“Husband and wife, entered together, three hundred dollars.

“Tuition for all strictly in advance.”

There it is—­the horse-leech’s daughter alive again, after a three-century vacation.  Fifty or sixty hours’ lecturing for eight hundred dollars.

I was in error as to one matter:  there are no charity students.  Gratis-taught clergymen must not be placed under that head; they are merely an advertisement.  Pauper students can get into the infant class on a two-third rate (cash in advance), but not even an archangel can get into the rest of the game at anything short of par, cash down.  For it is “in the spirit of Christ’s charity, as one who is joyful to hear healing to the sick” that Mrs. Eddy is working the game.  She sends the healing to them outside.  She cannot bear it to them inside the college, for the reason that she does not allow a sick candidate to get in.  It is true that this smells of inconsistency, but that is nothing; Mrs. Eddy would not be Mrs. Eddy if she should ever chance to be consistent about anything two days running.

Except in the matter of the Dollar.  The Dollar, and appetite for power and notoriety.  English must also be added; she is always consistent, she is always Mrs. Eddy, in her English:  it is always and consistently confused and crippled and poor.  She wrote the Advertisement; her literary trade-marks are there.  When she says all “students” are subject to examination, she does not mean students, she means candidates for that lofty place When she says students are “liable” to leave the class if found unfit to remain in it, she does not mean that if they find themselves unfit, or be found unfit by others, they will be likely to ask permission to leave the class; she means that if she finds them unfit she will be “liable” to fire them out.  When she nobly offers “tuition for all strictly in advance,” she does not mean “instruction for all in advance-payment for it later.”  No, that is only what she says, it is not what she means.  If she had written Science and Health, the oldest man in the world would not be able to tell with certainty what any passage in it was intended to mean.

Her Church was on its legs.

She was its pastor.  It was prospering.

She was appointed one of a committee to draught By-laws for its government.  It may be observed, without overplus of irreverence, that this was larks for her.  She did all of the draughting herself.  From the very beginning she was always in the front seat when there was business to be done; in the front seat, with both eyes open, and looking sharply out for Number One; in the front seat, working Mortal Mind with fine effectiveness and giving Immortal Mind a rest for Sunday.  When her Church was reorganized, by-and-by, the By-laws were retained.  She saw to that.  In these Laws for the government of her Church, her empire, her despotism, Mrs. Eddy’s character is embalmed for good and all.  I think a particularized examination of these Church-laws will be found interesting.  And not the less so if we keep in mind that they were “impelled by a power not one’s own,” as she says—­Anglice. the inspiration of God.