NewThoughtLibrary.com / DivineLibrary.org

on ordinary sight and hearing. It is imprisoned by "the error of common belief." This belief is under the direction of people who are unaware that there is an intelligence independent of the body. Quimby shows that he wishes to talk with that part of the self which does not believe in the adverse suggestions to which one becomes subject through ignorance. If he can make himself felt apart from common means of communication, this experience will show that the self really possesses these higher powers. If his patient hears his inner voice, she should not put a false construction upon it or become frightened and close the inner door. For he must convince her that her supposed friends are her enemies, those who tell her "with long hypocritical faces and whining tones" that she "looks very feeble," and "not so well." "These are the hypocrites that devour widows' houses. For your science is your house, and as you are all alone you are a widow in the Science of Christ or Truth. Now Christ visited the widowed and fatherless in their distress, and told his disciples to do the same, and keep them pure and unspotted from the world of opinions. While you read this I am with you in your belief or prison, till I shall tear it down and raise you up."

[Again, Quimby admits in writing to a man concerning his wife's case that he has sometimes judged for the moment by what the sick said about themselves, and advised them not to come; but on sitting with such patients he has found their trouble amounted to a "mere nothing." He has advised others to come, on the basis of their own description, and found them far worse than he expected. This has led him to give all people opportunity to take the chance and he will then do the best he can for them. If certain of curing one whom he has never seen he would at once advise favorably. But he will not venture to give a mere opinion. If however the patient herself in this case will write to Quimby, giving an account of her own case, he will devote an hour to her, and so write that she may follow her own leadings. In this way Quimby gave inquirers an opportunity to look beneath all opinions.

[It is noticeable that in these letters, written in 1860 and 1861, Quimby shows that he has a clear conception of the "Science of Christ," or "Christian Science," a term which he employed later.