procession if his remarks had been unsatisfactory to it.
It may be that there is evidence somewhere–as has been claimed–that
Mrs. Eddy has charged upon the Deity the verbal authorship of Science and
Health. But if she ever made the charge, she has withdrawn it (as it
seems to me), and in the most formal and unqualified; of all ways. See
Autobiography, page 57:
“When the demand for this book increased . . . the copyright was
infringed. I entered a suit at Law, and my copyright was protected.”
Thus it is plain that she did not plead that the Deity was the (verbal)
Author; for if she had done that, she would have lost her case–and with
rude promptness. It was in the old days before the Berne Convention and
before the passage of our amended law of 1891, and the court would have
quoted the following stern clause from the existing statute and frowned
her out of the place:
“No Foreigner can acquire copyright in the United States.”
To sum up. The evidence before me indicates three things:
1. That Mrs. Eddy claims the verbal author ship for herself.
2. That she denies it to the Deity.
3. That–in her belief–she wrote the book under the inspiration of the
Deity, but furnished the language herself.
In one place in the Autobiography she claims both the language and the
ideas; but when this witness is testifying, one must draw the line
somewhere, or she will prove both sides of her case-nine sides, if
desired.
It is too true. Much too true. Many, many times too true. She is a
most trying witness–the most trying witness that ever kissed the Book, I
am sure. There is no keeping up with her erratic testimony. As soon as
you have got her share of the authorship nailed where you half hope and
half believe it will stay and cannot be joggled loose any more, she
joggles it loose again–or seems to; you cannot be sure, for her habit of
dealing in meaningless metaphors instead of in plain, straightforward
statistics, makes it nearly always impossible to tell just what it is she
is trying to say. She was definite when she claimed both the language
and the ideas of the book. That seemed to settle the matter. It seemed
to distribute the percentages of credit with precision between the
collaborators: ninety-two per cent. to Mrs. Eddy, who did all the work,
and eight per cent. to the Deity, who furnished the inspiration not
enough of it to damage the copyright in a country closed against
Foreigners, and yet plenty to advertise the book and market it at famine
rates. Then Mrs. Eddy does not keep still, but fetches around and comes
forward and testifies again. It is most injudicious. For she resorts to
metaphor this time, and it makes trouble, for she seems to reverse the
percentages and claim only the eight per cent. for her self. I quote
from Mr. Peabody’s book (Eddyism, or Christian Science. Boston: 15 Court
Square, price twenty-five cents):
“Speaking of this book, Mrs. Eddy, in January last (I901) said: ‘I should
blush to write of Science and Health, with Key to the Scriptures, as I
have, were it of human origin, and I, apart from God, its author; but as
I was only a scribe echoing the harmonies of Heaven in divine
metaphysics, I cannot be supermodest of the Christian Science text-
book.”‘
Mr. Peabody’s comment:
“Nothing could be plainer than that. Here is a distinct avowal that the
book entitled Science and Health was the work of Almighty God.”
It does seem to amount to that. She was only a “scribe.” Confound the
word, it is just a confusion, it has no determinable meaning there, it
leaves us in the air. A scribe is merely a person who writes. He may be
a copyist, he may be an amanuensis, he may be a writer of originals, and
furnish both the language and the ideas. As usual with Mrs. Eddy, the
connection affords no help–“echoing” throws no light upon “scribe.” A
rock can reflect an echo, a wall can do it, a mountain can do it, many
things can do it, but a scribe can’t. A scribe that could reflect an