Mary Baker Eddy loved the Bible. The King James Version of the Bible was the first book from which she was taught. She learned to read from it and studied it daily from a child and throughout her life. The Bible was her chart and guide for living. In 1846, the year she identified as marking the beginning of her search “to trace all physical effects to a mental cause” (Retrospection and Introspection, p. 24), she wrote a poem titled, “The Bible.” Her first words to describe it are “Word of God!” And a little further on she speaks of her Bible as:
Oracle of God-like wonder,
Frame-work of His mighty plan,
Chart and compass for the wanderer,
Safe obeying thy command.
(Yvonne von Fettweis and Robert Warneck, Mary Baker Eddy: Christian Healer, Amplified Edition, p. 46)
From 1856–1862, when Mary was in large part confined to her bed because of invalidism, she spent most of her days studying the Bible. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, the textbook of Christian Science she later authored, she wrote, “As early as 1862 she began to write down and give to friends the results of her Scriptural study, for the Bible was her sole teacher; …” (p. viii). She would daily turn to her Bible for guidance throughout her life. No book was ever more important to her. In her later years, when she had a household staff in Concord, New Hampshire, and then in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, her custom was to open her Bible at random in the morning and call her staff together to share with them the inspiration that came to her from reading the verse or verses her eyes fell on.
