The autobiography of Elizabeth Squirrell of Shottisham, and selections from her writings : together with an examination and defence of her statements relative to her sufferings, blindness, deafness, entire abstinence from food and drink during twenty-five weeks, and other extraordinary phenomena: also facts and opinions illustrative and suggestive / by one of her watchers.

  • Squirrell, Elizabeth, 1838-
Date:
1853
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The autobiography of Elizabeth Squirrell of Shottisham, and selections from her writings : together with an examination and defence of her statements relative to her sufferings, blindness, deafness, entire abstinence from food and drink during twenty-five weeks, and other extraordinary phenomena: also facts and opinions illustrative and suggestive / by one of her watchers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    or is acted upon by a superior intelligence, then it cannot be accounted for, but must remain an inexpli- cable mystery. ‘That a circumstance of the kind rarely happens to any one, it does not follow that such events do not occur at all. Its rarity does not impeach its veracity. ‘The fact of its ringing is established beyond all doubt. It cannot be the work of imagination, or a deceptive sound, to upwards of forty persons; to one of whom it has occurred as many as fifty times. ‘It is a fact which cannot be cast overboard, nor must we throw away as useless what we cannot understand. Some assertions have been made to the effect, that having a small harmonica upon the bed, I was in the habit of concealing it beneath the clothes, and striking or touching it when I wanted to make dupes to the glass. This reasoning I think dis- plays a credulity far more absurd than that of those who do not reject the real fact. The feud about the little instrument is soon settled, when it is known that the glass had rung several weeks before the harmonica ever rested on the bed, so that we cannot trace its origin to that. But suppose it to be so, how can it be accounted for, when I had both my hands in those of another person repeatedly, when the sound was heard ? was it not very strange that I should be able to use it for such a purpose ? Common sense says that none but a most practised and experienced conjuror could have availed himself of it. I ask com- mon sense whether I can possibly have attained to that perfection without any previous tuition ? Again, suppose it were an invention of my own, what could be the motive ? Nothing like that would have been