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MacPhilpin 1880, Google Books scan of Harvard copy

Internet Archive · 91 pages · text by OCR

This is an 1880 book, The Apparitions and Miracles at Knock, prepared and edited by John MacPhilpin of Tuam and published in Dublin by M. H. Gill and Son. The Internet Archive holds a Google scan of the Harvard College Library copy. It reprints Tuam News accounts and the official depositions of eye-witnesses to the apparition of 21 August 1879 on the sacristy gable of Knock Church, County Mayo. It argues that natural light could not have caused the apparition and lists cures recorded in Archdeacon Cavanagh's diary.

  • p. 1 …A public domain book is one that was never to copyright or whose legal copyright term…
  • p. 27 …the church, the reflection from them could never beam on the outside at the foot of…
  • p. 32 …The tenants have never been rich. The wealthiest is only so far above want, that one…
  • p. 38 …Either the Apparition was a reality; or, it never took place; and all the fifteen witnesses…
  • p. 39 …point of fact (if he were deceived), never had occurred. And then you must multiply that…
  • p. 40 …the gables of a house, and they never continue longer than a few moments, like a…
  • p. 41 …It is never even, nor at rest. But in the Apparition there was no rippling, or…
  • p. 51 …It was still bright; I had never heard from Miss M'Loughlin about the vision which…
  • p. 53 …a large globe of golden light; I never saw, I thought, so brilliant a light before…
  • p. 56 …sight to be seen at the chapel such as we never before beheld, and she told
  • p. 58 …came there first I thought I would never leave it. I would not have gone so…
  • p. 60 …bright at the south gable, but it never entered my head that it was necessary to…
  • p. 85 …I never walked on the heel, but simply tipping the ground with the top of my…
gable; I saw then and there distinctly the three images—one of the Blessed Virgin Mary, one of St. Joseph, and the third, as I learned, that of St. John the Evangelist. I saw an altar, too, and a Lamb on it, somewhat whiter than the altar; I did not see the cross on the altar. The Blessed Virgin Mary appeared in the attitude of prayer, with her eyes turned up towards heaven, a crown on her head, and an outer garment thrown round her shoulders. I saw her feet. St. Joseph appeared turned towards the Blessed Virgin, with head inclined: I remained looking on for fully fifteen or twenty minutes; then I left, and returned to my own house.

## Seventh Witness.

## The Testimony of Dominick Beirne.

I am brother of Mary Beirne, who has given her evidence already; I live near the chapel of Knock; my age is twenty years. On the occasion when my sister came at about eight o'clock on the evening of the 21st of August into our house, she exclaimed: "Come, Dominick, and see the image of the Blessed Virgin, as she has appeared to us down at the chapel." I said, "What image?" and then she told me, as she has already described it for your reverence in her testimony: she told me all she was after seeing; I then went with her, and by this time some ten or twelve people had been collected around the place, namely, around the ditch or wall fronting the gable, where the vision was being seen, and to the south of the schoolhouse; then I beheld the three likenesses or figures that have been already described—the Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph, St. John, as my sister called the bishop, who was like one preaching, with his hands raised towards the shoulder, and the fore finger and middle finger pointedly set; the other two fingers compressed by the

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Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 91 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.