Mrs. Eddy was fully aware of the necessity of proving that the Science she had discovered would relieve humanity of its burden of sin and disease. Of this she was fully convinced. Her words must be authenticated by works following. Through her own ministration and that of her early students, the healing works were soon established. Furthermore, circulation of the textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," was followed immediately by healings of various types of discord from reading its inspired pages. The healed were prompted to send to Mrs. Eddy and to the editor of the Journal of Christian Science testimonies of these healings as expressions of gratitude for the lifting of their burdens.
As the textbook was more widely circulated, the number of these testimonials increased, and from an ever-widening field. From all parts of the United States, from east and west, from north and south, from the great cities as from humble hamlets, came these evidences that the healing Christ set forth in her textbook was working the same type of cures that are so definitely set forth in the New-testament. That Mrs. Eddy was heartened by this great "cloud of witnesses," we may well believe.
Many of these testimonies of healing were published in the early issues of the Journal of Christian Science, as many, in fact, as the available space would permit. When our Leader decided to publish in a more enduring form many of her addresses, letters, Bible Lessons, and answers to questions, she also saw the wisdom of including examples of the fruitage of her consecrated endeavor. Accordingly, there were inserted nearly seventy pages of testimonies written by persons who without the help of a practitioner had been healed of various types of disease through reading Science and Health. As the truth contained in the textbook had been thoroughly grasped, the thought of the seeker had been transformed, and with that transformation the healing had taken place. Here was proof, proof in abundance, of Mrs. Eddy's main thesis, namely, that God, the divine Father-Mother, was available through His Christ to destroy whatever unlike Truth is held in human consciousness, and that, when false belief about the universe and man should be eliminated, healing would be effected. Examination of these testimonies proves that even in its infancy Christian Science was doing the work which Mrs. Eddy had emphatically stated it would do. Her claims were being substantiated in every particular, so far as infinite Truth may be brought to bear upon human affairs and conditions.
