A WOMAN CAME UP TO THE FRONT of the church in Lima, Peru, where a meeting of Christian Scientists had just concluded. "Who is Mary Baker Eddy?" she asked. Many in the audience that evening had told how they and their families had been healed by reading Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. This woman and her husband were eager to meet the author.
After learning that Mary Baker Eddy was a 19th-century American, the couple settled (happily) for buying the book. Reading her writings is actually the best way to get know Mary Baker Eddy. And those who study them seriously often find that the answer to the question of who she was continues to unfold through the demands of spiritual practice and regeneration.
Some people in Mrs. Eddy's day may have known her primarily as the person who discovered how Christ Jesus healed. She herself healed many serious cases of disease and injury through prayer alone, and word spread. Over many years, she taught hundreds of students, who in turn taught others. Healings multiplied. One woman whose young son was given up by doctors after he swallowed carbolic acid saw him quickly healed through Christian Science treatment. She wrote, ". . . to me it meant that Christian Science had come to restore to us all that our Master had promised, and no less. Within a few days I had calls to help others, and in every case healing was realized" (Reminiscences of Annie M.Knott, p. 4, The Mary Baker Eddy Library).
