Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/466

410 ended her long struggle for possession. Before the reorganisation of the Mother Church, Mrs. Eddy had still to bring questions of church government before the church body; she had to conciliate, to persuade, to make concessions, and sometimes to explain and justify her own conduct. In 1888 her seceding students had even considered a plan to expel Mrs. Eddy from her own church, and only by constant exertion had she kept the organisation under her control. But from the time the Boston church was reorganised, Mrs. Eddy's power over it was absolute. She was the church. She wrote its bylaws, appointed its officers, selected its membership, and virtually owned the church property. Its doctrines were her books—the church was committed to teach as the everlasting truth what she had written and whatever she might write in the future. Mrs. Eddy was never again called upon to explain or to modify her commands, and never again was there dissension or division in her church. She had completely conquered her spiritual kingdom. She had now but to go on revealing the alleged will of God, and her church had but to go on obeying her.