Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery Part 12

[129:1] Brand, _Popular Antiquities_, vol. iii, p. 269.

[129:2] _Ancient Legends, Mystic Charms, and Superst.i.tions of Ireland_, vol. ii, p. 74.

[129:3] _Ancient Cures, Charms, and Usages of Ireland_, p. 9.

[129:4] Vol. i, pp. 356 _seq._

[130:1] George F. Fort, _Medical Economy during the Middle Ages_, p.

296.

[130:2] Vol. iv, p. 1698.

[132:1] George F. Fort, _Medical Economy_, p. 296.

[133:1] Robley Dunglison, _History of Medicine_, p. 18.

[133:2] _The Sacred Books of the East_, edited by F. Max Muller, vol.

xlii, p. 2.

CHAPTER XI

MEDICINAL RUNIC INSCRIPTIONS

The discovery of the script of the ancient Germans, supposed to be of Egyptian or Phenician origin, was attributed to Wodan, who was regarded as the chief expert in magical writing. The so-called noxious runes were thought to bring evil upon enemies; the helpful ones averted misfortune, while the medicinal runes were credited with healing properties.[135:1]

These ancient characters formed the earliest alphabets among the Germanic peoples, and are found throughout Scandinavia, as well as in Great Britain, France, and Spain, engraved upon monuments, stones, coins, and domestic utensils. The Gothic word _runa_ meant originally a secret magical character, and was used to signify a mysterious speech, song, or writing. The reputed inherent therapeutic qualities of medicinal runes were potent psychic factors, through the subconscious mind, in healing disease.

The Anglo-Saxons made use of runic inscriptions, not only as curatives, but also to banish melancholy and evil thoughts. After their conversion to Christianity, biblical texts were subst.i.tuted for the runes, and the art of composing the former was studied with as much care as had been devoted to the heathen charms.[136:1] The term _rune_ became a synonym for knowledge and wisdom; an oracular, proverbial expression.[136:2] The traditional belief of the Anglo-Saxons in the efficacy of healing runes persisted in the fourteenth century. When foreign medical pract.i.tioners settled in England at that period, the cures wrought by them were attributed to the superior virtues of the charms employed, rather than to their professional skill.[136:3]

The ancient Saxons, before their arrival in Britain, were wont to go forth into battle, having engraven upon their spears certain runic characters, which were valued as protective charms, and served to inspire confidence on the part of the warriors. These magic inscriptions were believed to have been either invented or improved by Wodan, who taught the art of putting them into rhyme, and engraving them upon tables of stone.[136:4] In William Camden's "Britannia,"[136:5] are described divers medicinal inscriptions, found in c.u.mberland. These were used as spells among the borderers even as late as the close of the eighteenth century. A book of such charms, of that era, taken from the pocket of a moss-trooper or bog-trotter, contained among other things a recipe for the cure of intermittent fever by certain barbarous characts.

In Paul B. du Chaillu's work, "The Viking Age" (London, 1889), mention is made of the ancient northern custom of employing runes as medical charms.

One Egil went on a journey to Vermaland, and on the way he came to the house of a farmer named Thorfinn, whose daughter, Helga, had long been ill of a wasting sickness. "Has anything been tried for her illness?"

asked Egil. "Runes have been traced by the son of a farmer in the neighborhood," said Thorfinn.

Then Egil examined the bed, and found a piece of whalebone with runes on it. He read them, cut them off, and sc.r.a.ped the chips into the fire. He also burned the whalebone, and had Helga's clothes carried into the open air. Then Egil sang:

As man shall not trace runes, except he can read them well, it is thus with many a man, that the dark letters bewilder him.

I saw on the cut whalebone ten hidden letters carved, that have caused the woman a very long sorrow.

Egil traced runes and placed them under Helga's pillow. It seemed to her as if she awoke from a sleep, and she said that she was then healed.[138:1]

The ancient northern peoples wore protective and defensive amulets, which were fastened around the arm, waist, or neck. These amulets were styled _ligamenta_, _ligaturae_, or _phylacteria_, by the writers of the early Middle Ages. They were usually fashioned as gold, silver, or gla.s.s pendants. Cipher-writing and runes were commonly inscribed upon them, often for healing, but contrariwise, to bewitch and injure.[138:2]

Among the peoples of Western Europe, ancient magical healing formulas, relics of previous ages, were employed in medieval times by rural charlatans, who professed to cure ophthalmic disorders by the recitation of ritualistic phrases, together with suitable gestures of the arms and fingers over the affected eyes. Dislocations were said to have been promptly reduced by means of runic enchantments, which were doubtless supplemented by mechanical treatment; while fractured bones of man or beast were alleged to unite readily under the influence of Odinic charms. Wherever the Teutonic races were found, a knowledge of runic remedies appears to have prevailed.[138:3]

FOOTNOTES:

[135:1] M. Mallet, _Northern Antiquities_, p. 226.

[136:1] John Thrupp, _The Anglo-Saxon Home_.

[136:2] Nelson's _Encyclopaedia_.

[136:3] H. D. Traill, _Social England_, vol. ii, p. 110.

[136:4] Joseph Strutt, _Manners of the English_, vol. i, p. 17.

[136:5] Vol. iii, p. 455.

[138:1] _The Egil's Saga_, chap. 72.

[138:2] Jacob Grimm, _Teutonic Mythology_, pp. 1173-1174.

[138:3] George F. Fort, _Medical Economy in the Middle Ages_.

CHAPTER XII

METALLO-THERAPY

Metallo-therapy has been defined as a mode of treating various affections, chiefly those of a nervous character, by the external application of metals. It was recommended by Galen and other medical writers, but they attributed its curative powers to the magical inscriptions which the metals bore.

Mesmer experimented with magnets extensively, but soon abandoned their use, as he found that he could obtain equally good results without them.

The so-called "metallic tractors" originated with Dr. Elisha Perkins (1740-1799), a practising physician of Norwich, Connecticut, and consisted of two rods, one of bra.s.s, and the other of steel. In cases of rheumatism and various neuroses, the affected portions of the body were lightly stroked by means of the tractors, and many remarkable cures were reported. The new therapeutic method was endorsed by many reputable pract.i.tioners, both in the United States and Europe, and its fame spread like wild-fire.

It was soon discovered, however, that wooden tractors were fully as efficacious as the metallic ones, and that the many vaunted cures were psychic. Thus Perkins's tractors afford a striking example of the curative force of suggestion.

Thereby (wrote John Haygarth, M.D., Fellow of the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh, in a brief treatise on the Imagination, published in the year 1800) is to be learned an important lesson in Medicine, namely, the wonderful and powerful influence of the pa.s.sions of the mind, upon the state and disorders of the body. This fact, he continued, was too often overlooked in Practice, where sole dependence was placed upon material remedies, without utilizing mental influence. To the latter, this sagacious physician, writing more than a century ago, was shrewd enough to ascribe the marvellous cures attributed to the remedies of quacks, whose magnificent and unqualified promises inspire weak minds with confidence.

In one of his Lowell Inst.i.tute lectures, at Boston, November 14, 1906, Dr. Pierre Janet described the development of metallo-therapy in France between the years 1860 and 1880. Metallic discs were applied to the patient's body. These discs were of different kinds, sometimes being composed of two or more metals. In some cases a magnet was used.

Different subjects, it was found, did not manifest sensitiveness to the same metals, some being cured by iron, others by copper, while the greatest number were susceptible to gold. Many interesting facts relating to these cures were noted, such as periods of transition and oscillation in the maladies, and most curious of all, a kind of transference. For example, should a paralysis or a contraction seat itself on the right side, the application of the discs would effect a cure, but the malady would often return to the opposite side. And there were other curious phenomena. A modification of sensation was invariably observed.

Under the influence of the metal disc, the shin and muscles, which before were numb, regained their normal states, and the return of sensation preceded the cure, and was an indispensable condition. One can obtain exactly the same results with discs composed of inert substances.

An old-fashioned letter-wafer, for instance, applied to the hand, has produced similar effects. According to Dr. Janet, these phenomena are wholly due to psychic agencies, partly akin to suggestion and partly different. They depend upon the mechanism of attention. This faculty, when directed upon any organ, will bring into prominence sensations not ordinarily felt.

Consciousness is limited, in that it does not always take cognizance of all the existing sensations. This explains the phenomenon of transference, in that the suppression of those sensations which were prominent brings to the surface others which were not before recognized by the consciousness.

As a result of the introduction of metallo-therapy in the hospitals of Paris, an enormous number of hysterical patients applied for treatment, influenced partly, no doubt, by the love of notoriety.