Once in my childhood, in a bitter moment of disappointment and sorrow, I added to my evening prayer, "Lead me, oh God, and guide me in thy path, show me the way." From then until now, this has been my prayer, and all these years when darkness and doubt seemed to assail me on every side, this prayer would ever return to me. I did not know then what I asked for, and seemed to be getting farther away from all thoughts of God and of religion. I had come almost to doubt that there was a God, but, those words continually came to me, sometimes in despair, sometimes as a seeming mockery.
My business did not prosper, and at home I was quarrelsome and ill-tempered, everything irritated me, and I longed to be alone. Christian Science was presented to me by my sister who was then living with me, but I rejected it with all kinds of scoffing and almost a curse. My mother and sister could not live with me, and left, their stay not seeming congenial. I failed in business, and felt the hard hand of a prince among men, whom I had trusted, turned against me, mocking me with my future and telling me of how little use I could be in my line of business.
The old prayer was ever with me, but I was still without hope or understanding. Christian Science was again presented to me. This time, utterly broken in spirit, believing all that had been said of me, I was ready to listen to anything. I studied a little, half believing, half doubting, and took up another line of work. The sense of my failure was presented, and it seemed as though I suffered a cruel wrong in a strange city with my wife, a boy, and baby depending on me. My wife was always a strength and a help, showing me what she had seen of the truth. I came to long for the company of Scientists, and hung round Second Church in New York, drinking in and feasting on every word, until I sometimes thought they would wonder at me, but the good which came to us through them I cannot begin to tell of, nor can I express enough gratitude.
