The great financial panic of 1857 was followed by several years of economic depression. By September, 1859, Martha Pilsbury felt that she could no longer hold back from foreclosing the mortgage on the North Groton house where the Pattersons lived. An entry in the diary of Cyrus Blood, a neighbor, on September 20, states laconically, “Dr. Patterson has had an auction today.”⁸⁵ An entry in Mrs. Patterson’s notebook for the same date reads, “On this day my sister sells our homestead.”

Beneath these words she wrote:

Father didst not thou the dark wave treading,
Lift from despair the struggler with the sea?
And seest Thou not the scalding tears I’m shedding,
And knowest Thou not my pain and agony?
.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .
For my sick soul is darkened unto death,
With Stygian shadows from this world of wo;
The strong foundations of my early faith
Shrink from beneath me, whither shall I flee?
Hide me O, rock of ages! hide in thee.⁸⁶

This seemed like the absolute end. All her life a home of her own was a matter of deepest importance to Mrs. Eddy, and one of her greatest hardships was the fact that so much of her existence had to be lived in other people’s houses. In Science and Health she would write, “Home is the dearest spot on earth, and it should be the centre, though not the boundary, of the affections.”⁸⁷

Now this last refuge was to be taken from her. Her most cherished possessions had to go in auction. It is not clear exactly what happened, for she and Patterson managed to stay on in the house for almost six  ● ● ●