Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/379

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WITHDRAWAL FROM THE WORLD
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and the enthusiasm for work which was so necessary in the multitude of duties pressing upon all. He remained with Mrs. Eddy until 1896. In 1892 she made him her publisher when she removed William G. Nixon from that office. Dr. Foster-Eddy then lived at the Commonwealth avenue house, though Mrs. Eddy was residing in Concord. Away from her personal influence, he was not as attentive to business as the requirements of his office demanded, and he indulged in certain fopperies which brought down upon him scathing criticism from other students, not entirely unwarranted. It became necessary for Mrs. Eddy to remove him from the publishing business in the spring of 1896, when she made Joseph Armstrong, a former banker of Kansas, her publisher.

Mrs. Eddy then directed Dr. Foster-Eddy to go to Philadelphia to carry out certain plans in the work of the church. She gave him a letter to present to the Philadelphia church and minute instructions, but he did not carry out her directions. As her personal agent he misrepresented her and became persona non grata in that city. The Philadelphia church wrote a letter concerning him to Mrs. Eddy and she recalled him, but he did not return to her at once. He first went to Washington on a pleasure trip and finally presented himself at Pleasant View, bursting with a story of his fancied wrongs. Mrs. Eddy received him in the library and heard him out; then she left him in silence. He quitted the house and returned to Boston where she sent him a letter of admonition, kindly worded, but unmistakable in