Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/290

248 She continually consulted Mr. Spofford in the preparation of the second edition of Science and Health (the little book which was eventually converted into an intermittent attack upon him), and in a letter written several weeks after the above she says:

, Oct. 22, '76.&emsp; —

Dear Student—Your interesting letter just read. I am in a condition to feel all and more than all you said. The mercury of my mind is rising as the world's temperature of thought heats up and the little book "sweet in the mouth" but severe and glorious in its proof, is about to go forth like Noah's dove over the troubled waves of doubt, infidelity and bigotry, to find if possible a foothold on earth. . . . I have great consolation in you, in your Christian character that I read yet more and more, the zeal that should attend the saints, and the patient waiting for our Lord's coming.

Press on; You know not the smallest portion, comparatively, of your ability in science. . . . Inflammation of the spinal nerves are what I suffer most in belief.

There was no middle ground with Mrs. Eddy, and it was her policy to strike before she could be struck. After her disagreement with Mr. Spofford concerning his disposition of the money he had received from the sale of her book, she denounced him as an enemy to truth, had her students begin to treat against him, expelled him from the Christian Scientists' Association, tried to induce the county papers to publish attacks upon him, and launched two lawsuits at him within a month of each other. Mrs. Eddy and her husband gave such wide circulation to the charge that Mr. Spofford had been dishonest in regard to the sale of the book, that the publishers of the book felt called upon to publish the following statement: