The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-10-07
MARX TWAIN ON
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
Continued from first page.)

| NSOuLlHueu lTOul llISI pdS0.J
and rainbow was Upon his head, and his
face was as it were the sun. and his feet
as pillars of fire. And he had in his
, hand = little pook.'
"A little book. merely little book
could words be modester? Yet how stu
pendous its Importance! Do you know
what book that was?
WAS tt
81 hold it in Ly hand-Christian Sci
ence."
Love Livers. Lights, Bones, Truth.
Kidneys, one of a series. alone and with
! out equal-it is beyond imagination for
wonderh'
Love Livers, Lights, Bones. Truth
! Kidneys, one of a series. alone and with
out eGual-it is beyond imagination for
wonder
| Hear our Founders eloquent words:
Then will voice from harmony cry, Go
! and take the little book: take it and eat it
up, and it shall make thy belly bitter;
| but it shall be in thy mouth sweet as
honey" Mortal, obey the heavenly evan
gel. Take up Divine Science. Read 1t
from beginning to end. Study it, ponder
| it, 1t Will be indeed sweet at it's first
! taste, when it heals you; but murmur not
ever Truth. if you find it's digestion Bit
ter You now know the history Of our
! dear and holy Science, sir, and that its
origin is not of this earth; but only it's
discovery. / will leave the book with you
and will go now; but give yourself no
uneasiness-I will give you absent treat
| ment from now till l go to bed
III
Under the powerful influence of the near
| treatment and the absent treatment to-
| gether, my bones were gradually retreat
| ing inward and disappearing from view.
| The good work took brisk start, now,
| and went on swiftly. My body was dill
gently straining and stretching, this way
| and that. to accommodate the process Of
| restoration, and every minute or two |
heard dull click inside and knew that
| the two ends of a fracture had been sue
cessfully Joined. This muffled clicking
| and gritting and grinding and rasping con-
tinued during the next three hours and
then stopped-the connections had all
| been made. All except dislocations; there
were only seven of these: hips, shoulders,
| knees neck: so that was soon over: one
| after another they slipped into their sock
cts with a sound like pulling a distant
cork, and l jumped up as good as new,
as to framework and sent for the horse
doctor.
l was obliged to do this because l had
stomach ache and a cold in the head
| and was not willing to trust these things
any longer in the hands of woman whom
l did not know. and in whose ability to
successfully treat mere disease 1 had lost
all confidence. My position was justified
by the fact that the cold and the ache
had been in her charge from the first
along with the fractures. but had ex-
perienced not shade of relief; and in
deed the ache was even growing worse
and worse. and more and more bitter
now, probably on account Of the protract-
ed abstention from food and drink.
The horse doctor came, pleasant man
and full of hope and professional interest
in the case. In the matter of smell he
was pretty aromatic in fact quite horsy,
and tried to arrange with him for absent
treatment, but it was not in his line, so
out of delicacy l did not press it. He
looked at my teeth and examined my hook,
and said my age and general condition
were favorable to energetic measures;
therefore he would give me something
to turn the stomach ache into the bolts
and the cold in the head into the blind
staggers; then he would be on his own
beat and would know what to do. He
made up bucket of bran mash, and said
a dipperful Of it every two hours, alter
mated with a drench with turpentine and
axle grease in it, would either knock my
ailments out of me in Ewenty-four hours
or so interest me in other ways as to make
me forget they were on the premises. He
administered my first dose himself, then
took his leave, saying l was free to eat
and drink anything 1 pleased and in any
quantity l liked. But l was not hun
CRY any more, and 1 did not care for
food.
l took up the Christian Scientist book
and read half of it, then took a dipperful
Of drench and read the other half. The
resulting experiences were full of interest
and adventure. All through the rumb-
lings and grindings and quakings and
effervescings accompanying the evolution
of the ache into the bolts and the cold
into the blind staggers / could note the
generous struggle for mastery going on
between the mash. and the drench and
the literature; and often 1 could tell
which was ahead, and could easily dis
tinguish the literature from the others
not when they were mixed; for when
bran mash and an eclectic drench are
mixed together they look just like the
Apodistical Principle out on a lark, and
no one can tell it from that. The finish
was reached ait last, the evolutions were
complete and fine success; but l think
that this result could have been achieved
with fewer materials. l believe the mash
was necessary to the conversion of the
stomach ache into the bolts, but I think
one could develop the blind staggers out
of the literature by itself; also, that
! blind staggers produced in this way
would be of a better quality AID more
lasting than any produced by the artificial
| processes of a horse doctor.
For of all the strange, and frantic and
incomprehensible, and uninterpretable
books which the imagination of man has
| created, surely this one is the prize sam
| pie. 1t is written with a limitless conf
| dence and complacency, and with dash
and stir and earnestness which often
compel the effects of eloquence, even when
| the words do not seem to have any trace
| able meaning There are plenty of people
| who imagine they understand the book; 1
1