Page:Faithhealingchri00buckiala.djvu/292

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
278
"CHRISTIAN SCIENCE" AND "MIND CURE"

which the introduction of the proper drugs might give, it is saved from the consequences of the administration of the wrong ones.

The number of instances in which the prescriptions interfere with nature is so great that Dr. Paris wrote, many years ago, "The file of every apothecary would furnish a volume of instances where the ingredients of the prescription were fighting together in the dark. This is especially true of diseases of children. The late Dr. Marshall Hall said, "Of the whole number of fatal cases of diseases in infancy, a great proportion occur from the inappropriate or undue application of exhausting remedies."

Farther, those who are treated by the Mind Curers in many cases derive benefit from the freedom of diet, air, and exercise allowed. They are told to pay no attention to symptoms, think nothing whatever about their diseases, and not talk about them; to eat, sleep, drink, and act as nearly as possible as if they were well; and in a large majority of chronic diseases, this is all that is needed to produce a return to health.

They have also the benefits of faith and fancy; as they are taught to imagine healthy, vigorous organs, and their whole bodies in the condition of health, and with such mental pictures to drive away all consciousness of symptoms, they summon to their aid that most potent of all influences, a calm and fearless mind. The presence of the practitioner and her methods greatly contribute to this calming influence.

She enters with a cheerful air and, without taking your hand or approaching your bed, seats herself and asks you to tell her all your symptoms. [She may, however, belong to the class which will not allow any description of symptoms.] She receives your budget of ailments calmly, without one expression of sympathy, for she has none, considering all your maladies as an illusion or dream from which it is her divine mission to