Phineas Parkhurst Quimby

Background

Phineas Parkhurst Quimby was born on February 16, 1802 in Lebanon, New Hampshire, United States. He was the son of a blacksmith named Jonathan Quimby and of his wife, Susannah (White) Quimby. When he was two years old his family moved to Belfast, Me. , where he was brought up.

Education

Phineas was put to work at an early age, receiving no more than six weeks of schooling in his whole life.

Career

In 1838 Phineas Parkhurst Quimbly became interested in mesmerism through the lectures and experiments of Charles Poyen, who visited Belfast in the course of his American tour. The exhibitions of another mesmerist, named Collyer, increased this interest. Studying the subject with great energy, Quimby discovered that he himself possessed remarkable mesmeric powers, and he began to give private exhibitions. These were followed by appearances in public which were so successful that he abandoned clock-making and gave all his time to his new art.

In 1843 he made a trip through New England, accompanied by his "subject, " Lucius Burkmar, a very suggestible lad, who exhibited what were considered to be clairvoyant and telepathic faculties. Mesmerists were then frequently called upon to heal the sick, and Quimby found that Burkmar, when in the hypnotic state, could apparently diagnose diseases correctly and prescribe the proper medicines. Mesmerists were then frequently called upon to heal the sick, and Quimby found that Burkmar, when in the hypnotic state, could apparently diagnose diseases correctly and prescribe the proper medicines. Further experiments, however, gradually convinced him that Burkmar's prescriptions had nothing to do with the cures that were usually effected. These, Quimby came to believe, were solely due to the faith of the patients in the healer.

Hence in 1847 he gave up mesmerism, devoting himself thenceforward entirely to mental healing. In this he was very successful.

In 1859 he established himself in Portland, where he conducted a large practice. All disease, he held, was of mental origin, due to erroneous belief in physical causation. Thus he reached an idealistic interpretation of the universe, which placed all reality in God, an impersonal principle of Wisdom acting through the human mind when the latter functions properly. The knowledge of the relation between the divine and the human Quimby called "Science, " or, occasionally, "Christian Science. " He developed an elaborate christology in which, without knowing it, he trod in the footsteps of the early Gnostics, reviving their distinction between the divine Christ and the human, phantasmal Jesus. In his psychological views he foreshadowed later theories of the subconscious, mingled with a belief in various occult powers of the mind.

Beginning to write out his theories merely for the guidance of patients, he was led on to produce a number of manuscripts, which remained unpublished until long after his death.

In 1862 and again in 1864 he had as a patient Mary M. Baker Eddy, who was then Mrs. Daniel Patterson; she held long discussions with him, studied and copied some of his manuscripts, and became temporarily his most enthusiastic follower; there can be no doubt that she derived from him the basic ideas of her own subsequent system of Christian Science, although she gave to them a much stronger subjective bias. Quimby himself, who was generous to a fault, utterly lacking in personal ambition, and wholly concentrated on the work of healing, made no effort to advertise his doctrines or to capitalize them in any way. At last his condition became so serious that he was obliged to give up his practice. He returned to Belfast in the summer of 1865 and devoted his few remaining months to putting his manuscripts into better shape.

After his death, his doctrines were zealously promulgated by two of his patients, Warren Felt Evans and Julius Dresser. From the long-continued efforts of Dresser, especially, came the New Thought movement, which thus unquestionably stems from Quimby.

Achievements

• Phineas Parkhurst Quimby was the founder of "New Thought" movement.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Complete Collected Works of Dr. Phineas Parkhurst Quimby

    ( Dr. Phineas Parkhurst Quimby (1802-1866) was a lifelon...)

  • The Quimby Manuscripts (Forgotten Books)

    (P. P. Quimby has been called the founder of 'New Thought....)

Religion

While Phineas' whole outlook was essentially religious, he distrusted church organizations and looked upon orthodox Christianity as a mass of superstition.

Views

The meaning of happiness for Dr. Phineas Quimby was to alleviate the suffering and heal the illnesses of humanity. He believed what is called death, was just a change from one state of consciousness to a transcending spiritual state.

Personality

Phineas Parkhurst Quimby was a charitable man, never concerning himself with the payment for services rendered to his patients.

Interests

• Phineas amused himself by making daguerreotypes and by inventing a bandsaw similar to those in use today.

Connections

Phineas married Susannah B. Haraden and had four children.

Father:

Jonathan Quimby

Mother:

Susannah (White) Quimby

Spouse:

Susanna Burnham Haraden Quimby

Daughter:

Augusta Susan Quimby Frederick

follower:

Mrs. Daniel Patterson

Son:

William Quimby

Son:

George Albert Quimby

Son:

John Haraden Quimby

colleague:

Lucius Burkmar

References

• Phineas Parkhurst Quimby: Revealer of Spiritual Healing to This Age, His Life and What He Taught (Based on the Quimby Manuscripts and Original Letters in the Library of Congress)
• Phineas Parkhurst Quimby: His Complete Writings and Beyond