One evening our daughter telephoned to ask me to pray for her eldest son, who was very ill with what she thought was meningitis. His school had sent a letter to all parents, giving details of this disease and the symptoms, and he was manifesting all of them. By then my daughter's fear had affected me, as well, and because of this I suggested she should call a full-time Christian Science practitioner to treat him. She agreed to do so.
After her call, I immediately turned to the ninety-first Psalm to calm my own fear. I particularly pondered the verse "He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways" (verse 11). I thought of God's angels, described by Mary Baker Eddy in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures as "God's thoughts passing to man; spiritual intuitions, pure and perfect; the inspiration of goodness, purity, and immortality, counteracting all evil, sensuality, and mortality" (p. 581). I knew these angels were in charge of my grandson's well-being.
I read also in Science and Health: "We weep because others weep, we yawn because they yawn, and we have smallpox because others have it; but mortal mind, not matter, contains and carries the infection. When this mental contagion is understood, we shall be more careful of our mental conditions, and we shall avoid loquacious tattling about disease, as we would avoid advocating crime" (p. 153). I quickly overcame my fear by realising mental contagion couldn't mesmerise me or our daughter and make us believe that disease was a real condition.
