Produced by David Edwards, Wolfgang Menges and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) Transcriber's Notes: Italics are marked with underscores, like _this_, oe ligatures have been changed to 'oe'. The original hyphenation was preserved even when inconsistent, obvious typos have been fixed. THE FAITH DOCTOR _A STORY OF NEW YORK_ BY EDWARD EGGLESTON AUTHOR OF THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER, ROXY, ETC. [Illustration: Publisher's emblem] _THIRD EDITION_ NEW YORK D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 1891 COPYRIGHT, 1891, BY EDWARD EGGLESTON. _All rights reserved._ PREFACE. Though there is no life that I know more intimately and none that I have known for so long a period as that of New York, the present story is the first in which I have essayed to depict phases of the complex society of the metropolis. I use the word society in its general, not in its narrow sense, for in no country has the merely "society novel" less reason for being than in ours. The prevailing interest in mind-cure, faith-cure, Christian science, and other sorts of aerial therapeutics has supplied a motive for this story, and it is only proper that I should feel a certain gratitude to the advocates of the new philosophy. But the primary purpose of this novel is artistic, not polemical. The book was not written to depreciate anybody's valued delusions, but to make a study of human nature under certain modern conditions. In one age men cure diseases by potable gold and strengthen their faith by a belief in witches, in another they substitute animal magnetism and adventism. Within the memory of those of us who are not yet old, the religious fervor of millenarianism and the imitation science of curative mesmerism gave way to spirit-rappings and clairvoyant medical treatment. Now spiritism in all its forms is passing into decay, only to leave the field free to mind-doctors and faith-healers. There is nothing for it but to wait for the middle ages to pass; when modern times arrive, there will be more criticism and less credulity, let us hope. The propositions put into the mouth of Miss Bowyer, though they sound like burlesque, are taken almost verbatim from the writings of those who claim to be expounders of Christian science. While Miss Bowyer was drawn more closely from an original than is usual in fictitious writing, I am well aware that there are professors of Christian science much superior to her. There are, indeed, souls who are the victims of their own generous enthusiasm; and it grieves me that, in treating the subject with fidelity and artistic truthfulness, I must give pain to many of the best--to some whose friendship I hold dear.