The following letter may serve to answer other questions similar to the one therein referred to, and it is therefore published.
"Dear Sir:— Your letter of the 7th is before me. I should be very glad if I could answer it; but in order to have you clearly understand the sense in which we use the word "adversary" I should have to take you over the whole ground of Christian Science thought. The only true way to get a clear understanding of this is to intelligently read Science and Health, and the Scriptures in the light thereof. As one who has witnessed the struggles of many out of the mazes and entanglements of promiscuous reading, with a view to gleaning Truth from every one who saw it to write upon the topic, I speak with some measure of authority, when I say, that until you arrive at the point where you are willing to look for Christian Science in and through Science and Health and the Bible, as above suggested, you will continue to be confused and to ask questions of this person and that person, as to the sense in which they use certain terms. If you were to take up -main the study of mathematics, you would get the best and most authoritative work upon the subject and confine yourself thereto until you had familiarized yourself with it, would you not?
You would not look about for every booklet or pamphlet which might be written by any person who happened to take a fancy to write upon the subject of mathematics, hoping thereby to become a successful mathematician. If you did, you would make a failure. Should we not pursue relatively the same methods in our search for absolute and demonstrable Truth? Promiscuous searching is not true searching. That has been the trouble, in part, with theology in its expounding of the Scriptures. Shall we who are endeavoring to get at their larger and clearer meaning, their spiritual interpretation, make a similar mistake? Shall we take the dictum of every one who sees fit to express himself? I say this in a spirit of brotherly love; and let me tell you again, that until you are ready to investigate in the true way, you will drift into greater and greater confusion until you find yourself without base or anchorage. If you do not, you will prove a marvelous exception to the rule as I have observed it, and I have endeavored to observe it carefully and conscientiously."
