Healing Hypotheses
CHAPTER IV
HORATIO WILLIS DRESSER
i. Their Early Lives, in Association with Quimby
It has been said of Dresser,
No one is so well qualified to deal with the [subject of Quimby's views and the teachings developed from them] as Mr. Dresser, for he has the distinction of being the only author in New Thought circles who was born and bread in the atmosphere of the new philosophy as it was imbibed directly from Dr. Quimby, and who is thoroughly acquainted with all of Dr. Quimby's writing.1
Perhaps it should be mentioned at this point that Dresser was not identified exclusively with New Thought, but more of that is to be seen later.
The parents of Dresser were Julius Alphonso Dresser (February 12, 1838-May 10, 1893) and Annetta Gertrude Seabury Dresser (May 7, 1843-December 5, 1935).
In a February 23, 1944, letter to his daughter Dresser identified as his father the man written about in the following quotation from a 1922 Dresser book.
Two generations ago, in a small New England city, a promising young man of
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1 Leonard, op. cit., part 1, X (Sept.-Oct., 1905), 3.
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twenty-two lay apparently at the point of death. On both sides of his house the ancestors were physically weak, and all save two in a family of nine had already passed from this life when our record begins. The young man of whom we are speaking was frail in physique. There seemed to be little power of resistance to withstand the oncoming of a disease accounted fatal as matters go in this world of allegiance to material things. In type he was spiritually minded and highly intuitive, inclined to think for himself and exercise individual initiative. He was zealous in religion, devoted to the church, eager in fact to prepare himself for the ministry if his health should permit the completion of his college course. On the side of faith as conventionally understood nothing more could indeed have been asked.
He had joined the church at sixteen with a large measure of emotional enthusiasm. He regularly attended all services and was especially zealous in prayer-meeting. He was a Calvinist, however, in the thorough-going sense of the word. God to him was little more than a Man seated on a white throne of authority outside the world, a God to be admired with awesome reverence rather than a Father to be loved. Naturally our young man, devout as he was, had no idea of the power of divine love as an indwelling presence to be sought as one might turn to a friend. Christianity was a doctrine of salvation interpreted as a Baptist of the period understood it. Salvation as thus conceived by no means included the problems of bodily weakness and ill health. Prayer was for certain purposes. The observances decreed by the church were to be rigidly adhered to, leaving mundane matters for consideration in their proper place. Among these matters was the question of disease, and the physicians of the old school had apparently done their utmost to save this young man.
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Then there came from a wholly unexpected source marvelous change into this young life. This change not only meant that he was rescued from the abyss of death by spiritual means when material methods had failed, but that he was given a new impetus and an understanding of life which enabled him to live on this earth during many years of great usefulness. It will be worth while considering what wrought the change, why it could be so pronounced in the case of a man emphatically spiritual in type, genuinely a Christian as the Gospel was then understood.
There came as if heaven-sent a man whose work among the sick had no place among therapeutic systems commonly known as scientific.1
This man, of course, was Quimby. Dresser says that the healing of his father
was more than victory over death and the successful staying of a disease presumably fatal. It will hardly be possible to see the meaning of this profound turning of a young life from one channel into another if we look at it as a mental cure. The change was the equivalent of a conversion and much more, if by a conversion we mean the adoption of a creed which makes of a worldly man a follower of Christ. For this man had already given himself to Christ. Strange to relate, in adopting the teachings of the new therapeutist he renounced the church as an organization, together with all its observances, also his desire to become a
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1 Horatio W. Dresser, Spiritual Health and Healing (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1922), pp. 1-3.
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minister. Yet on the other hand he became more faithfully a follower of Christ than before.
The apparent paradox is resolved when we note that the transition was from the Calvinist deity to faith in God as immanent, loving, guiding Father, immediate and accessible, in a sense as intimate as that of our own self-consciousness when aware that there is an ideal self within us, when we will to have that self become actual in daily life. It meant the conviction that the true God is already present in our spirit to uplift and make us free as rapidly as we come to recognize and respond, admitting the divine life into all parts of our being. It signified the disclosure of the original gospel of health and freedom taught and proved by the Master. Sectarian Christianity no longer existed for him. He reacted against its limitations as against the faults of medical science and practice. Yet he did not in any sense cease to believe in Christ as the true Savior of the world.
That his was a genuine conversion in the practical sense of the word was shown by the fact that, once restored to active service, he began to live by what to him was a new gospel and to give his time to spreading this gospel in the world.1
This is not to say that he immediately set out on his own to spread the message. More will be seen on this point.
Later, our young man was fond of saying that one must set aside all preconceptions for the time being, to grasp the new point of view as a "spiritual science.". . .
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1 Ibid., pp. 4-6.
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This gospel involved the idea that Christ is not a Person in the sense in which orthodox believers associate the Son with the Father in the Trinity. The leading idea was that Christ was divine wisdom taught and exemplified by the historical personality, Jesus of Nazareth, whom we begin truly to understand when we make this discrimination. . . ..
Even our young man with all his Christian zeal was as one in a dream. To awaken him was to give him a different idea of what it means to be faithful to the Master, to believe in God and live by the divine wisdom. It was to start from within in the living present, the divine moment of his true selfhood. It was to concentrate upon what man is ideally, touched with the fulness of life by the quickening presence of Christ....
Our young man began to reform the whole man--who needed it less in most respects than many men do. Or, rather the Spirit wrought such regeneration in him. The Spirit summoned him to live a consistent life in mind and body. He was still handicapped, with his frail physique and difficult inheritance. But he began anew to work on and up. He led a triumphant lift of the spirit. That is the great consideration.1
Elsewhere Dresser briefly summarized:
My father, Julius A. Dresser, was a patient and follower of Dr. Quimby, in Portland, Me., from June, 1860, and was in Portland when Mrs. Eddy, then Mrs. Patterson, came from Hill, N. H., to receive treatment. He owed the thirty-three years
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1 Ibid., pp. 6-10.
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of his life following 1860 to Dr. Quimby, whose ideas he ardently espoused and often explained to new patients, among them Mrs. Eddy. The first mention of Mrs. Eddy in my father's journal is October 17, 1862, and my mother, Annetta G. Dresser, who was cured by Dr. Quimby after six years of hopeless invalidism, was present when Mrs. Eddy was assisted up the steps to Dr. Quimby's office....
My father lent Mrs. Eddy his copy of the first volume of Dr. Quimby's manuscripts, which she may have copied for herself.1
The journal volume referred to has not been found in connection with the present study, but another still in the possession of the family covers the period November 1, 1861-April 7, 1862. During most of that time J. A. Dresser was at Waterville, Maine, studying in Colby College.2 His journal entries show him as a sensitive, serious, not especially academic sort of person. He was much concerned about religion, and was trying to
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1 Horatio W. Dresser, "The Facts in the Case" section of "Christian Science and its Prophetess," The Arena, XXI (May, 1899), 539-40. The first volume of Quimby's manuscripts is published under the title "Christ or Science" as the fourteenth chapter of The Quimby Manuscripts. Mrs. Eddy is better known for her use of "Questions and Answers," chapter 13. See Milmine, op. cit., chapter VIII, especially pp. 128-29; see also the Milmine McClure's Magazine fourth installment, April, 1907, p. 623.
2 A February 6, 1962, letter from the college library, although the registrar was addressed, says that the only information available there "is that in a general catalog of 1920. It states only that he attended Colby 1861-62."
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straighten out his thinking while influenced by both the new Quimby teachings and conventional religious thought. At this time he was maintaining his participation in the organized religious life of the community.
Something of his outlook is shown by a Christmas entry listing the presents that he gave:
I gave (by hanging on the tree) to F. and H. [presumably his sister and brother, Frances and Horatio]' "Hymns of the Ages," & "Lessons in Life," Kate Hawse, "Gold Foil," Amanda Bates, Tuppers Proverbial Philosophy, and bot. [sic] "Self Help" for myself. This morning I gave Abbie Hawse "Lessons in Life," by Timothy Titcomb. I gave, also, books to three of my class of little boys.
Fortunately, he recorded a look back to an earlier time. On November 8 he records:
I got out my old journals--back books written in, to read what was recorded last fall, and observing a book among them in which I commenced a religious journal (i.e. strictly of a religious nature), I took that & read it. I find so many mistakes and strange notions in it that I think I'll burn it, as 'tis very short. But copy a few things.
The first record is concerning my conviction of sin, which took place on my hearing a sermon, at the church where I attended service, in Lawrence, Mass.
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1 Their father, Asa Dresser, died February 21, 1854, at 47, and their mother, Nancy Smart Dresser, January 16, 1857, at 46. Some children died at early ages. Of the surviving ones, J. A. was the youngest and Frances (November 29, 1832-July 6, 1870) the eldest.
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That particular event happened on sunday [sic] evening Nov. 27th 1853. Then in my sixteenth year; sixteen the following Feb. On the friday [sic] evening following the sunday [sic] evening of conviction, I experienced a change--pardon, peace and acceptance into the fold of "our Lord and His Christ." Next evening I spoke a few words in prayer meeting, and on the second sunday [sic] following was baptized--immersed of course--by Elder Timothy Cole, of that church, & recd. into the church.
I used to feel it my duty to take some part in nearly every meeting, and commenced very soon to feel it duty to pray. This duty I never faithfully performed, but experienced a great amount of trial with regard to it.
He goes on to lament his human shortcomings, but, as suggested above, he probably had less cause for concern than most people.
The next day he writes:
I burned another journal yesterday, a regular account of life, while at work in the machine shop at Lawrence[,] Mass., which I read immediately after burning the religious journal. It contained an account beginning a few weeks before I met with a change of heart, and was continued for a few weeks after. Would like to have kept it, but I considered it too imperfect.
In addition to his recording conventional religious sentiments, including a desire for the conversion of his brother and sister, J. A. Dresser from time to time refers to Quimby and his teachings. A November 5 entry tells:
This morning I experienced a clearness and command of the truth concerning disease &c, such
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as I have not before had since I learned about it. Horatio & I both woke from sleep by four o'clock, and we had quite a talk about the source & location of pain. He brot. [sic] in disease also, but I knew it was not of any use to speak of that, so I would not talk upon that, but pain alone....
I could not convince him of anything nor he me. But I wonder if it was the opposition alone that gave me that exceedingly clear view of that truth that disease is in the mind, and also enabled me to see just how the temptations come, & how they effect, to make me fear & think in the old way, to distrust this. How much alike are the experiences in the Christian life and in this. But I took the most of that blessing (for it was truly a blessing) as an answer to my prayers. Oh, if I could maintain myself in that same state of mind, that I was in while dressing myself, all of the time, I would be proof against disease, and could conquer some lesser ails in others. I believe that is so!
The brief entries of the next two days do not give additional light on this matter. On the third day, Friday, November 8, 1861, he shows more of his thought in relation to customary religious activities:
Went to prayer-meeting at the Bapt. last night, and Congl. Tuesday night. Took no part (except to sing), though I tho't some of it, as I generally do. I enjoy some parts of a prayer meeting, for instance, Mr Pepper's very feeling address to us, (remarks) last night, and any time when I observe deep feeling in any one who takes a part. But Oh! the coldness & formality of prayer-meetings here I do not like. I expect that I am by far too exacting, and need to set myself right first before I demand anything dift. from others from what I may have given me.
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I wish I knew myself, what & where I am! Perhaps I should have gotten up last night & spoken, if Dr Champlin, & perhaps some other all-knowing (?) and educated (?) heads had not been there. But I dont [sic] like to be criticized. I rather get up to speak before a heart of charity than before a head of systems & rules.
But I should be better off, if I was in that state in which I would get up and say what might be beneficial (to either myself or others or both), always when I deemed it best, and without fear or hesitancy, whoever might be present.
Oh, hard is human nature! Blind & bigoted!
On December 11 he observes:
We had a most excellent meeting last night at the Congl. vestry. 'Twas the regular Congl. prayer-meeting and the best prayer-meeting I have been to in this place. The interest increases, bless God, Mr. Hawse appointed another for friday [sic] night.
I have for several days past been trying to work out the problem of anger, irritability, impatience, so that I may scientifically, as Dr. Q. says, avoid those evils; or, in other words, so I may see, not only its foolishness, in a clearer light, but may see just the source of the impatience, how it affects or moves, as I do in the case of many other evils, to which I am subject, as prejudice, dislike to anything; appetite, amativeness, love lying in bed in cold weather, &c, &c, and that I may guard against the anger and impatience as intelligently and successfully as in case of those others. Pride & vanity, thank God, I can command much better than I used to. These diseases, too, belong to the catalogue. But I have even better success with the
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diseases than with anger and impatience. The latter seem to be hard to detect, as I wish to see them. Yet I proved that, like the other evils, the source of them is the flesh. For, when I was angry I lost my clear view of the flesh and its influence, its temptations, looking from the spirit, or in other words, I departed from the spirit into the flesh, I lived no longer in the flesh. Hence the conclusion is plain, that the anger is in the flesh. Yet I cant [sic] detect its approach and ward it off so as in the case of the other evils.
On December 14 he reports without details, "Some firey trials come up, now-a-days, concerning anger and impatience; but I trust I am gradually working out the problem and becoming wiser." On the same day he says that
while at Mr Pepper's, . . . I got into a discussion upon scripture, which lasted about an hour, and then we took long walk, . . . all the while discussing theology, &c. He brought out of me about the whole theory of things, that that is so different from others views.
He really agreed with me much better than I had an idea of me, and ... there was a great deal of truth in what I said, but that I carried it too far. Our talk before [referred to in his entry for the 9th] was a week ago tonight, and this time, as then, I got into a considerable of doubt and difficulty from hearing his views, although I tho't after we parted tonight that there was little reason for my being moved from my views this time, as came so near me, comparatively, But O, that is just my disposition. Oh! too weak to be described on paper!! But very likely I am not right in all I think. But I must be proved out of it. God will guide me! After coming home I felt a very unusual forbearance,
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mingled with love, towards my sister. Indeed I never felt so well disposed, and never talked so calmly, and patiently, as when we discussed so long [?], at tea time, our disagreements. And I could attribute the same to nothing except my talking and maintaining my ground upon what I did.
After mentioning academic and health difficulties on March 4, 1862, J. A. Dresser says,
Frances has been thinking lately of going to see Dr Quimby, and I have been thinking it would, likely, do me good, so have both decided to go tomorrow, if pleasant.
The next entry, dated Wednesday, March 12, tells of being delayed a day by snow and of the trip, followed by:
F. sat with Dr. Q. soon after getting there, & was benefitted. I sat with him, also, that afternoon, and recd. great benefit. I had been feeling debilitated, and he roused me up. Mr. Haines told me next day that the afternoon before he thot. I looked more like I did when he first saw me, in Sept. 1856 (when I was quite unwell . . .) than at any other time since then.
I sat with Dr Q. twice & recd. much benefit, but it was difficult to keep my spirit up all the time. But the good I got still continues to benefit me. F. & I both stopped at the International Hotel, but I guess for the last time.
I left on saturday [sic] noon & came back to Wat....
Recd. also a letter from F. last night. Said she went to Dr Qs room after I left & shed a "few briny tears, which Dr Q. said ought to be bottled as valuables."
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On Friday, March 14, he rejoined F. in Portland. The following Tuesday his remarks include:
I thot. some of going back to Waterville today, but wanted to talk more with Dr Q., so delayed....
How much better I do feel & get along physically under the influence of the (as it seems) more sensible way of thinking!!
Back in Waterville he found renewed "inclination to sickness" and "disinclination to books," especially when not feeling well. He considered transferring to Bowdoin College.
The journal of Julius Dresser is most helpful, not only because of the information that it gives about his own difficulties in coming to accept the Quimby views that became his own, but because it shows something of the atmosphere prevailing at the time. From reading his forthright account one comes to appreciate the gap that it was necessary for one to bridge in moving from conventional religion to Quimby. One also learns something of the living conditions then prevailing. As an important record of that time and place, the closing pages of the journal are quoted at length below.
On Saturday, April 5, 1862, he wrote:
Came to P[ortland] on Thursday [?]. Couldn't stop longer in Waterville. I am too susceptible to the influences that may exist around me, to live in so much error ... in my present weak condition. So I have come to P. to stay until I can go away from here and accomplish something.
Thought of bringing my books & making up this present college term, & last fall's term, but came away in a hurry, and had no convenient
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trunk, nor room in my carpetbag, so left them. I guess it was just as well.
Frances has improved some since she has been here, but has set herself against Dr Q's views, and partly against him, (because he dont just exactly meet her sensitive nature), so she cant improve much yet, while she stands thus. She returns to W. on monday or tuesday. I found a pleasant boarding place yesterday, Mr. Chas. Farley's, at No. 3 Federal St. They are a fine family. Have four daughters & one son at home. Two or three sons away. Pay $3.50 per week for my board & have washing included. They are not so lively at least so far, as I wish they were. I am bound [?] for a good time now, like I had a year ago last fall. And I intend to get back where I was then in the possession of the truth. But Dr Q. has so many sick folks to attend to that I can get but little opportunity to speak with him. I brot. Robinson's flute with me from Waterville, and think some of taking lessons & learn to play it.
Monday 7th, 8 A.M. Heard Mr. Stebbins preach a doleful sermon on death yesterday morning, but heard some fine music there. They have the best choir that there is, likely, in the state (Stone church, Unitarian).
In the afternoon went to Dr. Quimby's room and discussed truth & error. Frances came in after meeting (knowing I was there), and stopped a while. She never listens to Dr Q. when she can keep her mind on something else, because he dont come to her requirements, so did not then, though three or four of us were listening (Mrs Q., Mrs Thacher, & I, also Miss Deering [presumably the one whose name appears on some Quimby writing that she once had in her possession; see The Quimby Manuscripts. 1st ed., p. 18, 2nd ed., p. 24]), all that were present beside F. After a while F. said to me
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that she wished I could have heard Mr Dwight, that he preached beautifully. That made me a little angry, though it ought not to have had that effect. But even if she did dislike Dr Q's talk, it did not follow that I disliked it also, and I was not to forbear hearing to assist her in her conceit. She irritates me strangely, and I her, though I wish it was not so, and dont like to be writing such a thing. I hope, however, after I learn more of the truth that I will be able to bear every such thing. I cant endure the thought of having to bear it by self control. I want to gain a free & willing forbearance. No, I mistake. It would not be forbearance, that I know of, if free & willing I want to learn to act wisely at all such times.
I wrote to Mrs Hawes, Abbie & Kate on saty, inviting a discussion of what I have been telling them, viz, this truth. Suppose Kate, only, will take it up. Wrote that I would like all the honest opposition that they could bring against me, by giving all their own objections, bible quotations, references to anything, & sayings and assertions of Mr Hawes (their minister. No relation). Said I would like it on several accounts, namely, it would be assistance to me, to give the answers, would bring up points that I might overlook (what help I wanted I should get from Dr Q.), and it might be instructive to them.
I see more and more now as time passes, the foolishness of the world's views of things, bible & nearly everything.
There has been a great deal more going on in my mind upon the subject of Dr. Q's views since I came to Pd. a month ago (with Fs.) and also was last fall when & after I came to Pd for a few days, & through the winter too, than I wrote in my journal. Indeed I have written but very little about those things since my first falling back into error
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a year ago last fall (when I unwisely talked so much with others that I found them too much for me. Some were smarter than I, & beat me), even when I was thinking a great deal, as was the case last fall, has been to some extent through the winter, and very much during the past month. I want now, and intend to get back where I was when I left Portland for Waterville, one year ago last August (28th). And in the future I'll know enough to keep my tongue still when I can't conquer, which would be often.
It was remarkable how easily I fell into this way of thinking, or theory, or truth, when I came again where I heard it talked, last Oct. For about a year (not quite) I had lived in disbelief of it, having, about the last of the Oct. previous closed, through the conquering influence of others, I being away from any one who knew the truth, my very earnest &, to me, bright career in believing & preaching (and partly living--in joy--) this noble, liberal, high and holy truth (not holy in that very hypocritical, sanctimonious sense). I even thought of meeting Dr Q. as an opposer, some day; intending to fortify myself and expecting to present some knock-down arguments to him, such is the natural conceit I have, which is illustrated also in the case of my pitching into everybody, right & left, upon the truth, when I went to Waterville in Oct. '60, thinking I was going to conquer. But a part of that, though, may be over-confidence. But when I came to see Dr Q. last fall, without my consent, and almost unawares [?] to myself I fell, into the upright way, in spite of my boasted (to myself) ability to meet & oppose Dr Q. Then I met that Mr Carter here also, who had a great deal of influence over me. I went home, at that time, not knowing just what to think. Mr Carter told me to remain in the church & to pray,
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& so I did. After a while I got interested, with some others, in helping others to become religious, and gave much attention to that all through the winter. I spoke in the prayer meetings, and perhaps I say not wrong if I say that, I was one of the principle [sic] getters up of the late revival there. I took my letter from the Yth. [Yarmouth?] church & joined the Waterville Baptist church in Oct., and was one of their most active members.
I had some hesitancy, in Oct., after leaving Pd., to having an outward form of prayer, but I yielded to what seemed best, and took the form. But never, during the last year & a half, have I regularly had more than one kneeling prayer, which seemed enough. And in all this time I have had some difficulty in asking forgiveness of sin.
It did not seem necessary to ask forgiveness, tho' I could not account for that, but wanted to acct. [?] full [?] [act free ?] [add faith?] During the winter I thought sometimes about those common exhortations in the meetings, & wished I knew just what was right. But I wanted to do good & thinking that that was the best way I knew, I took hold on [in?] the old form, & was active. When I was home this last time they (the church brethren) noticed my apparent coldness, and some spoke with me. But now I may expect a warm time with them at some time in the future.
In one of Dresser's later writings, quoted in Appendix B in relation to Quimby, he tells of "a man [J. A. Dresser, no doubt] of frail physique who was suffering from typhoid pneumonia" who was removed from the critical phase of his illness by [Quimby's] silent treatment before being told the explanation for his disease,
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including the statement "Your religion is killing you."1 Dresser continued undoubtedly about his mother, with an account of a
case [in which] the chief bondage was not doctrinal, although this patient was also very religious; it was with regard to the patient's physician. This was a young woman of nineteen who had been an invalid for five years and had been given up as hopeless by several physicians, the disease being known rather vaguely as "spinal complaint." Despite the fact that these physicians had tried to find a cure, and had inflicted painfully exacting methods of bodily treatment, including cauterizing over the supposed vital spot in the spine, the patient still believed in the old-school practice and was devotedly attached to the family physician. In fact she was taken to Quimby amidst protestations that he was an "old humbug." Still loyal to her doctor, sustaining her loyalty by belief in his medicines and methods, her attitude was partly sustained by her religious faith. Moreover the mode of life to which she had been subject since her health broke down when she was a schoolgirl of fourteen had tended to reinforce her allegiance to everything pertaining to old-time methods. Her emotional life was greatly repressed. She had been deprived of all opportunities for physical exercise and social contacts. During the major part of the time she had been confined to her room, if not to her bed, hampered in every respect by physical weaknesses; still more by nervous disability and mental disturbances. Hence the force of Quimby's remark when he said "I am going to make you mad with your doctor today." Proceeding to carry out what he said during the
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1 Horatio W. Dresser, "Quimby's Technique," p. 25.
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silent part of the treatment, the treatment had the effect of transferring her allegiance so that she reacted as forcefully against her doctors as the young man above mentioned against his Calvinism. The major servitude to old-time patterns once broken, the secondary bondages were broken more readily. In all this it is not a question of "influence" as if to compel a person to change allegiances. The patient must "get the picture," in line with what the therapeutist is accomplishing spiritually, so that the whole chain of adverse relationships shall fall. This done, re-education can begin. Quimby's work for these two people was as great as anything that can be accomplished for the human soul.
Was Quimby's technique always as efficacious? No, because some people resisted almost from the start. Some were healed in part, as in the case of a patient [Mary Baker Eddy?] who became an enthusiastic follower for a time only, and then branched out for herself, the deeper issues of her life being left unresolved. Now and then a patient was unwilling to face vital issues, but still clung to self-love, to pride, or whatever may have been the chief deterrent, such as an attempt at serving two masters. The patient who followed part way usually demurred when it became a question of the ruling love. If however a patient was willing to make any needed change, while also interiorly receptive, Quimby could apply his technique to the full.1
There is scarcely any doubt that Dresser was writing of his parents, probably about seventy years after
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1 Ibid., pp. 26-27.
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their healings, but at a time when his mother still was available to check the information, if Dresser thought that necessary.
Her own remarks are of equal interest as Dresser history and as information about Quimby:
It was some time in 1860 that I first heard of Dr. Quimby. He was then practising his method of curing the sick in Portland, where he had been located about a year. My home was a few miles from that city, and we often heard of the wonderful work he was doing.1
Mrs. Dresser continued after telling of her own case.
The most vivid remembrance I have of Dr. Quimby is his appearance as he came out of his private office ready for the next patient. That indescribable sense of conviction, of clearsightedness, of energetic action,--that something that made one feel that it would be useless to attempt to cover up or hide anything from him,-made an impression never to be forgotten. Even now in recalling it; after thirty-three years, I can feel the thrill of new life which came with his presence and his look. There was something about him that gave one a sense of perfect confidence and ease in his presence,--a feeling that immediately banished all doubts and prejudices, and put one in sympathy with that quiet strength or power by which he wrought his cures.
We took our turns in order, as we happened to come to the office; and, consequently, the reception room was usually full of people waiting their turn. People were coming to Dr. Quimby from
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1 A. G. Dresser, op. cit., p. 43.
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all parts of New England, usually those who had been given up by the best practitioners, and who had been persuaded to try this new mode of treatment as a last resort. Many of these came on crutches or were assisted into the office by some friend; and it was most interesting to note their progress day by day, or the remarkable-change produced by a single sitting with the doctor. I remember one lady who used crutches for twenty years, who walked without them after a few weeks.
Among those in waiting were usually several friends or pupils of Dr. Quimby, who often met in his rooms to talk over the truths he was teaching them. It was a rare privilege for those who were waiting their turn for treatment to listen to those discussions between the strangers and these disciples of his, also to get a sentence now and then from the doctor himself, who would often express some thought that would set us to thinking deeply or talking earnestly.
In this way Dr. Quimby did considerable teaching; and this was his only opportunity to make his ideas known. He did not teach his philosophy in a systematic way in classes or lectures. His personal explanations to each patient, and his readiness to explain his ideas to all who were interested, brought him in close sympathy with all who went to him for help. But further than that he had no time for teaching, as he was always overrun with patients, although it was his intention to revise his writings and publish them.1
Perhaps overlooking Evans or considering his early work in healing only experimental, she says of Quimby that
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1 Ibid., pp. 47-49.
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if any one evinced any particular interest in his theory, he would lend his manuscripts and allow his early writings to be copied. Those interested would in turn write articles about his "theory" or the Truth," as he called it, and bring them to him for his criticism. But no one thought of making any use of these articles while he lived, nor even to try his mode of treatment in a public way; for all looked up to him as the master whose works so far surpassed anything they could do that they dared not try.
Among the more devoted followers were the daughters of Judge Ware . . . and Mr. Julius A. Dresser, also of Portland, who spent much of his time for several years in the endeavor to spread Dr. Quimby's ideas.
It was also at this time, 1862, that Mrs. Eddy, author of "Science and Health," was associated with Dr. Quimby; and I well remember the very day when she was helped up the steps to his office on the occasion of her first visit. She was cured by him, and afterwards became very much interested in his theory. But she put her own construction on much of his teaching, and developed a system of thought which differed radically from it.
This does not seem strange when one considers how much there was to learn from a man as original as Dr. Quimby, and one who had so long investigated the human mind. Unless one had passed through a similar experience, and penetrated to the very centre of things as he had, one could not appreciate his explanations sufficiently to carry out his particular line of thought. Hence none of the systems that have sprung up since Dr. Quimby's death, although
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originating in his researches and practice, have justly represented his philosophy....1
Information concerning Mrs. Eddy introduces a fact of interest concerning J. A. Dresser; at some time he was at a water cure establishment, whether as a patient it is not clear. A quotation from his journal entry apparently of October 17, 1862, says:
The most peculiar person I have seen of late is Mrs. Patterson, the authoress, who came last Friday, a week ago today, from Vail's Water Cure in Hill, N. H., where Melville, Fanny Bass, and I were, and is now under Dr. Quimby, and boarding also at Mrs. Hunter's. She was only able to get here, and no one else thought she could live to travel so far, but today she, with Mrs. Hunter and sister, Nettie [a footnote explains: Annetta Seabury, later Mrs. Julius Dresser] and I went up into the dome of the "New City Building" up seven flights of stairs, or 182 steps. So much for Dr. Quimby's doings.2
This quotation is of considerable worth here for its showing that J. A. Dresser and his future wife apparently were well by that time. It also suggests that he did not know the future Mrs. Eddy before she went to Quimby. One might get a contrary impression from the following:
When Mary reached Doctor Vail's Sanatorium [during the summer of 1862], she found that Doctor Quimby of Portland and his work were one of the
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1 Ibid., pp. 49-51.
2 Ernest Sutherland Bates and John V. Dittemore, Mary Baker Eddy [:] The Truth and the Tradition (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1932), p. 88.
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main topics of conversation. The whole Sanatorium seemed to be in a state of vague unrest and expectancy. Several of the patients had actually been to Portland and seen Quimby. One Julius Dresser--afterwards to figure so prominently in Mary Patterson's life and story--returned to the Sanatorium from such a visit shortly after Mary got there. He was much improved in health and quite enthusiastic about Quimby's work and methods.
Mary [who previously had tried to get Quimby's help] was more than ever satisfied that she must get to Portland at all costs.1
Perhaps she heard of J. A. Dresser, but did not meet him then. Whatever the facts about these matters may be, they do not seem to be of great consequence.
It is said that when she reached Portland, she "was received by Julius A. Dresser and introduced to Dr. Quimby."2
While most details of Mrs. Eddy's story cannot be dealt with here, the reactions of people to her when she visited Quimby may be of some importance in relation to the later relations between her and J. A. Dresser. It is reported that Quimby told another patient that she was "not so quick to perceive the Truth as Mrs. Patterson,"3
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1 Hugh A. Studdert-Kennedy, Mrs. Eddy [:] Her Life, Her Work and Her Place in History (San Francisco: The Farallon Press, 1947), pp. 110-11; see also pp. 132 and 305 for assertions that it was J. A. Dresser's reports that were instrumental in causing her to call on Quimby.
2 Milmine, op. cit., p. 56.
3 Bates and Dittemore, op. cit., p. 95. Milmine, op. cit., p. 62; installment 2, XXVIII (February, 1907), 349.
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and that "Quimby at first took a decided liking to her. 'She's a devilish bright woman,' he frequently said."1 It is reported that some around Quimby were
doubtful, not of Mrs. Patterson's intelligence, but of her character. Annetta Seabury suspected her of being too ambitious, George Quimby warned his father that she would steal his ideas, and Quimby himself admitted that she lacked "identity" or integrity. [A footnote adds: On the authority of Horatio Dresser, who received this information from his parents and from Mrs. McKay, formerly Sarah Ware.] It is significant that she never was asked to join George Quimby and the Misses Ware in copying Quimby's manuscripts and never saw any of them save two [mentioned above] ...2
Just how long J. A. Dresser continued to devote much of his time to explaining Quimby's views to new patients seems not to be known. Nor does it seem to be known whether he ever spent his full time at it. It seems unlikely that Quimby could have afforded to hire him for the purpose. The Dressers were married in September, 1863, and after that J. A. Dresser "took up newspaper work in Portland."3
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1 Milmine, op. cit., pp. 57-58; McClure's Magazine installment 2, XXVIII (February, 1907), 347-48.
2 Bates and Dittemore, op. cit., p. 95. That Quimby believed that she had "no identity in truth" was the way that Dresser once put it in a letter. See Appendix E, his letter to El. Compare Quimby on identity in Appendix A.
3 Milmine, op. cit., p. 79 n, installment 2, p. 509 n.
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On January 16, 1866, Quimby died. On February 1, 1866, Mrs. Eddy had the historic fall on the ice, which it is claimed was followed on the third day by the revelation1 on which Christian Science is supposed to be founded. On February 14, or 15, 1866, she wrote to J. A. Dresser appealing for help, and urging him to step into the place left by Quimby, as she considered him the one best qualified.2 However, he
was now engaged in newspaper work in Portland and was at the moment in no mood to take up the task of becoming Quimby's successor. Knowing Mrs. Patterson well, he was not particularly alarmed over her condition. From the tone of his reply it is evident that he assumed that she had exaggerated the seriousness of her plight.
"I am sorry to hear of your misfortune, and hope that with courage and patience neither the prediction of the doctor nor your own fears will prove true, and I think they won't. That is my prediction. . . . You say you have not, in your troubles, placed your intelligence in matter, and yet you are slowly failing. If you believe you are
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1 Sibyl Wilbur, The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Boston: The Christian Science Publishing society, 1923, originally 1907), p. 130.
2 Both dates are given. See The Quimby Manuscripts 1st ed., p. 163; Bates and Dittemore, op. cit., p. 109; Studdert-Kennedy, op. cit., p. 132; Fleta Campbell Springer. According to the Flesh [:] A Biography of Mary Baker Eddy (New York: Coward-McCann, Inc., 1930), p. 133; Milmine, op. cit., pp. 69-70, correcting the February 1 date given in installment 2, p. 354; and Edwin Franden Dakin, Mrs. Eddy: The Biography of a Virginal Mind (New York: Charles Scribner & Sons 1930), p. 60.
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failing, then your intelligence is placed in matter. But if you can really place your intelligence outside of matter then do so, and let the Devil take the hindmost or what he can get. Be assured he can't get you, nor any part of you. Keep your intelligence, which is yourself, out of your matter, and the Devil or death won't get you, for he is in matter, and that's what's the matter."
With regard to the vacant throne of Quimby, the following words of Dresser must have been pondered long and seriously by Mrs. Patterson, for she later turned them to good account.
"As to turning doctor myself, and undertaking to fill Dr. Quimby's place and carry on his work, it is not to be thought of for a minute. Can an infant do a strong man's work?" To be sure he did a great work, but what will avail in fifty years from now, if his theory does not come out, and if he and his ideas pass among the things that were, to be forgotten? He did work some change in the minds of the people, which will grow with the development and progress in the world. He helped to make them progress. They will progress faster for his having lived and done his work. So with Jesus. He had an effect that was lasting and still exists. He did not succeed nor has Dr. Quimby succeeded in establishing the science he aimed to do. The true way to establish it is, as I look at it, to lecture and by a paper and make that the means, rather more than the curing, to introduce the truth. To be sure faith without works is dead, but Dr. Quimby's work killed him, whereas if he had spared himself from his curing, and given himself partly and as considerately, to getting out his theory, he would then have, at least, come nearer
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success in this great aim than he did." [Footnote: Julius Dresser to Mrs. Patterson, March 2, 1866.]1
Possibly his turning to newspaper work was related to his idea of publishing Quimby's ideas. He may have sought publishing experience and perhaps even a plant. In 1866 he "moved to Webster, Mass., where he edited and published the Webster Times."2
The death of Quimby was a great shock to Mr. and Mrs. Dresser. It was generally expected by Quimby's followers that Mr. Dresser would take up the work as Quimby's successor. Mrs. Dresser hesitated to attempt it publicly, knowing her own and her husband's sensitiveness, and after consideration they decided not to undertake it at that time. "This," says Mr. Horatio W. Dresser, "was a fundamentally decisive action, and much stress should be placed upon it. For Mrs. Eddy naturally looked to father as the probable successor, and when she learned from father that he had no thought of taking up the public work, the field became free for her. I am convinced that she had no desire previous to that time to make any claims for herself. Her letters give evidence of this."
Mr. Dresser's health again weakened from overwork, and after living in the West for a time he returned to Massachusetts and began his public
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1 Bates and Dittemore, op.cit., pp. 109-10, ellipsis there.
2 Milmine, op.cit., p. 79n., installment 3, March, 1907, p. 509.
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work as mental teacher and healer. In Boston Mr. Dresser found that Mrs. Eddy's pupils and rejected pupils were practising with the sick, and he believed that their work was inferior to Quimby's. This gave him confidence to begin. In 1882 Mr. and Mrs. Dresser began to practice in Boston, and in 1883 they were holding class lectures, teaching from the Quimby manuscripts and practising the Quimby method.
From this the facts with regard to Mrs. Eddy and Mr. Quimby spread, and this was this beginning of the Quimby controversy.1
It may be that the Dressers began their public healing before moving to Boston. In a biography of Mrs. Eddy by a Christian Scientist who resigned from tho church, but wrote "a reverent, eminently appreciative work [that, however,] failed to win official approval,"2 it is reported:
Shortly after Quimby's death, Dresser, who had married, went west, and for some years he and his wife practised a form of mental healing out there. By 1881-1882, word of the new system being taught in Boston reached him, and when he found that the Mrs. Eddy who was identified with the movement was the Mary Patterson he had known in Portland, he determined to make his way east again and see what was going forward.
His first impression, before he set out, was possibly that Mrs. Eddy was making a success of
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1 Ibid.
2 Charles S. Braden, Christian Science Today: Power, Policy, Practice (Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press, 1958), p. 12.
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"Quimbyism," and, remembering her regard for himself and the appeal she had made to him for help, he may have thought that he might as well have his share in any success that was being achieved.
He did not approach Mrs. Eddy directly after his arrival in Boston. He decided to have all the facts before he made any move, and these facts when he discovered them were not at all to his liking. As the result of judicious enquiry and sundry visits to Hawthorne Hall, all he could see in Mrs. Eddy's teaching was something very like an "apostasy" from Quimby. As George Quimby was to write several years later, "the teaching was all too evidently her own," but it ought to be the teaching of Quimby.
The possibility that what Mrs. Eddy was teaching was something she herself had evolved never occurred to him apparently. Mrs. Eddy, the Mary Patterson who for four years had been associated with Quimby and himself, ought to be teaching Quimbyism and that was all there was about it as far as Julius Dresser was concerned. If she was not teaching Quimbyism, then she must be teaching something fraudulent and in any event was clearly guilty, in some inexplicable way, plagiarism.1
Without entering into the details of the controversy, it can be said that it was maintained that although Mrs. Eddy had various thoughts of her own, the basic insights and even terminology came from Quimby. Supporters of Quimby could disown Christian Science because of its Eddy elements and at the same time attribute to Quimby its "grain of wisdom ... mixed with
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1 Studdert-Kennedy, op. cit., pp. 305-306.
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a great quantity of chaff,"1 as it was put in the opening letter of the controversy, published in the Boston Post on February 8, 1883, giving some of J. A. Dresser's information. Had Mrs. Eddy granted what Quimby's supporters claimed for him and proceeded to assert the superiority of the features of her thought that differed from Quimby's substantially, the present situation promptly could have been reached: the recognition of Christian Science as one interpretation of what it means for existence be spiritual. Presumably it would have been with Mrs. Eddy as it was with Evans, who worked out a system that Dresser believed finally differed considerably from Quimby's but brought about no personal disputes. There would have been philosophical competition but not the resentment that followers of Quimby understandably felt over misrepresentations of his views, which were offered apparently to make Christian Science seem wholly different from the thought of Quimby.
In addition to writing to newspapers, and producing The True History of Mental Science in 1887, J. A. Dresser did some writing for healing periodicals that came to be established, and with his wife remained in practice in Boston. In the teaching that they did they were joined by Horatio W. Dresser. His life, in connection with which some additional details of the life of his father will be seen, is to be considered next.
The day before Quimby died, Horatio Willis Dresser was born. This was at seven o'clock in the
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1 Bates and Dittemore, op. cit., p. 233.
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morning on January 15, 1866, in Yarmouth, Maine. He was the first child of Julius and Annetta Dresser. He was followed by Ralph Howard (1872-1873), Jean Paul (1877-1935), who found his career in the New Church [Swedenborgian] ministry, and Philip Seabury (1885-1960), who took the name David Seabury, dropping Dresser, and was best known as a writer of books and articles in a New Thought vein.
Dresser lived in various places as a boy, for his father edited newspapers in Dansville, New York; Denver, Colorado; and Oakland, California.1
Financial necessities compelled him to leave school at the age of thirteen and to learn a trade, and having chosen telegraphy, he at the age of sixteen, took charge of a railroad station at Pinole, Cal., on the Central Pacific. Removing to Boston, Mass., in 1882, he became a reporter, and later business manager of the "New England Farmer," meanwhile giving as much time as possible to general reading. He fitted himself for Harvard, though he had never attended a high school, and matriculated there in 1891; but owing to the death of his father he left college during his junior year, and took up the work of writing and lecturing. He has been a serious student of Emerson since the age of seventeen, and intensely fond of philosophy.2 [He took part in the founding of a New Thought organization called the Metaphysical Club of
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1 National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, XI (1901), 110.
2 This is dealt with below.
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Boston in 1895,1 an organization not to be confused with the informal, more academic "Metaphysical Club" of some years before then. ]2 In October, 1896, he founded the "Journal of Practical Metaphysics," and this periodical he edited until 1898, when it was consolidated with "The Arena," of which Mr. Dresser was for a time associate editor. In December, 1899, he founded "The Higher Law," a periodical of advanced ideals.3
This publication ceased in 1902, at which time he was conducting a correspondence course in "practical spiritual philosophy"4 and, with Warren A. Rodman, an Institute of Metaphysics.5
From 1896 to 1898 he was the proprietor of the Philosophical Publishing Company.6
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1 Dresser, A History of the New Thought Movement, pp. 181-82.
2 Schneider, op. cit., pp. 519-20.
3 National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, XI (1901), 110.
4 Advertisement in The Higher Law, V (August-September, 1902), 228, if the pages of advertisements were numbered.
5 Advertisement in The Higher Law, V (February, 1902), iii-iv, if numbered.
6 Dresser entry in The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, the pages of which are not numbered.
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On March 17, 1898, he married Alice Mae (originally Mattice) Reed (March 7, 1870-August 19, 1961), whom he met the previous summer at a Greenacre New Thought session, at which her brother, Frederick Reed, was a manager and Dresser a lecturer.1 She had received her A.B. degree from Wellesley College in 1893, and was a teacher of Latin and history in Natick, Massachusetts, High School.
Some details of his life are best left for mention in consideration with his thought, as distinguished from this account primarily of the "external" side of his life. Here it is enough to say that in Harvard he received his Ph.D. degree in philosophy in 1907, and served as an assistant in philosophy from 1903 to 1911.
As he went on in his academic work, he became less closely identified with New Thought. A 1902 article says that "he has recently resigned from all organizations, desiring to be identified only with his own interpretation of Christ's teaching."2
The reports of the Harvard College Class of 1895 provide valuable information given by Dresser. In the 1902 (second) Report he says, "My residence since leaving college has been Boston, and my occupation, author, lecturer and editor." (p. 129) After listing his publications and marriage he mentions that he "travelled in Holland, Switzerland and England in summers of 1898 and 1899." (p. 130)
The 1905 Report, which contains a warning that the sketches of the men may not be exact quotations, finds
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1 Dresser, A History of the New Thought Movement, pp. 177-78 and conversation with Mrs. Dresser, August 30, 1960.
2 Paul Tyner, "The Metaphysical Movement," The American Monthly Review of Reviews, XXV (March, 1902), 314.
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Dresser reporting more writing, the birth of his daughter Dorothea, now Mrs. Charles H. Reeves, on December 18, 1901 [still living in 1992], and:
In 1902 I returned to Cambridge to complete my philosophical training, and have now nearly finished the requirements for a Ph.D. in philosophy at Harvard. Since September, 1903, I have been assistant in philosophy at Harvard and Radcliffe, and in 1904 I was Professor Royce's assistant in the Summer School. With the publication of "Man and the Divine Order" my work as a popular writer and lecturer was completed, and I am now fitting for a professorship in the history of philosophy and ethics. (p. 47)
The publication of that book in 1903 did not close that phase of his career. In the fourth Report, in 1910, Dresser adds word of the birth of his son, Malcolm, on October 14, 1905 [died August 15, 1985], and the completion of his academic degrees. In part he says:
My time has been devoted to teaching, lecturing, and writing, and there is little of importance to tell apart from this work in the philosophical field. I have undertaken to establish vital connections between philosophy and practice by giving a part of my time to technical studies, and all the rest to individual and practical needs. Accordingly, I have held a position as assistant in philosophy ... and published books from year to year on the topics that have grown out of my private teaching outside of the university. "The Philosophy of the Spirit," published in 1908, is the book into which I have put most time and thought. Appended to this volume is my doctor's thesis on Hegel's Logic.... I have lectured before various societies round about, and served a short term as professor of applied psy-
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chology in the Massachusetts College of Osteopathy. I am a member of the Old South Club, of Boston, and president of the Harvard Philosophical Club. (p. 61)
By the time of the fifth Report in 1915, he was living at 139 Mason Terrace, Brookline, Massachusetts, but the move was not directly from Cambridge. He mentions lecturing in "Hartford, New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, London, and other cities," and after referring to assisting Professor Palmer in the history of philosophy and ethics, continues:
In 1911 I went to Philadelphia for a few months, and taught philosophy for a term in Ursinus College, Collegeville, Pa. In 1912 I was appointed professor of philosophy at this college, but resigned in 1913 to return to Massachusetts and resume literary work. In 1911 I established a permanent summer home in Gray, Maine. (p. 80)
At Ursinus he was so well liked that the yearbook, The Ruby, prepared by the junior class, was dedicated to him. Written on a part of that volume in the possession of his family is:
In appreciation of kindly advice and inspiration in the higher things of life, this book is lovingly inscribed to our teacher, Dr. Horatio Willis Dresser, by the Class of 1914, Ursinus College.
In concluding a biographical sketch printed in the book, it is said:
Since coming to Ursinus, Dr. Dresser has gained the respect and esteem of the entire student body. His department is one of the best in the college. Not only is he esteemed as a teacher, but
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his courteous treatment to all, and his wise counsel have won for him a place in the hearts of the students which could not be easily filled by another.1
The briefer account of him in the preceding year's yearbook includes the information that
In 1912, he was elected Professor of Philosophy and Education in Ursinus College, where by reason of putting his personality into his subjects and giving them vital interpretation, he is at this early date meeting with success.
John W. Clawson, in a letter of December 9, 1961, says, "I believe that Dr. Dresser was teaching Education in addition to Philosophy." The Ruby of 1913 refers to him as "Professor of Philosophy." It also says that he received his A.B. degree "with honorable mention three times in philosophy, Magna Cum Laude."
ii. Recollections of People Who Knew Dresser.
Dr. Clawson, professor of mathematics and later dean of the college, indicated that the 1912 date of Dresser's election is incorrect, the faculty being that of 1911-1912. He also says:
I remember him quite well. But he was only with us for two years, 1911 to 1913, and I was not intimate with him. I remember being impressed by his wide interests and information about many things as exhibited in the meetings of a Faculty Men's Club which met from time to time during the academic year.
ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ
1 The Ruby, 1913, p. 9.
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He adds that he has "no information as to the reason for his leaving Ursinus."
Some who studied under Dresser at Ursinus have been located. Without exception, they expressed high opinions of him. In the words of Robert L. Matz, "Dr. Dresser was loved by all of us."
Rev. E. Bruce Jacobs recalls, in a letter of January 5, 1962:
I can see him slowly wandering towards his class room, early for class, then seating himself on a log or tree stump, for a period of meditation. This act reveals part of his philosophy of life. He would do it repeatedly.
In his class room, I remember most distinctly his fine English diction. One word which I will always remember as being associated with him was, or is, "awareness." He spoke of awareness with an earnestness and emphasis, quite distinctive.
He also tells of a time two years after his graduation:
I spent a summer in a small town in Ohio, and became quite well acquainted with an eighty year old Quaker citizen of that town. This eighty year old citizen was the leader of a remnant of Quakers in that community, and when he learned that I had been a pupil of Dresser's, I became highly exalted in his opinion.
Apparently Dresser did not make a practice of referring to his books, for until then, "I did not realize the eminence of Dr. Dresser as a lecturer and writer."
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In reply to more questioning, Mr. Jacobs wrote on January 27, 1962,
As I suggested previously, I knew nothing of his religious connections. To me he was a teacher of philosophy, and just what courses he taught I do not know. I know he taught no courses in religion. I have no recollection that he ever referred to Phineas Quimby, Swedenborg, New Thought or Christian Science.
Chester Robbins wrote on December 18, 1961:
I recall Dr. Dresser with great appreciation. I have no recollection, however, that he ever mentioned Swedenborg or New Thought. It seems to me that he was careful not to attempt in any way to indoctrinate his students with his own beliefs. Rather it was his constant endeavor to stimulate his students to think for themselves and encourage them to have the confidence and courage to express their own beliefs.
I remember Dr. Dresser for what he stood for and his approach to teaching rather than for anything he taught. He was one of the most stimulating teachers in whose classes I ever sat. We students had been accustomed to mastering subject matter in text books and reproducing the material in examinations in order to satisfy our instructors. Dr. Dresser insisted on original thinking by the student rather than on reproduction of the views of a text book writer. Perhaps a personal anecdote will illustrate: One of the college "grinds" who had a passion for high marks, dutifully mastered his textbook in preparation for an examination. On the other hand, I read widely and made no attempt to master the text. In response to Dr. Dresser's questions, I gave my own thoughts as a result of my reading. When the marks were given, I received an
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"A" and my classmate a "C." He was outraged and thought it unjust that he received a lower mark than I when he had followed and I had ignored the conventional way of preparing for an examination. He protested to Dr. Dresser who told him very quietly that he was interested in the student's thinking and not in the memorized views of a textbook writer.
Dr. Dresser believed in freedom of thought and the right to express it. While he was in no way an agitator, it was hearsay about the campus that he never hesitated to express his views forthrightly in faculty meetings regardless of the views of his colleagues and the college administration.
Writing under the date January 6, 1962, Walter R. Douthett, says:
I recall that in the year Dr. Dresser was at Ursinus I had one course with him. Not only was he a great and popular teacher but a friend of students on the campus. My outstanding recollection of him was his defense of [a fellow student].
In English Bible Class he was assigned the paper topic "Did Jesus Rise." After very thorough research he arrived at the conclusion that such a person never lived. For this the bible teacher and most of the faculty wanted to expel him. Dr. Dresser came to his defense and saved him.
The fellow student has confirmed the essentials of this incident, with the addition that he was not expressing his own views, but was doing an assigned term paper in relation to an author whose name he does not recall, on "Did Jesus Rise from a Lawyer's Point of View."
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Something omitted from Dresser's account in the Class of 1895 Report may help to explain why he left Ursinus. The records of the New Church Theological School in Cambridge [now in Newton], Massachusetts, indicate that he was both a student and instructor in church history there 1913-1914. It is not clear whether he ever intended to devote his life to the New Church ministry, but he did not do a great deal of preaching
In the sixth Class of 1895 Report, in 1920, he observes that since leaving college he had
taken no part in political or commercial life, or have engaged in any kind of activity on a large scale such as we single out for special mention when it is a question of success. My time has been devoted for the most part to the life of thought, in preparation for the twenty-five volumes I have written during this period. My interests have centered mainly about the inner life, on the problems of self-knowledge and self-control and human efficiency in general. My contacts have been chiefly with people in quest of light in these days of restless inquiry and uncertainty, of dissatisfaction with the teachings of conventional institutions.
I did not give up teaching in college in 1913 because I disliked it, or because of any reaction against philosophy as I was able to expound it, but because it seemed to me that there were men enough who could teach philosophy in the usual way, and my part was to do what others were not doing. Nor am I reactionary so far as the organized church as a whole is concerned: It came my way to associate rather with people who were
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exploring and thinking for themselves, and for whom I seemed to have a message.
At this point he could have added that in the April, 1915, through August, 1917, issues of Home Progress magazine, he edited a "Home History Circle" feature.
The only radical departure from this plan of life came when I enlisted with the Y.M.C.A. for service overseas during the last year of the War. I was fortunate enough to be transferred to a position under the auspices of the Fourth French Army, as director of a Foyer du Soldat, where I had uncommon opportunity to know officers and men, and to realize my main interest in connection with the War, that is, in its human side, its effect upon the men and upon their faith. I came back with increased faith in the principles of thought and life I have acquired in the course of the years. It seemed to me eminently worth while to have this privilege of serving among men who were doing their part so splendidly to win the War, and I would enlist earlier if I were to live over the last three years again. [The editor adds: Dresser received a bronze medal from the Foyer du Soldat, in recognition of his services with the French Army.]
I should find it rather difficult in looking over the twenty-five years to say what ought to have been different, what I would change another time. For life seems to exercise a kind of selection over us all, and our part is to do as well as we may under the destiny assigned to us. I have grown rather naturally into a kind of spiritual empiricism as the best working philosophy of life. It does not seem to matter especially whether one is conversing with people here at home who are troubled, or a French officer in the moonlight amid the dangers
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of air-raids and other ominous events. Everywhere the great interest is life. after all, and one's part is to help people where they are, into a better understanding, a more affirmative faith.
And so my twenty-five years have been divided between more or less interrupted college work and teaching, in conversations with individuals and lectures to small audiences, and the writing of books growing out of these lines of interest and work. The world has used me as well as I deserve meanwhile. I have no complaints to utter. What I would like most to see is the world working as steadily and unitedly for ends worth pursuing in times of peace as I found the Allies and the
"civiles" working in France during the War. That was the greatest event of the twenty-five years-that human contact with united peoples working together as brothers for a noble end.
Aside from these personal matters, I have to report concerning my family life only that which is most pleasant to hear, since the family group remains unbroken. I have had the pleasure of seeing my wife engaged in public service in war time [she did graduate work in dietetics and institutional management in Teachers College, Columbia, University, was associated with the United States Department of Agriculture Home Economics Extension Service, and in the First World War organized and directed the Food Economy Kitchen in Boston's North End] and my children developing in school and daily life. My home has been in or near Boston all this time, save in 1911-13, when I was teaching in Pennsylvania. We have a summer home in Gray, Maine, on the shore of the little [Sebago] lake; and if I have any hobby it is in cutting trees and other rural work during the three months of "the simple life," when we turn to as a family and cultivate soil. (pp. 114-116)
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Of considerable interest in connection with considering his relationship with New Thought is the listing of "clubs and societies": "International New Thought Alliance (Honorary Pres. and Field Sec.)." Perhaps this is to be explained by his having written A History of the New Thought Movement, which was published in 1919.
By the time of the seventh Report, of 1925, he had moved to South Hadley, Massachusetts, as his wife headed a dormitory at Mount Holyoke College from 1923 until 1945. The editor says that Dresser has retired from lecturing since the last Report, and Dresser adds:
I live such a quiet life that ordinarily nothing happens of interest outside of a small group of friends. About four years ago I began work on a series of textbooks for the Crowell Company, in connection with their social science series. The first of these came out in 1924, "Psychology in Theory and Application," a book which undertakes to coordinate all branches of psychology. The second one, "Ethics in Theory and Application," is now being put into type.
Meanwhile I am taking the place of a professor of philosophy in Mount Holyoke College. My daughter, Dorothea, graduated from Radcliffe last June, and my son, Malcolm, is a freshman in Massachusetts Agricultural College.
I wish there were something else to say. It is absorbing work, writing and reading to keep up to date on philosophical subjects, but I have done nothing worth recording since our Twenty-fifth. (p. 75)
The eighth Report, of 1930, finds him saying:
All my time is absorbed in literary work. Nothing else of any importance has happened to me.
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My son was graduated from Massachusetts Agricultural College in 1928 and received his Master's degree from Columbia in 1929. My daughter has presented the family with a fine boy, who is now two and one-half years old. (p. 29)
In the ninth Report, 1935, he refers to his textbook writing and continues:
For four years I have been connected with churches in Brooklyn, [New York,] doing part-time work there in personal problems of all sorts, chiefly by the aid of applied psychology. I use the term "Consultant in Personal Research" to distinguish this work from psychiatry and psychoanalysis. Last year I published a book about this work, "Knowing and Helping People," issued by The Beacon Press, Boston. Meanwhile, I have made my home in South Hadley, Mass., and during the summer I still go to Gray, Maine. (p. 31)
The birth of a granddaughter also was noted.
The fiftieth anniversary, tenth, Report in 1945 republishes some of the earlier material and adds:
Strange to say, some of us may have nothing momentous to report even in war-time. That is my case exactly. Since neither my son nor my son-in-law has been called into service, not my wife and not my daughter, everything has continued as usual. So have I, in my work as consulting psychologist in the clinic in Brooklyn. I have written no more books because when paper is short and printing is costly, I could not produce a book that would appeal to a publisher as a first-rate seller. Sometimes, however,
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business as usual is good news. For if we keep the even tenor of our way we can be of some small service at least to those who find the sledding difficult. Still agreeing with my great teacher, William James [who was like a father to him, Mrs. Dresser said] that there will always be war as long as there are warring passions in the human breast, I find it possible to put people on the right track when increased self-knowledge may lead to better self-control, thus to a victory over inward conflicts. The advance from inwardness to overt social expression may seem slow indeed when one thus advises individuals only, leaving each to make a better adjustment to his group. But that at least is my province until after the duration, "continuance in well doing" being an excellent motto for those whose pathways lie in fairly pleasant places, such as my summer home in Gray, Maine, where I still spend three months each year, cutting our season's wood, and beautifying our pine-clad acres. (pp. 152-53)
At some time he went to Europe to study with Jung and Adler, but details of this are lacking.
Dresser continued his work with the Associated Clinic of Religion and Medicine, later known as the Associated Counseling Service, from 1931 to 1953. This marked the continuance of an old friendship, for the minister of the First Unitarian Church, associated with the clinic, was John Howland Lathrop; they met as Harvard students. It was he who suggested Dresser as the spiritual advisor to succeed Elwood Worcester, who was much better known for his pioneering work in the
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Emmanuel Movement. Both of these undertakings were cooperative endeavors of clergymen and physicians.1 About a year after he retired from this work, Dresser suffered a heart attack, and died in the Osteopathic Hospital i