Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/223

Rh that time know. Hence she could not authoritatively govern Mrs. Wentworth in her thinking. Mrs. Wentworth was inclined to the Quimby method and Mary Baker had not found herself sufficiently to gainsay her predilection. She told Mrs. Wentworth freely all that she knew of Quimby’s method, but she herself worked on her own ideas, writing for hours in her room, struggling with the conflicting theories.

Mrs. Glover had with her a manuscript which she had prepared while at Portland under the sway of Quimby’s thought. Mrs. Wentworth wanted to copy this. She found in it certain comfort for her Spiritualistic leanings. Mrs. Glover did not refuse it to her, but felt so uncertain of its character that she did not want her to circulate it and made her promise to keep it only for her own perusal. Not yet certain enough to absolutely condemn it, she gravely doubted the statements which she had herself penned at an earlier date while still under Quimby’s influence.

Now, as has been said, Mary Baker was engaged on a manuscript concerning the spiritual significance of the Scripture. On this she was devoting the closest thought, endeavoring to make clear the apprehensions of pure spiritual doctrine. Mrs. Wentworth, as Mrs. Webster had done, spoke of this as Mrs. Glover’s Bible. So the family gossiped among themselves and came to speak of the manuscript Mary Baker loaned Mrs. Wentworth as the “Quimby” manuscript, and the one she was at work on as “Mrs. Glover’s Bible.” Horace Wentworth, the shoemaker, visiting home, caught up these phrases