And salved the splinter o’er and o’er.
It would appear from the explanations already given that by washing the gore away she destroyed the communication between the wound and the remedy.
Animal Magnetism.
The first allusion to the application of the magnet as a cure for disease is found in the works of Aetius, who wrote in the early part of the sixth century. He mentions that holding a magnet in the hand is said to give relief in gout. He does not profess to have tested this treatment himself. Writers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries recommend it strongly for toothache, headache, convulsions, and nerve disorders. About the end of the seventeenth century magnetic tooth-picks and earpicks were sold. To these were attributed the virtues of preventing and healing pains in those organs.
Paracelsus originated the theory of animal magnetism. The mysterious properties possessed by the loadstone and transferable from that body to iron, were according to Paracelsus an influence drawn directly from the stars and possessed by all animate beings. It was a fluid which he called Magnale. By it he explained the movements of certain plants which follow the course of the sun, and it was on the basis of this hypothesis that he composed his sympathetic ointment and explained the action of talismans. Paracelsus applied the magnet in epilepsy, and also prepared a magisterium magnetis.
Glauber professed to have a secret magnet which would draw only the essence or tincture from iron, leaving the gross body behind. With this he made a tincture of Mars and Venus, thus “robbing the dragon of the golden fleece which it guards.” This is understood to mean that he dissolved iron and copper in aqua fortis. And as Jason restored his aged father to youth again, so would this tincture prove a wonderful restorative. He commenced to test it on one occasion and very soon black curly hair began to grow on his bald head. But he had not enough of the tincture to permit him to carry on the experiment, and though he had a great longing to make some more, he apparently put off doing so until it was too late.
Van Helmont, Fludd, and other physicians of mystic instincts, were among the protagonists of animal magnetism, and physicians administered pulverised magnet in salves, plasters, pills and potions. But in 1660 Dr. Gilbert, of Colchester, noted that, when powdered, the loadstone no longer possessed magnetic properties. Ultimately, therefore, it was understood that the powder of magnet was not capable of producing any other effects than any other ferruginous substance. But the belief in magnets applied to the body was by no means dissipated. The theory was exploited by various practitioners, but notably towards the latter part of the eighteenth century, when the Viennese doctor, F. A. Mesmer, excited such a vogue in Paris that the Court, the Government, the Academy of Sciences, and aristocratic society generally were ranged in pro-and anti-Mesmer sections. Franklin stated that at one time Mesmer was taking more money in fees than all the regular physicians of Paris put together. And yet Mesmer’s explanations of the phenomena attending his performances were only an amplification of the doctrines which Paracelsus had first imagined.
The excitement did not spread to England to any great extent, but about the same time an American named Perkins created a great deal of stir with his metallic tractors, which sent the nation tractor-mad for the time. Dr. Haygarth, of Bath, contributed to the failure of this delusion by a series of experiments on patients with pieces of wood painted to resemble the tractors from which equally wonderful relief was felt, proving that the cures such as they were, could only have been the consequence of faith.
The Treatment of Itch.
The history of the treatment of itch is such a curious instance of the blind acceptance of authority through many centuries, in the course of which the true explanation lay close at hand, that it is worth narrating briefly.