Reply to Mark Twain MARY BAKER EDDY [Letter to the New York Herald]          It is a fact well understood that I begged the students who first gave me the endearing appellative "Mother," not to name me thus. But without my consent, the use of the word spread like wildfire. I still must think the name is not applicable to me. I stand in relation to this century as a Christian Discoverer, Founder, and Leader. I regard self-deification as blasphemous. I may be more loved, but I am less lauded, pampered, provided for, and cheered than others before me — and wherefore? Because Christian Science is not yet popular, and I refuse adulation.          My first visit to The Mother Church after it was built and dedicated pleased me, and the situation was satisfactory. The dear members wanted to greet me with escort and the ringing of bells, but I declined and went alone in my carriage to the church, entered it, and knelt in thanks upon the steps of its altar. There the foresplendor of the beginnings of truth fell mysteriously upon my spirit. I believe in one Christ, teach one Christ, know of but one Christ. I believe in but one incarnation, one Mother Mary. I know that I am not that one, and I have never claimed to be. It suffices me to learn the Science of the Scriptures relative to this subject.          Christian Scientists have no quarrel with Protestants, Catholics, or any other sect. Christian Scientists need to be understood as following the divine Principle — God, Love — and not imagined to be unscientific worshippers of a human being.          In his article, of which I have seen only extracts, Mark Twain's wit was not wasted in certain directions. Christian Science eschews divine rights in human beings. If the individual governed human consciousness, my statement of Christian Science would be disproved; but to demonstrate Science and its pure monotheism — one God, one Christ, no idolatry, no human propaganda — it is essential to understand the spiritual idea. Jesus taught and proved that what feeds a few feeds all. His life-work subordinated the material to the spiritual, and he left his legacy of truth to mankind. His metaphysics is not the sport of philosophy, religion, or science; rather is it the pith and finale of them all.          I have not the inspiration nor the aspiration to be a first or second Virgin-mother — her duplicate, antecedent, or subsequent. What I am remains to be proved by the good I do. We need much humility, wisdom, and love to perform the functions of foreshadowing and foretasting heaven within us. This glory is molten in the furnace of affliction.   "The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany" by Mary Baker Eddy, pp. 302:13 - 303:32

 

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