Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/215

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
GERMINATION AND UNFOLDMENT
175

finding that no further good could be done along the lines of procedure she had marked out with them. Mrs. Crafts was a confirmed Spiritualist, and after a very temporary lull in her resistance to Christian Science she renewed her opposition with all the energy of a narrow mind and found countless ways of expressing her resistance. Mary Baker went to Lynn for a short visit with the Winslows. She explained to them her desire for a quiet home in which she could write and work out her great problem. They suggested that she go to Amesbury and their reasons were clear. They were Quakers. In Amesbury, a quiet little town in the extreme Northeast corner of Massachusetts, situated on the Merrimac River, nine miles from the sea, dwelt the great Quaker poet, Whittier. It was natural for them to suggest this as an admirable place for literary seclusion. It was a quiet, peaceful village with historic tradition. The Winslows had friends there to whom they commended Mrs. Glover, as she was now called by her own request.

But to the Quakers she did not go. It will be remembered that the Winslows were disquietly affected by her ideas, even after being convinced of their healing power. They had told her if she persisted in presenting such doctrine she would be thought insane. This was also the opinion of a Unitarian clergyman and his wife. It was not in Mary Baker’s heart to arouse such opposition further or to carelessly enter another environment of resistance. She now turned her footsteps to the home of an elderly Spiritualist woman of whom she had heard much.