IN establishing the Christian Science movement Mrs. Eddy adopted precisely the same course as did the Master when he entered upon his mission of redemption. Patiently she wrought and taught, healing the sick, comforting the sorrowing, and rejoicing when she found here and there a student to whom she could safely entrust the important task of imparting to others this new-old Science of Mind-healing. She prized the revelation vouchsafed her as only one could who, chastened by years of sorrow and suffering, realizes at last the present-day possibility of the Christ-healing. Mrs. Eddy's great desire was to preserve in its pristine purity and integrity the Science of this healing which she had discovered, that its virtue, the overcoming of sickness and sin, might be secured to mankind for all time.
Marking the tremendous growth of the movement even in its earlier decades, it is easy to see why Mrs. Eddy deemed it necessary to safeguard so carefully the professions of healing and teaching. Through the directory in the Journal she had assured to those in search of relief from their ills the service of responsible practitioners, those who not only had duly qualified for that sacred office, but who as members of The Mother Church were subject to its rules and by-laws and therefore amenable to its discipline. Moreover, as a further certainty of their fitness, it behooved her to provide that these practitioners receive their training from an authorized teacher, as defined in Section 9 of Article XXVI of the Manual. These teachers are likewise listed in the directory, and they alone may give instruction, under certain conditions (Arts. XXVI, Sect. 4, XXVII, Sect. 3), in Christian Science. Thus Mrs. Eddy sought to ensure to would-be students absolute Science as she herself had taught it, and to protect them from the snares and pitfalls of so-called "talks" and irresponsible and indiscriminate teaching,—the "just-as-good" or "easier-way" substitute so often foisted upon the unwary in this as in other fields of endeavor.
To the claim so plausibly put forth by those who would discredit authentic instruction, namely, that class teaching is obsolete, we would refer by way of answer to the last pronouncements by our Leader on this subject. In Section 5 of Article XXVII is this direct statement: "No member of this Church shall advise against class instruction." Again, on page 240 of "Miscellany," Mrs. Eddy not only puts the seal of approval on authorized class teaching, but ever alert to the subtlety of evil she bids those who are ready for this progressive step "beware the net that is craftily laid and cunningly concealed to prevent their advancement in this direction." To pervert, adulterate, or by some other discreditable method do away with the pure Science that is steadily compassing the destruction of all evil, is a device of the arch-enemy to defer its own ultimate defeat.
