Connecticut western news., 1909-12-23
ADAMS DEFENDS
 CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
SESSION, PITTSFIELD, REFERRED TO
Injunction Not to Throw Stones at New ReIigion-0hio Man Aroused by Re- ports on Death of Officer Spencer WoodW0rth.


 Woodworth.
 As an editor, know you are broad minded enough to realize that every question has its two sides and that the columns of your paper are open alike to the opinions of anyone, and which does not imply that all opinions you publish are necessarily i'll line with your per sonal views.
 The newspaper reports of the arraign- ment of the mother and wife of Spencer Woodwork have interested me, partic- ularly when the young son of neighbors of mine in New Rochelle, N. Y, has just recovered from typhoid pneumonia under Christian Science treatment de lirious for three days), while his sister died two years ago with the same dis ease under medical treatment. But more particularly was interested in 1 the report of the coroner, who naturally took hls stand from his medical is he an M. D. ) viewpoint. He says the in. quest was held because he believed that an investigation would make believers in mental or absent treatment for serious illness "mOre cautious in the future. !" Have people who have lost relatives while under the care of a physician-o7 perhaps half a dozen specialists together been "more cautions" since and gone to other methods of treatment? This is what your coroner advises, does he not {? Well, they have, and thousands of peo- pie living c1n testify.
 The people believe that they have the ability to decide to whom thoy may q for relief if they are ill, But right there the doctors take issue with them. Tht truth of the situation comes to us as Il grlm bit of humor when we realize that always and forever the men who franc medical legislation and insist on theii wishes becoming laws are doctors. They each declare, "I am fit, but you are not, If any mau takes Q different view he is a criminal and can be sent to prison if he takes care of you, on your own re quest, if you are sick. Thus we get class legislation and the doctors trust sup. ported by law. All in the face of which there is no science of medicine.
 Science" presupposes a principle un- changing, unalterable. Look at medical science; the whole practice (mark thai word) has shifted ground within 20 years, 10 years, one year, one week (Read the accounts of the recent find ings of that celebrated Roumanian phy. sician in the papers today.)
 Ask any ld-fashioned mother (God bless the name) what she would do if called to a neighbours to help ill a case of pneumonia and she will know of moth. ing else but hot poultices. Tell DO of these motherly souls that the present Cit was 10 years ago) medical method is to put the patient in an lce-cold water bath, and 49 of them would faint, as did most of the physicians all over the country when St Lhke's hospital in New York first treated Il patient in this way and brought him out alive.
 Men get sick and employing no doctor, get we'll Others get sick, send for a doctor, and die. The best doctor in the world can give you no guarantee of con. tinued health. What would any regular physician have said had Mir. Woodwork been his patient and partaken of the heavy meal he did? pr. Oliver Wendell Holmes called medicine the science of gue sswork.
 also note that "Wlnsted ministers publicly censured Christian Science methods" There are lots of answers to this, but the most charitable is, why are the churches all over the land asking the question, "Why are the churches becom- ing depopulated?" while the Christian Science churches are multiplying by hun dreds every year, its members now mum. bering over a million, almost every one of whom are members out of sheer grat- itude for the blessings and reliefs they have received. Let your evangelical ministers get back to their charge, madc by Christ and practiced for 300 years after CnrlsC $ ueaIn Nuhtll CohsUauIihS took his Christ-given privilege from priests and give it to another set, much after the present-day political methods of disbursing "priyileges'O to "heal the sick, cleause the lepers" Let them show as many healed bodies from Christ's religion alone ns the Christian Scientists can and therell be no hue and cry over depopulatcd churches.
 cup to Pitts0cld, it you will, anu s 0 the neisAbIr of mine formerly mayor of tho city) whom the doctors gave "scven days to say goodbye to