CHAPTER IX

Four years ago I wrote the preceding chapters. I was assured by the wise
that Christian Science was a fleeting craze and would soon perish. This
prompt and all-competent stripe of prophet is always to be had in the
market at ground-floor rates. He does not stop to load, or consider, or
take aim, but lets fly just as he stands. Facts are nothing to him, he
has no use for such things; he works wholly by inspiration. And so, when
he is asked why he considers a new movement a passing fad and quickly
perishable, he finds himself unprepared with a reason and is more or less
embarrassed. For a moment. Only for a moment. Then he waylays the
first spectre of a reason that goes flitting through the desert places of
his mind, and is at once serene again and ready for conflict. Serene and
confident. Yet he should not be so, since he has had no chance to
examine his catch, and cannot know whether it is going to help his
contention or damage it.

The impromptu reason furnished by the early prophets of whom I have
spoken was this:

"There is nothing to Christian Science; there is nothing about it that
appeals to the intellect; its market will be restricted to the
unintelligent, the mentally inferior, the people who do not think."

They called that a reason why the cult would not flourish and endure. It
seems the equivalent of saying:

"There is no money in tinware; there is nothing about it that appeals to
the rich; its market will be restricted to the poor."