Ambitious, engaging and beautifully written, this study of late 19th-century American women's psychological and intellectual relationship to progressive social movements and quasi-religious self-improvement cults is a groundbreaking investigation that overturns established paradigms in which women are buffeted by history rather than agents of it. Prof. Beryl Satter maps the evolution of mind cure and its internecine rivalries with great detail; she provides a sophisticated critical reading of the New Thought novels that elucidates female ambivalence with respect to love, desire, service, and selfhood; and she consistently interprets developments within New Thought theology in terms of a rich historical context. B&W photos.