me in my mental practise to hurt others, but only to heal the sick and reform the sinner. She taught me from the Scriptures and from manuscripts that she wrote as she taught me.”

In answer to a story intending to reflect discredit upon his teacher, a story which charged her with living upon this poor workman and his family without payment, he further said:

“Mrs. Eddy boarded at my house when I resided in Stoughton, Massachusetts. She furnished our parlor and gave us the use of her furniture.”

But this statement, while it throws a little color on the picture, is not the one to bear in mind