It is over three years since I first heard of Christian Science and began to study it. For several years prior to that time I had been in a constant state of wretchedness and ill health, with various physical disorders and a mental state that bordered on melancholia, until it seemed that existence was made up of little else than pain, discord, perplexity, aimlessness, and endless disappointments,—in fact a miserable failure. I had spent two winters abroad in search of health, seen five different doctors in as many years, and had tried in turn courses of hydropathy, massage, electricity, dieting, drugging, fresh air treatment, and general hygiene, which broke up my career a good deal, but as regards cure left me about where I was at the beginning.
All Christian Scientists know that the truth comes to us when thought is in a measure prepared for it and in the hour of need. I can never forget the experience of reading "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" for the first time, and it is equally impossible to describe that experience in words. One finds, however, that revelation is not the whole of salvation, but rather the introduction to its working out. Since then my progress has been very gradual, but it is a pleasure and privilege to recall some landmarks that are passed, while looking forward to that fuller sense of emancipation which must be earned by growth in understanding and practice. I was soon able to lay aside glasses which I had worn continually, and my sight has not troubled me since, though much more reading has been done than formerly. I was also quickly relieved of a chronic liver trouble. Other ailments yielded to the treatment of Christian Science, and I have been helped at different times in attacks of sleeplessness, colds, etc. The desire for tobacco and alcohol left me quite naturally. The way does not always lie through easy paths, and often it seems that "he maketh the clouds his chariots." I am conscious of being on the threshold of an infinite task, but the outlook on life can never be what it was before this day star first appeared, and even the darkest hours are not now without some light and hope.
The Bible, once so vague (and so neglected), becomes a new book interpreted by this truth, and, in the measure of one's understanding, begins to glow with a deep and beautiful meaning throughout its whole chain of progressive revelation. Seeing that ultimately there is nothing else to live for, its seekers begin to wish for better and higher things than formerly; for Christian Science is Science, and is of God, and the whole world is unspeakably richer for its advent. I write this acknowledgment in gratitude to God, and to His messenger, Mrs. Eddy, through whom it has come.— London, S. W., England.
