The surprising case of Rachel Baker, who prays and preaches in her sleep : with specimens of her extraordinary performances taken down accurately in short hand at the time ; and showing the unparalleled powers she possesses to pray, exhort, and answer questions, during her unconscious state : the whole authenticated by the most respectable testimony of living witnesses / by Charles Mais, of the city of New-York, stenographer.

  • Mais, Charles.
Date:
1814
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The surprising case of Rachel Baker, who prays and preaches in her sleep : with specimens of her extraordinary performances taken down accurately in short hand at the time ; and showing the unparalleled powers she possesses to pray, exhort, and answer questions, during her unconscious state : the whole authenticated by the most respectable testimony of living witnesses / by Charles Mais, of the city of New-York, stenographer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    A man not attached to any religious society, had seri- ous meditations of his own. When volition was lost anil consciousness suspended by sleep, he performed the exercises of prayer to God and exhortation to men with zeal and fervour. The paroxsysm was renewed nightly; the time a little after he fell asleep; the at- titude, that of kneeling in his bed. He knows noth- ing of these transactions but by information from those who have attended him. Ucing rather unrestrained in his religious opinions, he owns himself afflicted and ashamed on being told that he has become a preacher in his sleep. During a calamitous war, a farmer buried some pieces of gold in his field. He forgot the spot, and sought his hidden treasure, until he despaired of success. The loss dwelt upon his mind night and day, and gave him perpetual uneasiness. At length, about fifteen years after the concealment of the money, he rose at night from his bed in a lit of somnambulism, and went forth to the Held. In a short time he return- ed with the guineas in his hand. Being observed to be in a sleep-walking condition, he was waked by his wife and brought to his senses. His surprise was extreme on discovering his situation. And he imme- diately related to her and the family the dream by which lie was iustructediwhere to find the precious metal, which he produced in proof of the correctness of his recollection during that dream, A boy, very much exercised by somnambulism, fell asleep one day in the religious meeting he was atten- ding. During that sleep, his somnambulism invad- ed him. It continued through the rising of the meet- ing, and during his walk to his lodgings, He then ate his dinner, went to school (it was a week day) and performed several tasks in calculation. After he done these and various other things, he suddenly ap- plied his hand to his forehead, rubbed his eyes and waked up. He instantly enquired if the meeting was dismissed, and said lie was ashamed of having fallen asleep. He had a belief that he was yet in the meet-