Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/396

350 many beautiful Christian Science churches in America. About two thousand students gathered for this occasion, but they respected Mrs. Eddy’s wish not to haunt her drive or to visit Pleasant View. They assembled in front of the church and awaited her visit to them. From her carriage she made an address which the perfect silence of the assemblage made clearly audible. She directly addressed herself to the president of the church as representing the church body, but her remarks were in the nature of a general greeting.

When Mrs. Eddy published “Miscellaneous Writings” in 1897, she requested in the March Journal that her students cease teaching Christian Science for one year. She had labored assiduously on this new publication, gathering her scattered writings out of the Journal and from many messages and class lessons, also from some letters on special subjects; and she believed the book would better prepare the minds of persons coming into the faith to understand the Christian Science text-book than the efforts of students. The book met with great success, for it was like a personal meeting with the Leader, full of the animated flashes of her wit and the quiet touches of her sympathetic understanding.

Although this work was sent out as a sort of primary class-book, it was eagerly read by the students who had gone through many classes with her as teacher, and soon became the most cherished of her writings after “Science and Health.” Its appearance gave rise to a demand for just one more class,