Personally, I'd prefer to be cured by something a little
less dramatic in its effects. Does the discomfort of the
cure make it more miraculous?
>
> Miracle II (c. 1155)
>
> At about the same time a certain woman in the village of Earley became
> swollen with the disease of dropsy. Believing that the blessed James
> would help her, she came to Reading on the eve of his nativity to call
> in her affliction upon God and the blessed apostle. At about the first
> vigil of the night, just as the monks were beginning Matins, the
> aforesaid woman threw herself on the pavement of the presbytery and
> began to writhe and to have her inside stirred up from the very marrow
> for the sake of her health. Indeed her very bowels were stirred up.
> She had passed some part of the night in this agony, when suddenly the
> pits of her stomach burst forth and the flood-gates of her bowels were
> opened. Again and again, she vomited up the poison which she had built
> up over a long period and cleared out all the filth of harmful fluid.
> Before daybreak, before the night had run its full course, the mercy of
> the blessed James had been so efficacious that, when the woman's
> stomach was measured, to people's amazement it was found to be four
> handbreaths narrower than her own girdle. And so, restored to perfect
> health, she was eager to give thanks . . .
>
> Miracle XXIV
>
> A certain knight named Robert of Stanford was overtaken and long
> afflicted by a very severe fever. He therefore came to Reading to pray
> for a cure and plead with the blessed apostle. And after prayer he
> asked that water of blessed James by given to him to drink for a little
> while. No sooner had he tasted it than it brought about a cure within
> him. He proceeded to vomit again and again until the harmful fluid was
> brought up and the feverish heat was reduced by the vomiting. Full of
> joy and praise he returned home cured.
>
> Miracle XXVI (1154-89)
>
> A certain brother of the venerable house of canons at Merton, named
> Roger Hosatus . . . sought and obtained the health-giving water. When
> he had tasted a drop of it, his insides were stirred up and set in
> motion. He immediately vomited up the poison which had settled in a
> lump on his chest and heart and as soon as these organs were relieved
> he ate and drank, as he had not done for a long time previously . . .
>
> Oriens.
>
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