some time in prayer, and then walked, without any assistance whatsoever, to his relatives and friends who were gathered at the chief entrance of the chapel. He returned home quite recovered and perfectly well, and so remained, up to the 19th of September, 1816.[52] The result of this miraculous intervention was that several of his kinsmen and acquaintances became converts to the religion which he had elected to follow; and these, together with many Roman Catholics who became acquainted with Almighty God’s merciful visitation of him, joined in a solemn act of thanksgiving, by assembling to sing the _Te Deum_ in the chapel of Garswood.[53] Thus, then, we see the prophecy of a Christian priest, who was unjustly and illegally condemned and cruelly murdered, exactly and most strikingly fulfilled; and a wonderful sign bestowed from God to man of Eternal Truth, in the supernatural cure wrought some two centuries and more afterwards upon this Lancashire farm-labourer. Here something may be properly put on record, regarding cases in which visible marks and tokens of the Passion of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ have been supernaturally and miraculously impressed upon God’s saints and servants, in order to set forth before the eyes of man, as a matter of _sight_ and not as a matter of _faith_, the truth of the Revelation of Almighty God, through His Son Jesus Christ our Lord. The first recorded instance of stigmatization is that of S. Francis of Assisi, in the thirteenth century. From the life of this distinguished saint, written by S. Bonaventure (chapters xii. and xv.), we gather the following particulars of these remarkable phenomena. It was the custom of the saint, from time to time, to retire into the solitudes of Mount Alverna, in the Apennines, in order the more easily to give himself up to prayer and meditation. “While fasting there for forty days, being in prayer, on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, and feeling within his soul an intense desire to be crucified with his Lord, he beheld, descending from heaven towards him, a seraph, having six wings as it were of fire.[54] When the celestial messenger came near to him, there appeared between the wings the form of One crucified, with the hands and feet stretched out upon the cross. Two wings rose above the head, two were spread forth in flight, while the others veiled the whole body.” Francis felt a great joy at the apparition, and yet, at the same time, a deep sorrow at beholding Him Whom his soul loved, so cruelly fastened to the Cross, the thought of which pierced his heart as with a sword of grief. It was presently revealed to him that he was to imitate the Passion of our Lord.