effort to vindicate himself. In the matter of hypnotism Mrs. Eddy's
mere word is enough. She has, she says, an unerring instinct by which
she can detect hypnotism in any creature:

"I possess a spiritual sense of what the malicious mental practitioner
is mentally arguing which cannot be deceived; I can discern in the
human mind thoughts, motives, and purposes; and neither mental
arguments nor psychic power can affect this spiritual insight."[25]


_Actual Size of Mrs. Eddy's Following_

The result of Mrs. Eddy's planning and training and pruning is that
she has built up the largest and most powerful organization ever
founded by any woman in America. Probably no other woman so
handicapped--so limited in intellect, so uncertain in conduct, so
tortured by hatred and hampered by petty animosities--has ever risen
from a state of helplessness and dependence to a position of such
power and authority. All that Christian Science comprises to-day--the
Mother Church, branch churches, healers, teachers, Readers, boards,
committees, societies--are as completely under Mrs. Eddy's control as
if she were their temporal as well as their spiritual ruler. The
growth of her power has been extensive as well as intensive.

In June, 1907, the membership of the Mother Church, according to the
Secretary's report, was 43,876. The membership of the branch churches
amounted to 42,846. As members of the branch churches are almost
invariably members of the Mother Church as well, there cannot be more
than 60,000 Christian Scientists in the world to-day, and the number
is probably nearer 50,000.