Mary Baker Eddy

Beasley, Norman. Mary Baker Eddy. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1963.

This biography, with six appendices, follows Beasley’s earlier two books The Cross and the Crown and The Continuing Spirit.  Beasley begins with Mary Baker Eddy’s early years, followed by her 1866 spiritual breakthrough on the nature of Jesus’s healing, and the publication of her teachings in her textbook Science and Health. The bulk of the book focuses on Eddy’s establishment of her Church and its organizational structure—her means of protecting her teachings and developing movement. “She had long held the conviction that upon her was laid a mission no one could complete but herself” (190).  Beasley draws on Eddy’s published and unpublished writings, newspaper articles, letters, student reports, earlier biographies and Bible passages which Beasley ties to Eddy’s foundational steps. Writing as a journalist, and not a Christian Scientist, he also explores the controversies and often malicious attacks faced by Eddy from the press, clergy and even her own followers. And as a graduate of Detroit College of Law, he treats Eddy’s Bylaw development and the ‘Next Friends’ legal suit knowledgeably.  While dated, Beasley writes with a unique depth of understanding of Eddy’s mission and purpose.