The Project Gutenberg eBook, Dickory Cronke, by Daniel Defoe

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Title: Dickory Cronke
The Dumb Philosopher, or, Great Britain's Wonder

Author: Daniel Defoe

Release Date: April 20, 2005 [eBook #2051]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DICKORY CRONKE***

Transcribed form the 1889 George Bell and Sons edition by David Price,
email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk

DICKORY CRONKE

THE
DUMB PHILOSOPHER,
OR,
GREAT BRITAIN'S WONDER;
CONTAINING:

I. A faithful and very surprising Account how Dickory Cronke, a Tinner's
son, in the County of Cornwall, was born Dumb, and continued so for Fifty-
eight years; and how, some days before he died, he came to his Speech;
with Memoirs of his Life, and the Manner of his Death.

II. A Declaration of his Faith and Principles in Religion; with a
Collection of Select Meditations, composed in his Retirement.

III. His Prophetical Observations upon the Affairs of Europe, more
particularly of Great Britain, from 1720 to 1729. The whole extracted
from his Original Papers, and confirmed by unquestionable Authority.

TO WHICH IS ANNEXED HIS ELEGY,
WRITTEN BY A YOUNG CORNISH GENTLEMAN, OF
EXETER COLLEGE IN OXFORD.

WITH

AN EPITAPH BY ANOTHER HAND.

"Non quis, sed quid."

LONDON:
Printed for and Sold by THOMAS BICKERTON, at
the Crown, in Paternoster Row. 1719.

PREFACE

The formality of a preface to this little book might have been very well
omitted, if it were not to gratify the curiosity of some inquisitive
people, who, I foresee, will be apt to make objections against the
reality of the narrative.

Indeed the public has too often been imposed upon by fictitious stories,
and some of a very late date, so that I think myself obliged by the usual
respect which is paid to candid and impartial readers, to acquaint them,
by way of introduction, with what they are to expect, and what they may
depend upon, and yet with this caution too, that it is an indication of
ill nature or ill manners, if not both, to pry into a secret that is
industriously concealed.

However, that there may be nothing wanting on my part