ON INCUBATION; OR THE ART OF HEALING BY VISIONARY DIVINATION.
Medicine unquestionably ranks among the most ancient of all human
sciences. In the infant state of society, when simplicity of manners
characterised the pursuits of mankind, medical assistance was little
wanted; but when the nature of man degenerated, and vice and luxury
corrupted his habits of innocence and temperance, diseases sprung up
which those aids alone could check or eradicate. The knowledge of them
at first could not fail to be empirical and precarious. The sick were
placed in the high ways, that travellers and passers by might assist
them with their counsel; and at length the priesthood appropriated this
privilege exclusively to themselves.
It was not merely the sacerdotal dignity which rendered them objects of
awe and reverence to the illiterate multitude; the priests were regarded
as the depositaries of science and learning; and proved themselves as
skilful as they were successful, in cementing their influence by those
arts which were best calculated to inflame the prejudices of the vulgar
in their favour.
It is the work of ages to wean men and nations from popular illusions,
and the deep-rooted opinions transmitted from sire to son: it cannot
therefore surprise us, that even when the intellectual energy of Greece
was signalizing itself by efforts which have commanded the admiration of
after ages, it should still remain a popular dogma in medicine "that
persons labouring under bodily infirmity, might be thrown into a state
of charmed torpor, in which, though destitute of any previous medical
knowledge, they would be enabled to ascertain the nature of their
malady, as well as of the diseases of others, and devise the means of
their cure." Upon this dogma was founded the mystery of incubations, or
the art of healing by visionary divination.
It is not our object here to discuss whether a man can be capable of
divination: such a power, however, was assigned to him, not only by the
vulgar, but by the greater number of the philosophical sects of
antiquity; and it does appear to savour a little of temerity, that
Epicurus and the cynics should have ventured to reject a belief so
universally and strenuously maintained, and resting on an infinity of
traditions and accounts of prophets, in whom Greece had abounded from
her earliest times, and of whose divine gift of prophecy the firmest
conviction was currently entertained. Aeschylus, Plutarch, Apuleius, and
other Greek authors, bear ample testimony of this persuasion, and tell
us that by uncommon and irregular motions of the body intoxicating
vapours, or certain holy ejaculations, men might be thrown into an
enchanted trance; in which, being in a state between sleeping and
waking, they were unsusceptible of external impressions and obtaining a
glimpse of futurity, were gifted with the power of prophecy. Here their
allusion, however, only concerns the celebrated divinations of the
Pythia.[89] We must therefore, probe somewhat deeper, in order to
illustrate that species of divination which was the result of dreams,
and a source of divination on the nature of diseases and their remedies.
This kind of superstition was in no less acceptation than the former
among the ancients, whose temples were constantly crowded with the sick,
and reverberated with their supplications for divinatory dreams, which
were regarded as an immediate gift from the gods. Indeed, the celestial
origin of dreams was universally admitted by the nations of antiquity,
and thence also their efficacy as oracles. Nothing could be more natural
than such an idea. From the crude and imperfect notions which long
prevailed with respect to the soul, it was scarcely possible for them to
ascribe the impressions, which their memory retained of the creation of
their fancy during their slumbers, to the instrumentality of their own
conceits; they could not fail therefore to impute them to the
interposition of some foreign agent, and to whom more naturally could
they refer them than to a divinity? When awake, they imagined themselves
always attended by the gods in person, and ascribed every thought, and
resolved every appearance or accident, which deviated from the common
course of nature, to the immediate influence of a superintending deity.
It was under such impressions that so many nations originally rested
their belief in divinatory dreams. The records of antiquity therefore
abound in instances (for the greater part of an early date) where the
actions of men have been the result of a dream, whose conceit was
entirely at variance with the real state of their affairs. It was not
long before the diversity of dreams awakened their attention: some were
connected and simple, others were obscure, and made up of curious
fancies, though not incapable of being resolved by the windings and
turnings of allegory.
It was no unnatural transition from the received belief in dreams, to
the idea that they might become the medium of seeking instruction from
the gods: hence the institution of oracles, whose responses were given
in dreams; and the addition of sleeping chambers to many temples, such
as those in Epidaurus and at Oropos. Here it was, that after pious
ceremonies and prayers, men laid themselves down in expectation of
dreams; when the expectation was realized, though the dream proved ever
so confused or intricate, the dreamer always succeeded in reconciling
it to his circumstances: his own belief and priestly wiles, readily
effected the solution. The conceit of dreams, according to the votary's
wishes, was so powerfully promoted by the preparatory initiation he had
undergone, that it would have been somewhat extraordinary had he been
altogether disappointed. He was generally anxious to increase the fame
of his divinity by his dream, and possessed a high veneration and deep
impression of the miracles which that divinity had wrought. With these
predispositions he resorted to the temple, where he had a whole day
before him to ponder on his malady, and on every sort of remedy that
might have been suggested to him; how natural was it, therefore, for his
busy imagination to fix, in his sleep, upon one particular remedy more
forcibly than upon another? Add to this, the solemn lonely hour of night
was the appointed hour for his sleep, which was preceded by prayer and
other inspiring ceremonies, that would naturally elevate his devotion to
the highest pitch. He had also previously perambulated the temple, and
with a full heart surveyed the offerings of those whose sickness had
departed from them.
If all these preparations were unavailing, the officiants of the temple
had still means in reserve, by which the credulous should be thrown into
that bodily state which was indispensable to the divinatory sleep: of
these, succeeding instances will be hereafter produced. In those days,
there were however, some men from whom the somniferous faculty was
withheld: they were, therefore, admonished to repeat their prayers and
oblations, in order to win the divinity's favour: and the ultimate and
customary resort was, if success did not crown his perseverance, to
pronounce it a token, that such patients were an eyesore to the
divinity.
From this divinatory sleep, arose the vulgar expressions in Greece
[Greek: enkoimasdai], and [Greek: enkoimaesis][90] The latin terms are
_incubare_ and _incubatio_ an exact translation of the Greek words. It
appears, therefore, that the Romans and Greeks were equally acquainted
with the institution; though we find but very little mention made of it
by the Latin writers, yet this is no argument against its prevalence
among the Romans, as we are left with as scanty accounts of many other
superstitions which were in vogue amongst them. It is highly probable
that it was not by any means so popular in Rome as in Greece; and the
cause of this may, perhaps, be found in the reflecting disposition and
sober character of the haughty Roman, to which the light and volatile
temperament of the Grecian, formed so striking a contrast.
That incubation was a ready means of diving into the future, needs no
demonstration. Although its practice was chiefly resorted to in cases
where medical aid was desired, it was still made use of in every other
case, in which the ancient oracles were consulted. Whether it arose in
Greece, or migrated thither from the East, is a point with which the
ancients have left us unacquainted, though they advert to its prevalence
amongst those who were called barbarians. Strabo has several instances
of it, and particularly mentions a place in the Caspian sea, where such
an oracle existed;[91] he also relates, in his celebrated account of
Moses, that this law-giver laid it down, in common with the priests of
Esculapius, that to those who led a chaste and virtuous life the deity
would vouchsafe prophetical visions in his sanctuary; but to those who
were of idle and impure habits, they would be denied.[92]
Pomponius Mela even mentions a savage nation, in the interior of
Africa, who laid themselves down to sleep on the grave-stones of their
ancestors, and looked upon the dreams they had on those spots as oracles
from the dead.[93] We shall see, hereafter, that this superstition was
equally indigenous among the Egyptians. Although it be doubtful whether
the Greeks owed this species of divination to their own invention or
not, its existence may at least be traced as far as the earliest ages of
their history; notwithstanding no positive mention of it has been made
either by Homer or the authors following him.
The oracular power of dreams, and the sanctuaries where they are
supposed to be dispersed, have been diffusely treated of in the
compilations of Van Dale and other learned writers. These species of
oracles were in high estimation, even in the most enlightened and
flourishing periods of Greece; it is somewhat singular, however, that no
people cherished them more devoutly than the Spartans, who depended
altogether upon oracles in their weightiest affairs of state. Of all the
civilized nations of Greece, Sparta always approved herself the most
superstitious; her advancement was rather the effect of her policy, than
of any stimulus given to her civilization by science. This consideration
will enable us to account for the powerful influence which, even in the
latest stages of Lacedemonian story, attached to the responses of
Passiphae, a local goddess of Thalame, but little known beyond the
confines of Laconia. The extent of their influence is particularly
evident in the history of Agis and Cleomenes.[94]
The greater part of these somnambulistic oracles were ascribed to
persons who had distinguished themselves as great dreamers when on
earth. In old times there was a description of prophets who pretended to
prepare themselves for the foreboding of future events through the
medium of sacred dreams. They were classed under the appellation of
[Greek: Oneiroploi], to which rank the most celebrated Vates of the
heroic age belonged. In this way it was that a sacred spot was dedicated
to Calchus, whence he gave his responses in dreams after his decease:
this spot lay in Daunia, on the coast of the Adriatic. The supplicant's
offices began with the offering up of a ram, on whose skin he laid
himself down, and in this situation, received the instruction he sought
for.[95] Amphilocus, a contemporary soothsayer, who accompanied the
Epigoni in the first Theban war, had a similar oracle at Mallos, in
Cilicia, which Pausanias asserts, even at the close of the second
century, to have been the most credible of his age; it is also mentioned
by Dion Cassius, in his history of Commodus.[96]
The most famous, however, of this class of oracles, was that of
Amphiaraus, the father of Amphilocus, which was one of the five
principal oracles of Greece; he had signalized himself as a sapient
soothsayer in the first Theban war; and his oracle was situated at
Oropos, on the borders of Boetia and Attica. Of all others this deserves
our most particular attention, as it was resorted to more frequently in
cases of infirmity and disease, than in any other circumstances. His
responses were always delivered in dreams, in whose interpretation, as
he was the first to possess that faculty. Pausanias says he received
divine honours. Those who repaired to Amphiaraus's oracle to supplicate
his aid, laid themselves down in the manner we have just related, after
several preparatory lustrations and sacrifices, on the skin of a ram
slain in honour of the god, and awaited the dreams, which were to
unfold the means of their different cures.
Lustrations and sacrifices were not, however, the only preparatives for
inducing the visionary disposition. The priests subjected the patients
to various others, which Philostratus affirms[97] to have been very
instrumental towards rendering the sleeper's mind clear and unclouded.
Part of these preparatives consisted in one day's abstinence from
eating, and three, nay, even in some cases, fifteen days' abstinence
from wine, the common beverage of the Greeks. This was the practice also
with other oracles; nor were the priests in the meantime insensible to
their own interests on these occasions; for those who were cured by
Amphiaraus's revelations were permitted to bathe in the sacred waters of
a fountain, into which they were enjoined to cast pieces of gold and
silver, which were destined, most probably, to sweeten the labours of
his officiants.
The oracles, whose intervention was principally or altogether sought for
the healing of the sick by means of divination founded on dreams, were
scattered over Greece, Italy, Egypt, and other countries. As regards
those of Egypt, it may be remarked, that although many of the Egyptians
believed there were thirty-six demons, or aerial deities, each of whom
had the care of a certain portion of the human frame, and when that
portion was diseased, would heal it on the patient's earnest prayer, yet
a variety of their oracles, such as those of Serapis, Isis, and Phthas,
the Hephaestos of the Greeks, appertained to the class, which is the
present object of our inquiry.
The oracle Serapis was situated near Canopus; it was visited with the
highest veneration by the wealthiest and most illustrious Egyptians, and
contained ample records of miraculous cures which that god had performed
on sleepers.[98] Isis, it is said, effected similar cures in her
lifetime, whence it became her office, in her after state of
deification, to reveal in dreams the most efficacious remedies to the
sick. Indeed the healing powers of this goddess were such, that, as we
are told by Diodorus,[99] the remedies she prescribed never failed of
their effect, and that convalescents were daily seen returning from her
temple, many of whom had been abandoned as incurable by the physicians.
The third oracle of the sick was consecrated to Phthas, and lay near
Memphis, but it is seldom mentioned by the ancients.[100]
In Italy there existed two oracles, whose responses were imparted in
dreams, before the worship of Esculapius was introduced from Greece. One
of them only belongs to this place, that of the physician Podalirus, in
Daunia,[101] which is mentioned by Lycophron.[102] Subsequently it is well
known incubation was practised after the Grecian form in the Roman
temple of Aesculapius on the Insula Tiberina.[103]
This description of oracles abounded throughout Greece; the most
memorable of which was that on the Asiatic coast, between Trattis and
Nyssa, which is more particularly described by Strabo than any other.
Not far from the town of Nyssa, says he, there is a place called
Charaka, where we find a grove and temple sacred to Pluto and
Proserpine, and close to the grove a subterraneous cave, of a most
extraordinary nature. It is related of it, that diseased persons, who
have faith in the remedies predicted by those deities, are accustomed to
resort to it and pass some time with experienced priests, who reside
near the cave. These priests lay themselves down to sleep in the cave,
and afterwards order such medicine as have been revealed to them there,
to be furnished to their patients in the temple. They frequently conduct
the sick themselves into the cave, where they remain for several days
together, without touching a morsel of food; nor are the profane
withheld from a participation in the _divinatory_ sleep, though this is
not permitted otherwise than under the controul, and with the sacred
sanction, of the priests. There is, however, nothing more surprising
about this place than that it is esteemed _noxious and fatal to the
healthy_.[104] This last remark of our geographer, proves how jealous the
priestly physicians were of their medical monopoly, and how fearful lest
the _saner_ part of mankind should detect and expose the pretended
virtues of their medical sanctuary.
We have hitherto mentioned the name of Aesculapius but casually, though
there was no god of antiquity more celebrated for curing every species
of malady by the incubatory process. He was particularly designated by
the Greeks as "the sender of dreams," [Greek: Oneiropompon]; nor could
any other deity boast of so great a number of those oracles. The most
distinguished of these was the oracle of Epidaurus, in the Argivian
territory; from which spot his worship extended over a great proportion
of the old world;--hither, as being the place of his birth and the site
of his richest temple, crowds of sick persons constantly repaired in
quest of dreams. The success attending them was diligently set forth on
every wall of the temple; where the _tabulae votivae_ recorded the names
of those who had been healed, the nature of their maladies, and the cure
which the god prescribed. Similar circumstances are related of his
Temple at Triccae, in Thessaly, where Esculapius was held in great
veneration at a very early period; there appears also to have been
another such temple either at or near Athens,[105] where we must look for
the scene of the ridiculous cure which Aristophanes makes Aesculapius to
perform on the blind god of riches. Though there is undoubtedly a rich
vein of the burlesque in the Plutus of the Grecian dramatist, yet we may
gather much concerning our present subject from the scene in which the
slave, who had attended Plutus in the Temple, relates the whole process
of his master's wife. Here also the night was the chosen period of
incubation. Before the signal for sleep was given, the officiants of the
temple extinguished all the lights in the sick men's chamber; thus
involving them in a solemn stillness and obscurity highly favourable to
the work in hand, but in a particular manner to the subterfuge of the
priests, who enacted the nocturnal apparition of Aesculapius to his sick
client.
This passage in Plutus is certainly the earliest circumstantial
relation we possess of the practice of this species of incubation.[106]
The license permitted to Grecian comedy was such as to authorise the
ridicule and contempt of the most popular deities; we are not, therefore
to conclude from the scenes that there were many unbelievers, or that
this ancient system of cure had sunk into disrepute: for the history of
our comedian's great contemporary, Hippocrates, informs us, that at this
very time the temple of Aesculapius at Cos abounded in tablets, on which
the sick attested the remedies that had been revealed to them during
incubation, and that he himself was highly indebted to them for much of
his medical knowledge.
Were it not authenticated by the most undeniable testimonies, it would
appear incredible that the impostures of the disciples of Aesculapius,
and the common faith in his regenerative powers, should have survived
with equal potency and acceptation during the ages immediately
succeeding the Christian era. It must not however, be forgotten, that
these were the times also, when an infinity of superstitious of every
description disgraced the Roman world; although it would have appeared a
necessary consequence, that their prevalency should have been checked by
the increasing determination of learning and science.
If at this period the number of dreaming patients had fallen off at Cos
and Epidaurus, the deficiency was amply compensated by the growing
popularity of Aesculapius's shrines at Rome, Pergamus, Alaea, Mallos,
and other places, where the ancient rituals were faithfully preserved.
The highest magistrates in the Roman states not only countenanced, but
patronised the superstition; Marcus Aurelius, by the friendship with
which he honoured the Paphlagonian imposter Alexander, and Caracalla, by
the journey he undertook to Pergamus, to obtain the cure of a disease
which inflicted him. This Alexander, the Cagliostro of his age, whose
memoirs have been handed down to us by Lucian, made shift to father a
new species of juggling upon the ancient process of incubation: for he
pretends that it was necessary for him to sleep for a night in the
sealed scrips which contain the queries he was to have resolved for
those who visited his oracle.[107] During this interval he dexterously
opened the scrips, and sealed them up again; pretending that the
responses which he delivered to the querists in the morning, had been
revealed to him by the deity in a dream.
The priests of Aesculapius possessed a never failing source of
information on the recipes or votive tablets with which these temples
abounded. These were sometimes engraven on pillars, as at Epidaurus; of
which Pausanias says there were six remaining in his time, and besides
these, one in particular removed from the rest, on which it was recorded
that Hippolytus had sacrificed twenty horses, in return for his having
been restored to life by him. Five memorials only of this kind have
reached the present age. One of them is to be found in the beginning of
Galen's fifth book de Compos, medic.: it is taken from the temple of
Phthas, near Memphis, and is the least interesting of the whole. Its
subject is the use of the Diktamnus, borrowed from Heras of Cappadocia,
a medical writer, frequently quoted by Galen. The remaining four are
much more important: they were engraven on a marble slab,[108] of later
date at Rome, and are thought, with much probability, to have belonged
to the Aesculapian temple in the Insula Tiberina. The present
translation, in which some errors either of the artist or copyist are
rectified, is extracted from the first volume of Gruter's Corp.
Inscriptionum. The narrations are perspicuous and laconic.
1. "In these latter days, a certain blind man, by name Caius, had this
oracle vouchsafed to him--'that he should draw near to the altar after
the manner of one who could see; then walk from right to left, lay the
five fingers of his right hand on the altar, then raise up his hand and
place it on his eyes.' And behold! the multitude saw the blind man open
his eyes, and they rejoiced, such splendid miracles should signalize the
reign of our Emperor Antoninus."
2. "To Lucius, who was so wasted away by pains in his side, that all
doubted of his recovery, the god gave this response: 'Approach thou the
altar; take ashes from it, mix them up with wine and then lay thyself on
thy sore side.' And the man recovered, and openly returned thanks to the
god amidst the congratulations of the people."
3. "To Julian who spitted blood, and was given over by every one, the
god granted this response: 'Draw near, take pine apples from off the
altar, and eat them with wine for three days. And the man got well, and
came and gave thanks in the presence of the people."
4. "A blind soldier, Valerius Asper by name, received this answer from
the god: that he should mix the blood of a white cock with milk, make an
eye ointment therewith, and rub his eyes with it for three days. And lo!
the blind recovered his sight, and came, and publicly gave thanks to the
god."
The success with which the Priests of Aesculapius carried on their
impostures, and the popularity which their dexterous management, no less
than the vulgar credulity obtained for them, will cease to surprise us
on maturer consideration. It could not be a difficult task for them to
give the minds of their patients whatever bias was best adapted to their
purposes. These credulous beings passed several days and nights in the
temple, and their imagination could not fail to be powerfully impressed
with what was diligently told them of the prescriptions and cures of
Aesculapius; nor to retain during their slumbers many lively impressions
of their meditations by day; their priestly nurses too were neither so
blind to their own interests, nor so careless of their reputations as to
omit the prescribing of such modes of diet and medical remedies as were
calculated to appease their patients' sufferings. Besides which, however
delusive and empirical their outward ceremonials and bold pretensions
might have been, we should remember, that priests, having some
acquaintance with the science of medicine, were generally selected to
officiate on those spots where the incubitary process[109] was the order
of the day. To this acquaintance were added the results of daily
experience, and the frequent opportunities which the incessant demands
of the infirm upon their skill afforded them of correcting previous
errors and improving their practical knowledge: of gradually
ascertaining the various kinds and appearances of human disorders; and
of digesting such data as would enable them, with the least possible
chance of failure, to prescribe the modes of cure and treatment suitable
to the various stages and species of the applicant's maladies. With such
means, it would have been not a little singular if the priests of
Aesculapius had failed in converting the popular veneration to his
credit and their own emolument.
FOOTNOTES:
[89] The Priestess of Apollo, by whom he delivered oracles. She was
called Pythia from the god himself, who was styled Apollo Pythius, from
his slaying the serpent Python. The Priestess was to be a pure virgin.
She sat on the covercle or lid of a brazen vessel, mounted on a tripod,
and thence, after a violent enthusiasm, she delivered his oracles; i.e.
she rehearsed a few ambiguous and obscure verses, which were taken for
oracles.
[90] These words are but ill explained by the best Greek Lexicographers.
Servius ad Virg., Aen. vii. 88, says: _Incubare dicuntur proprie hic,
qui dormiunt accipienda responsa_. Tertullian de Anima, C. 49, thence
calls them _Incubatores fanorum_.
[91] Lib. XI. p. 108. Paris, fol. 1620.
[92] Ibid. lib. XVI. p. 761.
[93] De situ orbis, lib. I. cap. 1.
[94] Plutarch apud Agis et Cleomen. Cicero (de Div. 1. c. 48) probably
alludes to this oracle, when he says, that the Ephori of Sparta were
accustomed to sleep in the temple of Pasiphae on state emergencies.
There was a similar oracle in the neighbourhood of Thalame, not fur from
Aetylum, sacred to Ino.
[95] Strabo, lib. VI. p, 284.
[96] Pausanias, 1, 35.
[97] De vita Apoll. Thyan, 11. 37.
[98] Strabo, lib. xvii. p. 801. Anian. Exped. Alex, vii. 6.
[99] In Egypt lib. I, 25.
[100] Galen de comp. Med. p. Gen v. 2.
[101] Podalirius and Machaon, the two sons of Esculapius. The state of
medicine at the time of the Trojan war was very imperfect, as we find
exemplified by these two acting as surgeons general to the Grecian army.
Their simple practice consisted chiefly in extracting darts or arrows,
in staunching blood by some infusion of bitter herbs, and sometimes they
added charms or incantations; which seemed to be a poetical way of
hinting, that frequently wounds were healed or diseases cured in a
manner unaccountable by any known properties they could discover either
in the effects of their rude remedies, or in the then known powers of
the human body to relieve itself. In Homer's description of the wound
which Ulysses, when young, received in his thigh from the tusk of an
enraged wild boar, the infusion of blood was stopped by divine
incantations and divine songs, and some sort of bandage which must have
acted by pressure. If any virtue could have acted as a charm, the very
verse that describes the wound might have as good a right to such a
claim as any other; but, in what manner the surgeons of ancient Greece,
before the discovery of the circulation of the blood, might apply
bandages for the purposes here mentioned, is not easily explained;
though doubtless these bandages must have acted like a tourniquet, which
is now the most effectual remedy for compressing a wounded artery, and
thereby stopping an hemorrhage.
[102] Alexand. 1050.
[103] Suet. Claid. c. 28.
[104] Strabo. lib. xiii. Pausan. lib. ii.
[105] Scholia ad Plut. v. 621
[106] Aristoph, Plut act. ii, sc. 6, and iii. sc 2.
[107] Luciani, oper. t. ii. ed Reitzii.
[108] It is often called by antiquaries _Tabella Marmorea apud
Maffaeos_, as it was first preserved in the collection.
[109] It is somewhat singular, that Cicero's treatise on divination, as
well as the works of Hippocrates and Galen, should be so destitute of
information on the subject of a mode of cure which was of such long
standing, and so universally esteemed. From the two last, one should at
least have expected something more satisfactory: Cos being the
birthplace of the one, and Pergamus of the other.