Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/102

68 Child of earth! heir to immortality! love hath made intercession with wisdom for you—your request is answered.

Let not the letter leave your hand nor destroy it.

Love each other, your spirits are affined. My dear Sarah is innocent, and will rejoice for every tear.

The gates of paradise are opening at the tread of time; glory and the crown shall shall be the diadem of your earthly pilgrimage if you patiently persevere in virtue, justice, and love. You twain are my care. I speak through no other earthly medium but you.

Mr. Quimby died January 16, 1866. As in the case of many mental healers, his own experience apparently belied his doctrines. He had for years suffered from an abdominal tumour. He had never had it treated medically, but asserted that he had always been able, mentally, to prevent it from getting the upper hand. The last few years of his life he worked incessantly. His practice increased enormously, and at last broke him down. In the summer of 1865 he was compelled to stop work. He closed his Portland office and went home to Belfast to devote the rest of his life to revising his manuscripts and preparing them for publication. His physical condition, however, prevented this; he became feebler every day. He now acknowledged his inability to cure himself. As long as he had his usual mental strength, he said, he could stop the disease; but, as he felt this slipping from him, his "error" rapidly made inroads. Finally, Quimby's wife, with his acquiescence, summoned a homœopathic physician. Quimby consented to this, he said, not because he had the slightest idea that the doctor could help him, but merely to comfort his family. His wife had never accepted the "theory"; his children, for the most part, had no enthusiasm for it. They all, however, loved the old man dearly and could not patiently witness his suffering