Language is inadequate to express my gratitude for the revelation of Christian Science and my joy that it has come to me. Although suffering from various physical ailments, they were trifling compared to the darkness of my mind, and I sought Christian Science for the spiritual enlightenment alone. For years I had been groping in the dark, like "an infant crying in the night." I never could accept the orthodox interpretation of God's will, but became a member of an orthodox church at the age of sixteen because I earnestly desired to lead a Christian life and because I wished to stand before my little world as a follower of Jesus. Thus, while I could not believe in God as a being who had to placate His anger against sinners by the sacrifice of His beloved son, I could see no other way to come out from the world and be separate.
While striving to live exemplarily I found myself diverging more and more from the accepted interpretation of the Bible, proportionably to the widening of my mental horizon.
To doubts of the vicarious sacrifice were gradually added the rejection of the doctrine of everlasting punishment, of the limitation to the Hebrews of revealed truth, the immediate translation to heaven after death of the believer, and the literal meaning of the Scriptures, until at twenty-seven I could only pray, O God—if there be a God!
