Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/310

268 repentance, humility, or prayer. They say that she was cold or indifferent to such topics. These two statements are not consistent, nor is the latter founded on fact. Many of her sermons are included in “Miscellaneous Writings” and are essentially spiritual. Prayer, Mrs. Eddy teaches, is the realization of the omnipresence of God and the aspiration for purity. Silent realization has always been an opening ceremony of her church. As for repentance, she taught the very essence of it, which she declared was the forsaking of sin.

The seeds of rebellion were in the first church organization. The reactionary effect observable in many of the early students was to repeat itself. Kennedy had persisted in the use of mesmerism, Spofford endeavored to wrest the leadership from the church’s founder, now Arens conceived the idea of writing a book on the topics he had studied, and for that purpose stole bodily from Mrs. Eddy’s writings. He preceded her to Boston and opened an office not far from where Kennedy had established himself. Rebellion now broke forth with violence in a group of students who walked out in a body. They prepared the following statement as their reason for so doing:

We, the undersigned, while we acknowledge and appreciate the understanding of Truth imparted to us by our teacher, Mrs. Mary B. G. Eddy, led by Divine Intelligence to perceive with sorrow that departure from the straight and narrow road (which alone leads to growth in Christlike virtues) made manifest by frequent ebullitions of temper, love of