0.0 – Christian Science Publication Contents

1	                           TO THE MOTHER CHURCH 

  	    My Beloved Brethren: — If a member of the church
 3	is inclined to be uncharitable, or to condemn his
  	brother without cause, let him put his finger to his lips,
  	and forgive others as he would be forgiven. One's first
 6	lesson is to learn one's self; having done this, one will
  	naturally, through grace from God, forgive his brother and
  	love his enemies. To avenge an imaginary or an actual
 9	wrong, is suicidal. The law of our God and the rule of
  	our church is to tell thy brother his fault and thereby help
  	him. If this rule fails in effect, then take the next Scrip-
12	tural step:  drop this member's name from the church, and
  	thereafter "let the dead bury their dead," — let silence
  	prevail over his remains. 
15	    If a man is jealous, envious, or revengeful, he will seek
  	occasion to balloon an atom of another man's indis-
  	cretion, inflate it, and send it into the atmosphere of mortal
18	mind — for other green eyes to gaze on:  he will always
  	find somebody in his way, and try to push him aside;
  	will see somebody's faults to magnify under the lens that
21	he never turns on himself. 
  	    What have been your Leader's precepts and example! 
  	Were they to save the sinner, and to spare his exposure
 
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  Miscellaneous Writings --- Letters: To T...he Mother Church                    

 1	so long as a hope remained of thereby benefiting him? 
  	Has her life exemplified long-suffering, meekness, charity,
 3	purity? 
  	    She readily leaves the answer to those who know
  	her. 
 6	    Do we yet understand how much better it is to be
  	wronged, than to commit wrong? What do we find in
  	the Bible, and in the Christian Science textbook, on this
 9	subject? Does not the latter instruct you that looking
  	continually for a fault in somebody else, talking about it,
  	thinking it over, and how to meet it, — "rolling sin as a
12	sweet morsel under your tongue," — has the same power
  	to make you a sinner that acting thus regarding disease
  	has to make a man sick? Note the Scripture on this
15	subject: "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the
  	Lord." 
  	    The Christian Science Board of Directors has borne
18	the burden in the heat of the day, and it ought not to
  	be expected that they could have accomplished, without
  	one single mistake, such Herculean tasks as they have
21	accomplished. He who judges others should know well
  	whereof he speaks. Where the motive to do right exists,
  	and the majority of one's acts are right, we should avoid
24	referring to past mistakes. The greatest sin that one can
  	commit against himself is to wrong one of God's "little
  	ones." 
27	    Know ye not that he who exercises the largest charity,
  	and waits on God, renews his strength, and is exalted? 
  	Love is not puffed up; and the meek and loving, God
30	anoints and appoints to lead the line of mankind's tri-
  	umphal march out of the wilderness, out of darkness
  	into light. 
 
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 Miscellaneous Writings --- Letters: To The Mother Church                    

1	    Whoever challenges the errors of others and cherishes
  	his own, can neither help himself nor others; he will be
 3	called a moral nuisance, a fungus, a microbe, a mouse
  	gnawing at the vitals of humanity. The darkness in
  	one's self must first be cast out, in order rightly to discern
 6	darkness or to reflect light. 
  	    If the man of more than average avoirdupois kneels on
  	a stool in church, let the leaner sort console this brother's
 9	necessity by doing likewise. Christian Scientists preserve
  	unity, and so shadow forth the substance of our sublime
  	faith, and the evidence of its being built upon the rock of
12	divine oneness, — one faith, one God, one baptism. 
  	    If our Board of Directors is prepared to itemize a report
  	of the first financial year since the erection of the edifice of
15	The First Church of Christ, Scientist, let it do so; other-
  	wise, I recommend that you waive the church By-law
  	relating to finances this year of your firstfruits. This
18	Board did not act under that By-law; it was not in ex-
  	istence all of the year. It is but just to consider the great
  	struggles with perplexities and difficulties which the
21	Directors encountered in Anno Domini 1894, and which
  	they have overcome. May God give unto us all that lov-
  	ing sense of gratitude which delights in the opportunity to
24	cancel accounts. I, for one, would be pleased to have the
  	Christian Science Board of Directors itemize a bill of this
  	church's gifts to Mother; and then to have them let her
27	state the value thereof, if, indeed, it could be estimated. 
  	    After this financial year, when you call on the members
  	of the Christian Science Board of Directors to itemize or
30	audit their accounts, these will be found already itemized,
  	and last year's records immortalized, with perils past and
  	victories won. 
 
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 Miscellaneous Writings --- Letters: To The Mother Church                    

 1	    A motion was made, and a vote passed, at your last
  	meeting, on a subject the substance whereof you had al-
 3	ready accepted as a By-law. But, I shall take this as a
  	favorable omen, a fair token that heavy lids are opening,
  	even wider than before, to the light of Love — and By-laws. 
 6	                        Affectionately yours,
  	                                        MARY BAKER EDDY 
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