With a deep sense of gratitude for the wonderful truth taught in Christian Science, which has come into my life to heal and save, and with the hope that it may bring comfort and courage to some who are suffering, I am sending this account of the experiences which led me from darkness into light and joy.
From early childhood I had been troubled with weak digestion; and as I grew up I frequently suffered intensely from indigestion, which seemed to make me very nervous. Doctors never relieved me, but always advised dieting. On returning from a trip abroad after many months of sight-seeing, I was told by a doctor that I was on the verge of nervous prostration. I was therefore confined to my room, forbidden to read or to have visitors, and given only a little light food for several weeks.
One day during this period I climbed upon a chair to reach something in my closet. The chair tipped forward, and I fell across the pointed ornament on the back of the chair and was found unconscious. After that I could eat nothing with comfort, became more nervous, and suffered constantly. I was very thin and pale. The doctor believed the fall had caused an internal injury; but as I was too weak and miserable for him to investigate, he advised a few weeks at the shore to gain strength. When I arrived at the shore, a friend told me of the wonderful thing she had just found,—Christian Science,—and lent me the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy. I at once proceeded to read the book, finding it at first very obscure; but I soon became so interested that I forgot myself and my ailments in trying to understand the truth it contained, for I constantly felt that if it had healed others it would also heal me. Upon returning home, I borrowed a copy of Science and Health from the Reading Room, and read every possible moment I could,—read all the afternoon, all the evening, and far into the night; for as its teachings became clearer, I could not get enough, and often stood up to read to overcome a tendency to go to sleep over it.
