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Of the many blessings that have...

From the April 1933 issue of The Christian Science Journal


Of the many blessings that have come to me through the teachings of Christian Science, one which occurred about five years ago stands out as a direct result of prayer.

For some thirty years I had been an incessant smoker. The habit had obtained such a hold on me that for years I had consumed daily from twelve to thirty cigars, and smoked continually all my waking hours. For the last fifteen of those thirty years I had been a student of Christian Science, a regular attendant at the services, and I used no other healing methods. During that time I heard many testimonies of the healing of the tobacco habit. These testimonies were frequently very irritating to me, and on more than one occasion on returning home I made the statement that I could see no wrong in smoking and certainly nothing to stand up and talk about. I knew that it was keeping me from applying for church membership, but I continued to smoke. Although I knew the habit to be selfish, wasteful, and offensive to others, I still clung to it.

Then one day something happened. That afternoon I was in the office of a Christian Science practitioner on an entirely different errand. At the end of our conversation she asked if I had ever had help on the habit of smoking, or ever seriously tried to heal myself of it. I replied that I had done neither. She then asked me if I thought smoking a Christlike habit. I replied that I did not, and there the conversation ended. It apparently had made little impression on me at the time, for before entering the elevator I lighted a fresh cigar and I smoked several more that afternoon and evening.

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