I want to express publicly my gratitude to the one who pointed the way of healing, Christian Science, to me at a time when it seemed as if all were lost.
I had exhausted the very best efforts of medical authorities in the treatment of asthma. One doctor told me frankly, "I can't do a thing for you." Another, one of three specialists licensed by the Federal government to practice the most advanced treatment for asthma, after a series of treatments which included a rigid diet, said, "I am doing all I can." However, I became worse; I could not sleep—did not dare to, as I knew the agony in store for me when I awoke.
Meantime I had become acquainted with the person mentioned above. One day I was talking with her in her office. I told her what the doctors had said, and with clenched fists asked her, "What would you do?" She calmed me down somewhat, and later called me into her private office and told me a little of how Christian Science helps and heals. I did not then know what Christian Science was, nor that she was a Christian Scientist. She talked with me a few minutes, and then suggested that I go to the Reading Room and get the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, and read it. I did not promise I would, for I could not see how reading a book could heal me when the best medical people had failed. Just to show my gratitude to her for her efforts, however—her sincerity and faith in Christian Science must have had something to do with it, too—I went to the Reading Room at noon and asked for the textbook. Later that day, Wednesday, she came and asked if I should not like to go to church that evening with her. I begged off, took the book home, and put it on a night table beside my bed, and there it lay untouched.
