The Quimby Manuscripts (Paperback)

by Horatio W. Dresser (Author)
Key Phrases: mesmeric period, patients and inquirers, letters from patients, Christian Science, Jesus Christ, George Quimby (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
In this volume, first published in 1921, Horatio Dresser compiles the writings of Phineas Quimby, the founder of the 19th-century "New Age" philosophy of New Thought. Quimby's manuscripts were much sought-after, and it was only through his personal friendship with Quimby and his family that Dresser was able to obtain them. Phineas Quimby developed his own religion based on Christianity and following the example of Jesus. He began with healing the mentally and physically ill and offering the healed the chance to read his manuscripts if they desired. In this book Quimby's rules for healing with the mind are revealed. Those interested in the history New Thought, Christian sects, mesmerism, and the power of the mind over the body will want to study these primary sources. American New Thought author HORATIO WILLIS DRESSER (1866-1954) wrote a number of books about mental health and spirituality including The Perfect Whole (1896) and In Search of a Soul (1897). Later in life, he left the New Thought movement and went to work at Harvard University, where he wrote about philosophy. Because of this abandonment of his earlier work, his writings are often forgotten today.

Product Details

• Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Cosimo Classics (March 15, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1602062145
• ISBN-13: 978-1602062146
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,556,284 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Important book for learning the origins of Christian Science, June 21, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Quimby Manuscripts (Paperback)

This book shows clearly how many of Mary Baker Eddy's ideas concerning Christian Science were actually taken from the work of Phineas Quimby. Quimby was not a very well educated man, but he was an empiricist who devoted decades to studying how healing works. He concluded that disease is essentially an error of mind, and that the two biggest perpetrators of this fraud were the medical profession and religious leaders. Eddy had been a patient of Quimby's, and only began to teach after his death, originally attributing much of her method to him, and then later referring to him only as a mesmerist, something he had abandoned years before.

Apart from setting the record straight on sources, the work in interesting as an alternate viewpoint. Quimby is not as good a writer as Eddy, and is very repetitive in spots, but his slant is somewhat different, and interesting in his own right.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The controversy, December 4, 2005

By	bic - See all my reviews

This review is from: Quimby Manuscripts (Paperback)

PP Quimby was a seminal American mystic and healer who was more or less the father of the New Thought movement, an ecumenical movement in 19th and 20th century Christianity that promoted(s) the idea of an omnipresent and universally accesable deity. The key characteristic of this teaching is that you and I have access to real and practical spirituality at every moment and that we can move closer to healing and well being through the use of our own mind and imagination.

Mary Baker Eddy was one of Quimby's patients and the founder of Christian Science, a Christian denomination that is very centered around spiritual healing.

If you peruse the other reviews of this text you will note a controversy with two sides holding forth. The controversy stems from the following: Quimby put forth religious ideas that were open to all, didn't need a church, and were radically personal and anti-denominational. Mary Baker Eddy created a church after studying with him which embraced an orthodoxy using very similar ideas to those which Quimby used. Quimby's later admirers accused her of appropriating his ideas to create a legalistic, theocratic institution which lost the liberating spirit of what he taught.

This text, for Quimby followers, is evidence of her misuse of his work. They site it as proof that she drew her theology from his teaching and used it to further her own ends. For Eddy followers, "The Quimby Manuscripts" does not function as proof and some even go so far as to say the text is an elaborate literary contrivance created to vindicate the folks who had a bone to pick with her. It is true that the author (Horatio Dresser) was in contention with Eddy and her followers but it is also true that Eddy almost certainly gained much of her insight from Quimby's visionary nature if not from the letter of his words. After all, he was both her Physician and her mentor.

Having written all of this, I will offer my own opinion in three parts:

A) Horatio Dresser knew Quimby's ideas as well as or better than anybody and the ideas are good and truthful. This book is an excellent resource for anybody interested in some of the root concepts behind what has become New Thought metaphysics. I believe that Dresser was a good, sincere and highly intelligent man and that he communicated important ideas to the world.

B) If you are a true student of healing and truth, whatever your particular path, it is worthless and destructive to engage in sectarian bickering. If there is one God that loves everybody, as taught by both Quimby and Mary Baker Eddy, than to quibble over interpretation, theology or authorship is an exercise in time wasting which could be better spent in personal practice of study, prayer, meditation, service or just day to day living.

C) I personally don't care for Churches or religious systems but I have met wonderful people from Christian Science. I say, if it works to make a person better, more power to them. But whether you like to go to a Church of some kind or prefer not to, why waste energy yammering about which system or teacher is "Right?" Isn't that what Jesus (not to mention countless other masters from other belief systems) warned against over and over again?

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Divine Revelation - Exposed, November 29, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Quimby Manuscripts (Paperback)

Now the world can read what Eddy "borrowed" from Quimby years before her so called discovery of Christian Science. By no means a "Divine Revelation". Even Quimby called his system christian science and science of health. A definite read for anyone who believes Eddy "discovered" Christian Science.