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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…
## One of the Witnesses.

This was a boy of about fourteen years of age, named Patrick Hill—a bright, intelligent little fellow, who told his tale clearly and simply. I shall put Hill's statement in the first person, without pledging myself, however, to literal exactness, and premising that the narrative was not continuous, but frequently interrupted by questions needless to repeat here: "I sometimes go out to the bog for turf, and did so on the day of the August Apparition, taking my little brother with me. When night came on, I went into the house of a relative, not far from Knock chapel. It was raining hard and very dark. While there someone (naming him), ran in and said: 'Oh, come up to the chapel, and see the Blessed Virgin against the wall!' We all ran up, and saw the end of the chapel covered with light; at first we stood against the wall of the yard, but presently we got over and went up close to the gable. Then we saw the Blessed Virgin standing like a statue so (lifting his hands and eyes); on her right was St. Joseph, bending towards her, and on her left St. John, dressed like a bishop, his left hand holding a book, his right raised, with two fingers pointing upwards. Above, and to the left of St. John, was an altar with a Lamb on it, round which moved what seemed to be the wings of angels, whose heads and bodies I could not see. We stood and looked at the figures a long time, and my little brother cried out that he wanted to take them home; they did not move, but lights kept playing about the wall. Presently there were ten or eleven of us looking, and we all knelt down and said Our Father, and Hail Mary; then, as the rain kept on, and we were very wet, we went away. I did not look behind me when standing in front of the figures, and cannot say whether any light was to be seen except on the wall." Having told

About this file

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.