The Temuka Leader. TUESDAY. FEBRUARY 27. 1883. MR MILNER STEPHEN.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1076, 27 February 1883, Page 2

The Temuka Leader. TUESDAY. FEBRUARY 27. 1883. MR MILNER STEPHEN.

Mr Mii<ner Stephen is the most extraordinary, interesting, and useful showman that has ever travelled New Zealand. In this matter-of-fact age, when no will believe anything unless he gets ocular demonstration of it, there is something refreshing in a man coming forward on a public platform and relieving pain instantaneously in the presence of hundreds of witnesses. It is something startling, bewildering, and so altogether out of the common that it takes an effort to bring oneself to realiee if. And yet what can we do but believe ? Legions of respectable witnesses testify to the wonders which this man has wrought in healing people, and newspapers have, wherever he has appeared, published accounts of hib cures. In his speech in Olnistchurch Mr Stephen says :—"Jjast week a girl 13 years of age was brought to him tvho_ was totally blind of one eye, and could not i

see daylight with it. He breathed into her eye—which was his mode of restoring the sight in bucli cases-and she at once recognised surrounding objects, and different articles on the table. Only yesterday he rsstored the hearing 6f a young fellow who had been deaf for ten years. In Wellington n young lady was brought on the stage who had been born deaf mid dumb, and had never heard a single sound. He breathed into her ear through a silver tube, and she could hear his voioe ; he breathed and she could hear a whisper. Then occurred one of the most beautiful scenes he had ever witnessed. The girl threw herself wildly into the arras of her parents, and after- ■ wards rushed to two other young ladies and shook them frantically by the hands. .He held in his hand a boot worn by a lady forty-two years of age, whose leg; he had lengthened five and a half inches in two morningsj. She walked away in an ordinary boot, and had worn one ever si ace. He also restored her eyesight i.i a marvellous manner, ultimately enabling her to read small print. It was such an extraordinary case that the newspapers made inquiries and published a special report about it. He took the parties before the Police Magistrate of the district (Sandhurst), and the case had been sworn to aod published in many papers." If we had nothing to go upon but the ipse dixit of Mr Stephen, we should put this down as bunkum, but the numerous cures he has effected in New Zealand, and the result of In's performance in Christchurch, as will be seen in another column, ea titles him to credence. It is not easy to swallow such assertions as the lengthening of a crippled leg by five or six inches, the giving of speech and hearing to the deaf and dumb, and the curing of the blind by merely the laying on of hands; but that he has done so is a well authenticated fact, and we must believe even if wecannot understand. When Mr Stephen came to New Zealand a few months ago it was announced by the Press Association that ho claimed to have received his wonderful healing powers from God, but we find by reading the report that he does not mention such a thiug. All he did in the way of religion was to read a shoit prayer, and certainly there is nothing wrong in doing that, neither could it be inferred from it that he claimed to have obtained his special powers from God. When we heard that he had stated his healing power, had been given to him through the influence of prayer, we set him down as a thorough humbug. We could not believe such a thing. But now it appears to us that that was all a misrepresentation, and that Mr Stephen makes no such claim, hut «nys that he possesses the power* and proves his assertion by effect ng cures. In addition to the laying on of hands he uses magnetised oil, water, and flannel, and this we believe gives the clue to his power. He possesses an extraordinary amount of animal magnetism, and it is byjthat means he succeeds in his cures. We notice that a good many North Island papers have written about Mr Milner Stephen. They all admit that he has performed cures ; they all admit that he possesses uncommon powers, but none of them has undertaken to say whence this power comes. A Rev Mr Coffey, who has earned for himself the soufriquet of ' Hot Coffee,' in Wellington, and who is always running Ids stupid head asainst walls, has attacked Mr Stephen, and ridiculed the idea of Mr Stephen charging £2 2s for the exercise of a pow-v •■ ' "- -i^od. This is silly nonsense, li -'U Stephen possess healing powers he has a good right to be paiti for exercising them, for it is only in that way he can give his time to suffering humanity. Surely the man whose leg he stretched five inches did not think £2 2s too much to pay him, neither could the blind,deaf, and dumb whose senseshe restored begrudge him so small a sum. Mr Milner Stephen is certainly an extraordinary man, but it is very probable there are a great many who possess vsimilar powers if they only knew it. We know one man in this town who claims to be able to cure in the same manner, and it is probable thai there are others, if they only knew it.