Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/462

Rh as were the new applicants. In this way Mrs. Eddy was enabled carefully to select the personnel of her new church, and to keep out of it such members of the old organisation as had not been agreeable to her. Every candidate for admission to the Mother Church is still balloted upon in this way.

The Boston church, built by the contributions of Christian Scientists throughout the country, had now lost its local character. With a membership of 1,502 drawn almost entirely from the branch churches, it was now the head of all the churches in the field, and at the head of the Boston church was Mrs. Eddy, installed under the title of "Pastor Emeritus," and governing through a subservient Board of Directors. No more was heard now concerning the spiritual disadvantages of organisation. Every one realised that in unity under Mrs. Eddy, and in obedience, lay the road of progress. The old watchword, "Mrs. Eddy and God make a majority," was revived.

"What," asked the Rev. D. A. Easton, pastor of the Mother Church, in his Easter sermon, 1893, "what does membership in the Mother Church mean? It signifies obedience. Mrs. Eddy has invited Scientists everywhere to unite with the Mother Church. To obey cheerfully and loyally marks a growth in Science.

"Brethren," wrote Dr. Foster Eddy in the Journal, "this is an epoch in the history of Christian Science. The year has been a marked one to us. The chaff has been separated from the wheat in a most marvellous manner." "We have come," he told Christian Scientists at the first annual meeting, "to