ndon, and,
notwithstanding that an exhibition before the nobility failed,
thousands flocked to his house in Lincoln's Inn Fields. In the
"Miscellanies" of St. Evremond a graphic sketch is given of his work.
The results of his healing are there summed up as follows:

"So great was the confidence in him, that the blind
fancied they saw the light which they did not see--the
deaf imagined that they heard--the lame that they
walked straight, and the paralytic that they had
recovered the use of their limbs. An idea of health
made the sick forget for a while their maladies; and
imagination, which was not less active in those merely
drawn by curiosity than in the sick, gave a false view
to the one class, from the desire of seeing, as it
operated a false cure on the other from the strong
desire of being healed. Such was the power of the
Irishman over the mind, and such was the influence of
the mind over the body. Nothing was spoken of in London
but his prodigies; and these prodigies were supported
by such great authorities that the bewildered multitude
believed them almost without examination, while more
enlightened people did not dare to reject them from
their own knowledge."

That there were real cures, however, seems most probable. The Bishop
of Dromore testifies thus from his own observation: "I have seen pains
strangely fly before his hands till he had chased them out of the
body; dimness cleared, and deafness cured by his touch. Twenty persons
at several times, in fits of the falling sickness, were in two or
three minutes brought to themselves.... Running sores of the 'King's
evil' were dried up; grievous sores of many months' date in a few days
healed, cancerous knots dissolved, etc." [74]

The celebrated Flamstead, the astronomer, when a lad of nineteen,
went into Ireland to be touched by Greatrakes, and he testifies that
he was an eyewitness of several cures, although he himself was not
benefited. In a letter to Lord Conway, Greatrakes says: "The King's
doctors, this day (for the confirmation of their majesties' belief),
sent three out of the hospital to me, who came on crutches; but,
blessed be God! they all went home well, to the admiration of all
people, as well as the doctors."[75]

Several pamphlets were issued by medical men and others criticising
his work, and in 1666 he published a vindication of himself entitled
"A Brief Account." This contained numerous testimonials