Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/395

Rh loyal to Mrs. Eddy, and those who merely conformed—who believed in the principle she taught, but who, as she often put it, "tried with one breath to credit the Message and discredit the Messenger."

Both factions believed in the supremacy of mind over matter, and in the healing principle which Mrs. Eddy taught. But the loyal were those who believed:

In the Fall in Lynn and its subsequent revelation.

That the Bible and Science and Health are one book—the Sacred Scriptures.

That sin, disease, and death are non-existent and will finally disappear under demonstration.

That Malicious Animal Magnetism can cause sickness, sin, and death.

That Mrs. Eddy has interpreted the Motherhood, or feminine idea of God, as Jesus Christ interpreted the masculine idea.

That the feminine idea of God is essentially higher than the masculine.

The loyal disciples did not hesitate to make the claim that Christian Science was the offspring of Mrs. Eddy's direct communion with God, just as Jesus was the offspring of Mary's communion, and that the result of this second immaculate conception was a book rather than a man, because this age was "more mental" than that in which Jesus Christ lived and taught. An article entitled "Immaculate Conception," in the Journal of November, 1888, elaborates this idea at great length:

Let us come in thought to another day, a day when woman shall commune with God, the eternal Principle and only Creator, and bring forth the