Christian Science by Mark Twain
Christian Science
by Mark Twain
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
PREFACE
BOOK I of this volume occupies a quarter or a third of the volume,
and consists of matter written about four years ago, but not hitherto
published in book form. It contained errors of judgment and of fact.
I have now corrected these to the best of my ability and later knowledge.
Book II was written at the beginning of 1903, and has not until now
appeared in any form. In it my purpose has been to present a character-
portrait of Mrs. Eddy, drawn from her own acts and words solely, not from
hearsay and rumor; and to explain the nature and scope of her Monarchy,
as revealed in the Laws by which she governs it, and which she wrote
herself.
MARK TWAIN
NEW YORK. January, 1907.
BOOK I CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
“It is the first time since the dawn-days of Creation that
a Voice has gone crashing through space with such
placid and complacent confidence and command.”
CHAPTER I
VIENNA 1899.
This last summer, when I was on my way back to Vienna from the Appetite-
Cure in the mountains, I fell over a cliff in the twilight, and broke
some arms and legs and one thing or another, and by good luck was found
by some peasants who had lost an ass, and they carried me to the nearest
habitation, which was one of those large, low, thatch-roofed farm-houses,
with apartments in the garret for the family, and a cunning little porch
under the deep gable decorated with boxes of bright colored flowers and
cats; on the ground floor a large and light sitting-room, separated from
the milch-cattle apartment by a partition; and in the front yard rose
stately and fine the wealth and pride of the house, the manure-pile.
That sentence is Germanic, and shows that I am acquiring that sort of
mastery of the art and spirit of the language which enables a man to
travel all day in one sentence without changing cars.
There was a village a mile away, and a horse doctor lived there, but
there was no surgeon. It seemed a bad outlook; mine was distinctly a
surgery case. Then it was remembered that a lady from Boston was
summering in that village, and she was a Christian Science doctor and
could cure anything. So she was sent for. It was night by this time,
and she could not conveniently come, but sent word that it was no matter,
there was no hurry, she would give me “absent treatment” now, and come
in the morning; meantime she begged me to make myself tranquil and
comfortable and remember that there was nothing the matter with me.
I thought there must be some mistake.
“Did you tell her I walked off a cliff seventy-five feet high?”
“Yes.”
“And struck a boulder at the bottom and bounced?”
“Yes.”
“And struck another one and bounced again?”
“Yes.”
“And struck another one and bounced yet again?”
“Yes.”
“And broke the boulders?”
“Yes.”
“That accounts for it; she is thinking of the boulders. Why didn’t you
tell her I got hurt, too?”
“I did. I told her what you told me to tell her: that you were now but
an incoherent series of compound fractures extending from your scalp-lock
to your heels, and that the comminuted projections caused you to look
like a hat-rack.”
“And it was after this that she wished me to remember that there was
nothing the matter with me?”
“Those were her words.”
“I do not understand it. I believe she has not diagnosed the case with
sufficient care. Did she look like a person who was theorizing, or did
she look like one who has fallen off precipices herself and brings to the
aid of abstract science the confirmations of personal experience?”
“Bitte?”
It was too large a contract for the Stubenmadchen’s vocabulary; she
couldn’t call the hand. I allowed the subject to rest there, and asked
for something to eat and smoke, and something hot to drink, and a basket
to pile my legs in; but I could not have any of these things.
“Why?”
“She said you would need nothing at all.”