I write the following to you at Miss Brown's request. I spent the night with her last night, and among other things she mentioned the fact that you were going to instruct a class of advanced students, to fit them for teaching. Also that you were not going to begin that class until she brought four students with her from the west. She was thinking of recommendingAs Written:recom mending the ShermansEditorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman, until I told her some things I knew about them. Namely, they are carrying the idea that I studied with them and not with you; I know this to be so because a lady friend of mine who knew that I had studied with you came to me and asked me if I hadn't studied with the Sherman'sEditorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman also. A Mrs. Willey, a friend of my friend, has lately studied with the ShermansEditorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman for $250Editorial Note: $250.00 in 1884 is the equivalent of $7,053.76 in 2018., and this Mrs. Willey told my friend that I studied with the ShermansEditorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman. My friend came to me a second time and said, "Didn't you study with the ShermansEditorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman? Mrs. Willey says so." and I believe she added "instead of with Mrs. Eddy." She almost seemed to doubt my word that I studied with you. Since Mrs. Willey studied she is treating her husband that he can smoke cigars so that it won't make him sick, because heretofore he could only smoke a pipe. This is her doctrine as learned of the ShermansEditorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman "Anything you like and want, spiritual or material, treat yourself for it and you can have it." "One can play cards, smoke, drink &c. & it won't hurt one." The S's.Editorial Note: Bradford Sherman; Martha E. Sherman told my friend this; that she needn't go to church, read the Bible, or pray; in short she need follow no rule except that which administers to her own personal pleasure.

I know another lady who took treatment of Mrs. Sherman all last winter & spring; and finally she began to have discharges & Mrs. Sherman sent her to a doctor to find out the cause, & whether it was cancerous or not. The doctor finally pronounced it cancerous although he didn?t think there was any cancer there but Mrs. S. has not cured the case, and this lady has lost faith in Metaphysics. I know another lady, a singing teacher, who has considerable trouble with her throat; and she uses lozenges for her throat at Mrs. S's recommendation. Mrs. S. also told her she was existing on nervous force & willpower. I know other cases that Dr. Sherman has had; some have been cured & then relapsed, as bad as they ever were; and some have not been helped at all. I know personally of cases of rheumatism that they would not take; and this all comes under the name of Metaphysics

Mrs. Emerson studied with Dr. S. about two yrs. ago, with the understanding that he had studied with you, and when she afterwards spoke to him about it, he denied ever having said so. A lady that Dr. S. sent to Miss Brown, asked her if she studied with Dr. S. It looks as if they were after money more than anything else. I think they need another course to make them understand Life, Truth, & Love, instead of mortal mind, if they would only stick to their teachings & give up their errors.

Dr. Avery is all things to all menI Cor 9:19 For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more. I Cor 9:20 And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; I Cor 9:21 To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law. I Cor 9:22 To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. I Cor 9:23 And this I do for the gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you. , for his own personal advancement. With the Spiritualists he is a spiritualist, with the M.D's, an M.D, with the Christian ScientistsAs Written:C.S's a Christian ScientistAs Written:C.S much to the detriment of your scienceEditorial Note: Christian Science. I would not say this if I did not know. His wife came over one evening and talked against spiritualism like everythingAs Written:every thing, but I saw that she still had the belief that the living & the dead could commune together, & when I said you did not teach that she said "Oh, Mrs. Eddy hasn't had as much experience with Spiritualism as we have." Since then I have heard of her attending spiritualist meeting. I think that they, also, need more instruction in regard to the way of Truth. Dr. Avery helped to get a patient away from Miss Brown and prevented this lady from following Miss Brown's directions, when he might have, by following the ScienceEditorial Note: Christian Science, encouraged this lady to do as Miss Brown wanted her to and thus have had the case curedAs Written:cure d, and the way he & Mr. Morrill gave Mrs. M. medicine during her confinement was shocking. In fact mesmerism has been pretty busy out here, judging from results.

I have been trying some experiments lately; the way I came to was this: I noticed that in treating certain patients, they were relieved of certain difficulties that I knew nothing about, and that they chemicalizedEditorial Note: Chemicalization is a term Mary Baker Eddy used to refer to a temporary stirring up of symptoms or process of "fermentation" as errors of various types are being destroyed., both morally & physically on questions that I did not take up at all, showing that the treatment had a general effect; indeed they have remarked, "your treatment is general in its effect." And I know that if I want to get at the first cause or thought of the disease, which is sometimes buried in oblivion, I can best find it out by giving them the treatment contained in your statement of beingEditorial Note: The "scientific statement of being" is on page 468 of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy.; and that all is Life, Truth, & Love, (Love being the Truth foreverAs Written:for ever) & that we are the offspringAs Written:off spring of love & not sensuality (which is the forbidden fruit), of Principle & not person. I find that this brings back their memory of first causes, & incidents in regard to the beginnings of their beliefs, & that it is the quickest and most potent way of bringing out all the latent beliefs of mortal mind. I think it is the best way of handling the question of mesmerism, also. I know that if I keep on in this way i.e. being conscious of the Truth only & unconscious of error & matter, as much as possible, that I will succeed.

I had rather a strange experience the other night. It seemed, all at once as if a mesmeric spell were being thrown over me and as if I was being engulfed in the waves of spiritual darkness, as if I were being drowned in the waves of malicious mortal mind; and all that I could think of were the words "Life Truth & Love." It seemed as if I was being bound hand & foot; I made an effort to speak to my mother in the next room; four or five times I called to her but I couldn't make a sound. In that brief moment of experience it seemed as though I could faintly imagine It seemed as though I could feel & see the malice trying to quench & drown out the Holy Ghost or divine love but I know this to be impossible for the divine love is all and malice is nothing what Christ must have suffered on the Cross when he cried "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?"Mark 15:34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi,
Eloi,
lama
sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? although I am far from being worthy at the present time to drink his cup. I am beginning to see faintly what you have suffered in rising to the position you now hold in ScienceEditorial Note: Christian Science.

I intend to take a course of advanced science with you as soon as circumstances permit; also, a thorough course of Bible study including all the Scriptures. I am deeply interested to know the spiritual interpretation of the Bible and have been ever since I studied. From time to time passages of scripture have come to me, with the spiritual interpretation of the passage.

When one begins to see into the deeper meaning of this scienceEditorial Note: Christian Science it is indeed wonderful; then there is nothing so attractive as this is.

One thing more about Dr. S.; he considers "Mrs. Coursen next to Mrs. Eddy as a teacher;" Mrs. Coursen has & does talk dreadfully about you & I know her students are not satisfied; in fact I know she kept some students from studying with you by writing to them daily, when she was studying with you "nothing new todayAs Written:to-day from the class."

Miss Brown says, "Do you wonder that, in the face of all these facts, I asked you to send someoneAs Written:some one to help me uphold the standard of Christian Science out west." It seems to me that the only ones in ScienceEditorial Note: Christian Science are Miss Brown, Mrs. Noyes, Roger Sherman {Miss Bickford, Mrs. Philbrick.} and perhaps Mrs. Emerson who is sincere, I believe and has done a great deal of free work but I think her pride & mesmerism keeps her from the Association also she is inclined to spiritualism & believes in Dr. Evans works, which I do not.

I know nothing about Mr. Wickersham. I liked what I saw of Mrs. Coleman, very much.

We that are true to the scienceEditorial Note: Christian Science all need help & correction in the errors that we still cling to. If I have not done right in telling you all these things, I will not do it again and I will remember As Written: remembe the words "Physician heal thyself"Luke 4:23 And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country. & "cast the beam out of thine own eye"Matt 7:4 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Matt 7:5 Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.