Books by Mary Baker Eddy

"OUR PRAYER IN STONE"
page 417

"OUR PRAYER IN STONE"

merican Art Journal, New York, January 26, 1895]

Such is the excellent name given to a new Boston church.
Few people outside its own circles realize how extensive is
the belief in Christian Science. There are several sects of
mental healers, but this new edifice on Back Bay, just off
Huntington Avenue, not far from the big Mechanics
Building and the proposed site of the new Music Hall,
belongs to the followers of Rev. Mary Baker Glover Eddy,
a lady born of an old New Hampshire family, who, after

PUL 58

many vicissitudes, found herself in Lynn, Mass., healed by
the power of divine Mind, and thereupon devoted herself
to imparting this faith to her fellow-beings. Coming to
Boston about 1880, she began teaching, gathered an
association of students, and organized a church. For
several years past she has lived in Concord, N. H., near
her birthplace, owning a beautiful estate called Pleasant
View; but thousands of believers throughout this country
have joined The Mother Church in Boston, and have now
erected this edifice at a cost of over two hundred thousand
dollars, every bill being paid.
Its appearance is shown in the pictures we are permitted
to publish. In the belfry is a set of tubular chimes. Inside
is a basement room, capable of division into seven excellent
class-rooms, by the use of movable partitions. The main
auditorium has wide galleries, and will seat over a thousand
in its exceedingly comfortable pews. Scarcely any wood-work
is to be found. The floors are all mosaic, the steps
marble, and the walls stone. It is rather dark, often too
much so for comfortable reading, as all the windows are of
colored glass, with pictures symbolic of the tenets of the
organization. In the ceiling is a beautiful sunburst window.
Adjoining the chancel is a pastor's study; but for an
indefinite time their prime instructor has ordained that the
only pastor shall be the Bible, with her book, called
"Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures." In the
tower is a room devoted to her, and called "Mother's
Room," furnished with all conveniences for living, should
she wish to make it a home by day or night. Therein is
a portrait of her in stained glass; and an electric light,

PUL 59

behind an antique lamp, kept perpetually burning *1 in her
honor; though she has not yet visited her temple, which
was dedicated on New Year's Sunday in a somewhat novel
way.

*1 At Mrs. Eddy's request the lamp was not kept burning.

There was no special sentence or prayer of consecration,
but continuous services were held from nine to four o'clock,
every hour and a half, so long as there were attendants;
and some people heard these exercises four times repeated.
The printed program was for some reason not followed,
certain hymns and psalms being omitted. There was singing
by a choir and congregation. The Pater Noster was
repeated in the way peculiar to Christian Scientists, the
congregation repeating one sentence and the leader responding
with its parallel interpretation by Mrs. Eddy.
Antiphonal paragraphs were read from the book of
Revelation and her work respectively. The sermon,
prepared by Mrs. Eddy, was well adapted for its purpose,
and read by a professional elocutionist, not an adherent of
the order, Mrs. Henrietta Clark Bemis, in a clear emphatic
style. The solo singer, however, was a Scientist, Miss Elsie
Lincoln; and on the platform sat Joseph Armstrong,
formerly of Kansas, and now the business manager of the
Publishing Society, with the other members of the Christian

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