King Alfred the Great in the ninth century invoked this obscure saint:
” He had this sort of disease from his childhood ; but once Divine Providence so ordered it, that when he was on a visit to Cornwall for the purpose of the chase, and had turned out of the road to pray in a certain chapel, in which rests the body of S. Gwerir, and now also S. Neot rests there, — for king Alfred was always from his infancy a frequent visitor of holy places for the sake of prayer and almsgiving, — he prostrated himself for private devotion, and after some time spent therein, he entreated God’s mercy, that in His boundless clemency He would exchange the torments of the malady which then afflicted him for some other lighter disease ; but with this condition, that such disease should not show itself outwardly in his body, lest he should be an object of contempt, as makes men useless when it afflicts them. When he had finished his prayers, he proceeded on his journey, and not long after he felt within him that, by the hand of the Almighty, he was healed, according to his request, of his disorder, and that it was entirely eradicated. . . . But, sad to say! it was replaced at his marriage by another which incessantly tormented him, night and day, from the twentieth to the forty-fourth year of his life.””
http://pyhiinvaeltaja.wordpress.com/2010/04/17/st-gwerir-hermit-of-liskeard/
Hattip to City Desert.
