the one who can impart it gives him the remedy. Suppose a person receives a shock from falling into a river, and returns home excited with a state like a cold. This produces a cough. Now, as there are many ghosts in the form of disease, he fears some of them may get hold of him. So he goes to a doctor and lays his case before him. The doctor says you are very liable to have consumption. Now of course you are troubled, and are all the time like the man who was looking for his lost money. So he inquires of every person what is good for a cough; or if they can tell where his money is. So every person gives his opinion, and there is just as much in one opinion as another. At last in despair he gives it up, and I am sent for. I first tell him what he is afraid of by telling him how he is affected. Here is something he can't get from the doctor. This makes him feel more comfortable, and then I go on to show him how he has been living on husks or opinions about an idea that never had an existence only in the superstition of the people. As he is full of these opinions I have to give him something in the form of truth that will dissolve the error and satisfy him.
EXPERIENCE OF A PATIENT WITH DR. QUIMBY
For many years I was very sick and finding no benefit resulting from the various modes of cure that I had employed, I thought of visiting Dr. Quimby. So I inquired of some friends in regard to his treatment. Some said he was a spiritualist and others that he was a mesmeriser, and others said he made war on all religious beliefs, and as I could not see what my belief had to do with my disease I gave up the idea of going to see him, but finally I was brought to the subject again through utter hopelessness and despair of recovery, so I went to see him. In my first interview I asked him if he could cure the spinal disease. He answered that he never wished a patient to tell him his feelings. “Very well” said I, “what do you want me to do?” “Nothing,” said he, “but listen to what I say.” I then asked him if he gave medicine. “No.” “Do you employ any agent from the world of spirits?” “No” said he. “Then,” said I, “it must be mesmerism.” He replied “that may be your opinion but it is not the truth.” “Then will you please tell me what you call your
