Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing

o expose the other to evident peril. It is not only the body that by its sound constitution strengthens th

r healing. Cicero was the greatest lawyer the world has seen, but there was not a man in Rome who could have cured him of a colic. The Greek was an expert dialectician when he was using incantations for his diseases. As late as when the Puritans were en

ontenelle says he would undertake to persuade the whole republic of readers to believe that the sun

d. The second period extends from this time to the fifteenth or sixteenth centuries, and the third period embraces the last three or four centuries. The second period was almost wholly stationary, and this, we are ashamed to say, was largely due to the prohibitive at

this really was. The cruder the art, the more powerful was the mental influence. The ways of primitive therapeutics are completely hidden from us except what we can gather from the races which retained their primitive practices in historic times. We can well understand, though, that the concoction

kely the cure, on account of the mental influence upon the patient. The primitive man's religion and therapeutics were inextricably interwoven and, unless we make an exception of the past few years, this has always been an unprofitable union for one or both. All the early civilizations with the exception of the Greeks, as well as the Christian nations up to the sixteenth centur

ving has not changed much in the last two or three milleniums. Their system of medical practice partakes of the character of that fo

ardy reports that a missionary told him of his being called in to see a man suffering from convulsions; he found him smelling white mice in a

is scarce, and here, as in Europe in the Middle Ages, the hair of the dog that bit you is used to heal the bite and to prevent hydrophobia. An infusion from the bones of a tiger is believed to confer courage, strength, and agility, and the flesh of a snake is boiled and eaten to make one cunning and wise. Chips from coffins which have been let down into the grave

pose Taoist priests are hired to recite formul?, ring bells, and manipulate bowls of water, candles, joss-sticks, and curious charms. Sometimes the family insists that one of the priests shall ascend a ladder, the rounds

orresponds to the afflicted part of the sick person's body is rubbed. Some ashes from the censor standing before the image may be taken to the sick-room and there reverenced. Holy water is brought from the temple, boiled with

mental healing, or at least attempts at healing by mental means, among the recipes and prescriptions which have come down to us. Poor and superstitious persons, especially, had recourse to dreams, to wizards, to don

s. The physicians were the priests, and among the interesting contents of this manuscript are several formul? to be used as prayers while compounding medicaments. Some of the prescriptions given here are accompanied by exorcisms which were to be used at the same time. Many of the prescriptio

ust first discover the nature of the possessing spirit, and then attack it. Powerful magic was the weapon used, and the healer must be an expert in reciting incantations and skilful in making amulets. On account of this, the Egyptians became the most skilled in magic of any people, and hav

Others extol the use of drugs; they study the qualities of plants and minerals, describe the diseases to which each of the substances provided by nature is suitable, and settle the exact time when they must be procured and applied; certain her

enius, which they used in order to obtain for them the cure of the particular member confided to their care. We have the authority of Origen for saying that in his time when any part of the body was diseased, a cure was effected by invoking the demon to whose province it belonged. P

s afterward among the Greeks. This "temple sleep" was closely akin in its eff

its symptoms, a desire for deliverance from it, and an order for it to depart. Some draughts were given which may have had some medicinal effect, but they were supposed to be enchanted drinks. Knots were

ere the sole practitioners. Much valuable medical knowledge was mixed with much that could only have had a mental influence. Disease was considered a punishment for sin, and hence the cure was religious rather than medical. The disea

is Bath-Chorin. She touches the hands and lower limbs by night. Many diseases are caused by demons." According to Josephus, "to demons may be ascribed leprosy, rabies, asthma, cardiac diseases, nervous diseases, which last are t

the Vedas. Notwithstanding this, demonology played a large part in the production of d

eatises contained in the collection which bears the name of Hippocrates (460-375 B. C.). He was the

had gazed." Empedocles (c. 490-430 B. C.) taught that demons "were of a mixed and inconstant nature, and are subjected to a purgatorial process which may finally end in their ascension to higher abodes." Yet he attributed to them nearly all the calamities, vexations, and plagues in

ed to understand the secrets of medicine and surgery. At a late period ?sculapius, the son of Apollo, was worshipped as a deity. When we speak of

posed to manifest himself. According to Homer, his sons, Machaon and Podalirius, who were great warriors, treated wounds and external diseases only; and it is probable that their father practised in the same manner, as he is said to have invented the probe and the bandaging of wounds. His priests, the ?sclepiades, however, practised incantations, and cured diseases by leading their patients to b

pon the miracle-working of a demi-god, and not upon medical art as we now know it. The modus operandi was unique in some details. The patients, mostly incurables, came laden with sacrifices. After prayer, they cleansed themselves with water from the holy well, and offered up sacrifices. Certain ceremonial acts were then performed by the priests, and the patients were put to sleep on the skins of the animals offered at the altar, or at the foot of the statue of the divinity,

the sanctuary from right to left, place his five fingers on the altar, then raise his hand and cover his eyes. He obeyed, and instantly his sig

uld mix the blood of a white cock with honey, to make up an ointment to be applied to his ey

from the altar some seeds of the pine, and to mix them with honey, of which mixture he was t

on the wane, that the priests began to study and to apply medical means in ord

Tiber. The temple at Cos was rich in votive offerings, which generally represented the parts of the body healed, and an account of the method of cure a

d, which an enlightened policy had raised on elevated spots, near medicinal springs, and in salubrious vicinities. Those men who pretended in right of birth to hold the gift of curi

nued sound made the fibres of the nerves to palpitate, and the pain vanished. In line with this treatment,

at virtues were ascribed to the herb alysson which was pounded and eaten with meat to cure hydrophobia. If suspended in the house, it promoted the health of the inm

, as a part of the religion, which is supposed to have been borrowed from the Etruscans. This comprehended both the theory and cure of disease.

in Ancient Egypt an

f the Miracles at Lourdes," Ni