ON AMULETS, CHARMS, TALISMANS--PHILTERS, THEIR ORIGIN AND IMAGINARY
EFFICACY, ETC.
Amulets are certain substances worn about the neck or other parts of the
body, under the superstitious impression of preventing diseases, of
curing, or removing them.
The origin of amulets may be traced to the most remote ages of mankind.
In our researches to discover and fix the period when remedies were
first employed for the alleviation of bodily suffering, we are soon lost
in conjecture or involved in fable. We are unable, indeed, to reach the
period in any country, when the inhabitants were destitute of medical
resources, and even among the most uncultivated tribes we find medicine
cherished as a blessing and practised as an art. The feelings of the
sufferer, and the anxiety of those about him, must, in the rudest state
of society, have incited a spirit of industry and research to procure
ease, the modification of heat and cold, of moisture and dryness; and
the regulation and change of diet and habit, must intuitively have
suggested themselves for the relief of pain; and when these resources
failed, charms, amulets, and incantations, were the natural expedients
of the barbarians, ever more inclined to indulge the delusive hope of
superstition than to listen to the voice of sober reason.
Traces of amulets may be discovered in very early history, though Dr.
Warburton is evidently in error when he fixes the origin of these
magical instruments to the age of the Ptolomies, which was not more than
three hundred years before Christ. This assertion is refuted by Galen,
who informs us the Egyptian King Nechepsus, who lived 630 years before
Christ, had written, that a green jasper cut into the form of a dragon
surrounded with rays, if applied externally, would strengthen the
stomach and organs of digestion. This opinion, moreover, is supported by
scripture: for what were the earrings which Jacob buried under the oak
of Sechem, as related in Genesis, but amulets. And Josephus in his
antiquities of the Jews,[110] informs us that Solomon discovered a plant
efficacious in the cure of epilepsy, and that he employed the aid of a
charm, for the purposes of assisting its virtues. The root of the herb
was concealed in a ring, which was applied to the nostrils of the
demoniac; and Josephus remarks that he saw himself a Jewish priest
practise the art of Solomon with complete success in the presence of the
Emperor Vespasian, his sons and the tribunes of the Roman army. From
this art of Solomon, exhibited through the medium of a ring or seal, we
have the Eastern stories which celebrate the seal of Solomon, and record
the potency of his sway over the various orders of demons or of genii,
who were supposed to be the invincible tormentors or benefactors of the
human race.
Nor were such means confined to dark and barbarous ages. Theophrastus
pronounced Pericles to be insane in consequence of seeing him with an
amulet suspended from his neck. And in the declining era of the Roman
Empire, we find this superstitious custom so general that the Emperor
Caracalla was induced to make a public edict, ordering, that no man
should wear any superstitious amulets about his person.
All remedies working as it were sympathetically, and plainly unequal to
the effect, may be termed amulets; whether used at a distance by another
person, or carried immediately about the patient. By the Jews, amulets
were called _kamea_, and by the Greeks _phylacteries_. The latins called
them _amuleta_ or _ligatura_; the catholics _agnus dei_, or consecrated
relics; and the natives of Guinea _fetishes_. Various kinds of
substances are employed by different people, and which they venerate and
suppose capable of preserving them from danger and infection, as well as
to remove disease when present. Plutarch says of Pericles, an Athenian
general, that when a friend come to see him, and inquired after his
health he reached out his hand and shewed him his amulet; by which he
meant to intimate the truth of his illness, and, at the same time, the
confidence he placed in these popular remedies.
Amulets are still prevalent in catholic countries at the present day;
the Spaniards and Portuguese maintain their popularity. Among the Jews
they are equally venerated. Indeed, there are few instances of ancient
superstition some portion of which has not been preserved, and not
unfrequently have they been adopted by men of otherwise good
understanding, who plead in excuse, that they are innoxious, cost
little, and if they can do no good, they can do no harm.
Lord Bacon, whom no one can suspect of ignorance, says, that if a man
wear a bone ring or a planet seal, strongly believing, by that means,
that he might obtain his mistress, and that it would preserve him unhurt
at sea, or in a battle, it would probably make him more active and less
timid; as the audacity they might inspire would conquer and bind weaker
minds in the execution of a peculiar duty.
AMULETS USED BY THE COMMON PEOPLE.
A variety of things are worn about the person by the common people for
the cure of ague; and, upon whatever principle it may be accounted for,
whether by the imagination or a natural termination of the disease, many
have apparently been cured by them, where the Peruvian bark, the boasted
specific, had previously failed. Dr. Willis says that charms resisting
agues have often been applied to the wrist with success. ABRACADABRA,
written in a peculiar manner, that is, in the form of a cone, it is
said, has cured the ague; the herb lunaria, gathered by moon-light, has,
on some high authorities, performed surprising cures. Perhaps it was
gathered during the invocating influence of the following charm, which
may be found in the 12th book, chap. XIV. p. 177 of "Scot's discovery of
witchcraft," which is headed thus:--
"_Another charme that witches use at the gathering of
their medicinal herbs._"
Haile be thou holy herbe,
Growing in the ground.
And in the mount Calvaire
First wert thou found.
Thou art good for many a sore,
And healest many a wound,
In the name of sweet Jesus
I take thee from the ground.
We are told that Naaman was cured by dipping seven times in the river
Jordan. Certain formalities were also performed at the pool of Bethesda.
Dr. Chamberlayne's anodyne necklaces, were, for a length of time,
objects of the most anxious maternal solicitude, until their occult
virtues became lost by the reverence for them being destroyed; and those
which succeeded them have long since run their race or nearly so.
The grey limewort was at one time supposed to have been a specific in
hydrophobia--that it not only cured those labouring under this disorder,
but by carrying it about the person, it was reputed to possess the
extraordinary power of preventing mad dogs from biting them. Calvert
paid devotions to St. Hubert for the recovery of his son, who was cured
by this means. The son also performed the necessary rites at the shrine,
and was cured not only of the hydrophobia "but of the worser phrensy
with which his father had instilled him." Cramp-rings were also used;
and eelskins to this day are tied round the legs as a preventive of this
spasmodic affection; and by laying sticks across the floor, on going to
bed, cramp has also been prevented.
Numerous are the charms and incantations used at the present day for the
removal of warts, many cases of which are not a little surprising. And
we are told by Lord Verulam, who is allowed to have been as great a
genius as this country ever produced, that, when he was at Paris, he had
above a hundred warts on his hands; and that the English ambassador's
lady, then at court, and a woman far above superstition, removed them
all by only rubbing them with the fat side of the rind of a piece of
bacon, which they afterwards nailed to a post, with the fat side towards
the south. In five weeks, says my Lord, they were all removed. The
following are his Lordship's observations, in his own words, relative to
the power of amulets. After deep metaphysical observations on nature,
and arguing in mitigation of sorcery, witchcraft, and divination,
effects that far outstrip the belief in amulets, he observes "We should
not reject all of this kind, because it is not known how far those
contributing to superstition, depend on natural causes. Charms have not
the power from contract with evil spirits, but proceed wholly from
strengthening the imagination: in the same manner that images and their
influence, have prevailed on religion, being called from a different way
of use and application, sigils, incantations, and spells."
ECCENTRICITIES, CAPRICES, AND EFFECTS, OF THE IMAGINATION.
A certain writer, apologizing for the irregularities of great genii,
delivers himself as follows: "The gifts of imagination bring the
heaviest task upon, the vigilance of reason; and to bear those faculties
with unerring rectitude or invariable propriety, requires a degree of
firmness and of cool attention, which does not always attend the higher
gifts of the mind. Yet, difficult as nature herself seems to have
reduced the task of regularity to genius, it is the supreme consolation
of dullness, to seize upon those excesses, which are the overflowings of
faculties they never enjoyed."[111] Are not the _gifts of imagination_
mistaken here for the strength of passions? Doubtless, where strong
passions accompany great parts, as perhaps they often do, the
imagination may encrease their force and activity: but, where passions
are calm and gentle, imagination of itself should seem to have no
conflict but speculatively with reason. There, indeed, it wages an
eternal war; and, if not contracted and strictly regulated, it will
carry the patient into endless extravagancies. The term patient is here
properly used, because men, under the influence of imagination, are most
truly distempered. The degree of this distemper will be in proportion to
the prevalence of imagination over reason, and, according to this
proportion, amount to more or less of the whimsical; but when reason
shall become, as it were, extinct, and imagination govern alone, then
the distemper will be madness under the wildest and most fantastic
modes. Thus, one of those invalids, perhaps, shall be all sorrow for
having been most unjustly deprived of the crown; though his vocation,
poor man! be that of a school-master. Another, like Horace's madman, is
all joy; and it may seem even cruelty to cure him.
The operations and caprices of the imagination are various and endless;
and, as they cannot be reduced to regularity or system, so it is highly
improbable that any certain method of cure should ever be found out for
them. It has generally been thought, that matter of fact might most
successfully be opposed to the delusions of imagination, as being proof
to the senses, and carrying conviction unavoidably to the understanding;
but we rather suspect, that the understanding or reasoning faculty, has
little to do in all these cases: at least so it should seem from the two
following facts, which are by no means badly attested.
Fienus, in his curious little book, _de Viribus Imaginationis_, records
from Donatus the case of a man, who fancied his body encreased to such a
size, that he durst not attempt to pass through the door of his chamber.
The physician believing that nothing could more effectually cure this
error of imagination, than to shew that the thing could actually be
done, caused the patient to be thrust forcibly through it: who, struck
with horror, and falling suddenly into agonies, complained of being
crushed to pieces, and expired soon after.[112]
The other case, as related by Van Swieten, in his commentaries upon
Boerhaave, is that of a learned man, who had studied, till be fancied
his legs to be of glass: in consequence of which he durst not attempt to
stir, but was constantly under anxiety about them. His maid bringing one
day some wood to the fire, threw it carelessly down; and was severely
reprimanded by her master, who was terrified not a little for his legs
of glass. The surly wench, out of all patience with his megrims, as she
called them, gave him a blow with a log upon the parts affected; which
so enraged him, that he instantly rose up, and from that moment
recovered the use of his legs.--Was reason concerned any more here; or
was it not rather one blind impulse acting against another?
Imagination has, unquestionably, a most powerful effect upon the mind,
and in all these miraculous cures, is by far the strongest ingredient.
Dr. Strother says, "The influence of the mind and passions works upon
the mind and body in sensible operations like a medicine, and is of far
the greater force than exercise. The countenance betrays a good or
wicked intention; and that good or wicked intention will produce in
different persons a strength to encounter, or a weakness to yield to the
preponderating side." Dr. Brown says, "Our looks discover our passions,
there being mystically in our faces certain characters, which carry in
them the motto of our souls, and, therefore, probably work secret
effects in other parts." This idea is beautifully illustrated by Garth
in his Dispensatory, in the following lines:--
"Thus paler looks impetuous rage proclaim,
And chilly virgins redden into flame.
See envy oft transformed in wan disguise,
And mirth sits gay and smiling in the eyes,
Oft our complexions do the soul declare,
And tell what passions in the features are.
Hence 'tis we look the wond'rous cause to find,
How body acts upon impassive mind."
On the power and pleasure of the imagination, from the pleasures and
pains it administers here below, Addison concludes that God, who knows
all the ways of afflicting us, may so transport us hereafter with such
beautiful and glorious visions, or torment us with such hideous and
ghastly spectres, as might even of themselves suffice to make up the
entire heaven or hell of any future being.
DOCTRINE OF EFFLUVIA--MIRACULOUS CURES BY MEANS OF CHARMS, AMULETS,
ETC.
Dr. Willis, in his Treatise on nervous disorders, does not hesitate to
recommend amulets in epileptic disorders. "Take," says he, "some fresh
peony roots, cut them into square bits, and hang them round the neck,
changing them as often as they dry." It is not improbable that the hint
was taken from this circumstance for the anodyne necklaces, which, some
time ago, were in such repute, as the Doctor, some little way further
on, prescribes the same root for the looseness, fevers, and convulsions
of children, during the time of teething, mixed, to make it appear more
miraculous, with some elk's hoof.
St. Vitus's dance is said to have been cured by the afflicted person
paying a visit to the tomb of the saint, near Ulm, every May. Indeed,
there is no little reason in this assertion; for exercise and change of
air will change many obstinate diseases. The bite of the tarantula is
cured by music; and this only by certain tunes. Turner, whose ideas are
so extravagantly absurd, where he asserts, that the symptoms of
hydrophobia may not appear for forty years after the bite of the dog,
and who maintains that "the slaver or breath of such a dog is
infectious;" and that men bitten by mad dogs, will bite like dogs again,
and die mad; although he laughs at the anodyne necklaces, argues much in
the same manner. It is not, indeed, so very strange that the effluvia
from external medicines entering our bodies, should effect such
considerable changes, when we see the efficient cause of apoplexy,
epilepsy, hysterics, plague, and a number of other disorders, consists,
as it were, in imperceptible vapours.--Blood-stone (Lapis Aetites)
fastened to the arm by some secret means, is said to prevent abortion.
Sydenham, in the iliac passion, orders a live kitten to be constantly
applied to the abdomen; others have used pigeons split alive, applied to
the soles of the feet, with success, in pestilential fevers and
convulsions. It was doubtless the impression that relief might be
obtained by external agents, that the court of king David advised him to
seek a young virgin, in order that a portion of the natural heat might
be communicated to his body, and give strength to the decay of nature.
"Take the heart and liver of the fish and make a smoke, and the devil
shall smell it and flee away." During the plague at Marseilles, which
Belort attributed to the larvae of worms infecting the saliva, food, and
chyle; and which, he says, "were hatched by the stomach, took their
passage into the blood, at a certain size, hindering the circulation,
affecting the juices and solid parts." He advised amulets of mercury to
be worn in bags suspended at the chest and nostrils, either as a
safeguard, or as means of cure; by which method, through the
_admissiveness_ of the pores, effluvia specially destructive of all
venomous insects, were received into the blood. "An illustrious prince,"
Belort says, "by wearing such an amulet, escaped the small-pox."
Clognini, an Italian physician, ordered two or three drachms of crude
mercury to be worn as a defensive against the jaundice; and also as a
preservative against the noxious vapours of inclement seasons: "It
breaks," he observes, "and conquers the different figured seeds of
pestilential distempers floating in the air; or else, mixing with the
air, kills them where hatched." By others, the power of mercury, in
these cases, has been ascribed to an elective faculty given out by the
warmth of the body, which draws out the contagious particles. For,
according to this entertained notion, all bodies are continually
emitting effluvia, more or less, around them, and some whether they are
internal or external. The Bath waters, for instance, change the colour
of silver in the pocket of those who use them. Mercury produces the same
effect; Tartar emetic, rubbed on the pit of the stomach, produces
vomiting. Yawning and laughing are infectious; so are fear and shame.
The sight of sour things, or even the idea of them, will set the teeth
on edge. Small-pox, itch, and other diseases, are contagious; if so, say
they, mercurial amulets bid fair to destroy the germ of some complaints
when used only as an external application, either by manual attrition,
or worn as an amulet. But medicated or not, all amulets are precarious
and uncertain, and in the cure of diseases are, by no means, to be
trusted to.
The Barbary Moors, and generally throughout the Mahommedan dominions,
the people are strikingly attached to charms, to which, and nature, they
leave the cure of almost every disorder; and this is the most strongly
impressed upon them from their belief in predestination, which,
according to their creed, stipulates the evil a man is to suffer, as
well as the length of time it is ordained he should live upon the land
of his forefathers; consequently they imagine that any interference from
secondary means would avail them nothing, an opinion said to have been
entertained by William III, but one by no means calculated for nations,
liberty, and commerce; upon the principle that when the one was
entrenched upon, men would probably be more sudden in their revenge, and
dislike physic and occupation; and when actuated with religious
enthusiasm, nothing could stand them in any service.
The opinion of an old navy surgeon,[113] on the subject, is worth
recording here. "A long and intense passion on one object, whether of
pride, love, fear, anger, or envy, we see have brought on some universal
tremors; on others, convulsions, madness, melancholy, consumption,
hectics, or such a chronical disorder as has wasted their flesh, or
their strength, as certainly as the taking in of any poisonous drugs
would have done. Anything frightful, sudden, or surprising, upon soft,
timorous natures, not only shews itself in the continuance, but produces
sometimes very troublesome consequences--for instance, a parliamentary
fright will make even grown men _bewray_ themselves, scare them out of
their wits, turn the hair grey. Surprise removes the hooping cough;
looking from precipices or seeing wheels turn swiftly will give
giddiness. Shall then these little accidents, or the passions, (from
caprice or humour, perhaps,) produce those effects, and not be able to
do anything by amulets? No; as the spirits, in many cases, resort in
plenty, we find where the fancy determines, giving joy and gladness to
the heart, strength and fleetness to the limbs, and violent
palpitations. To amulets, under strong imagination, is carried with more
force to a distempered part, and, under these circumstances, its natural
powers exert better to a discussion.
"The cures compassed in this manner," says our author, "are not more
admirable than many of the distempers themselves. Who can apprehend by
what impenetrable method the bite of a mad dog, or tarantula, can
produce these symptoms? The touch of a torpedo numbness? If they are
allowed to do these, doubtless they may the other; and not by miracles,
which Spinoza denies the possibility of, but by natural and regular
causes, though inscrutable to us. The best way, therefore, in using
amulets, must be in squaring them to the imagination of patients: let
the newness and surprise exceed the invention, and keep up the humour by
a long scroll of cures and vouchers; by these and such means, many
distempers have been cured. Quacks again, according to their boldness
and way of addressing (velvet and infallibility particularly) command
success by striking the fancies of an audience. If a few, more sensible
than the rest, see the doctor's miscarriages, and are not easily gulled
at first sight, yet, when they see a man is never ashamed, in time, jump
in to his assistance."
There is much truth and pertinence in some of the above remarks, and
they apply nearly to the general practice of the present day. The farces
and whims of people require often as much discrimination on the part of
the physician as the disease itself. Those who know best how to flatter
such caprices, are frequently the best paid for their trouble. Nervous
diseases are always in season, and it is here that some professional
dexterity is pardonable. Nature, when uninterrupted, will often do more
than art; but our inability upon all occasions to appreciate the efforts
of nature in the cure of diseases, must always render our notion, with
respect to the powers faith, liable to numerous errors and deceptions.
There is, in fact, nothing more natural, and at the same time more
erroneous, than to lay the cure of a disease to the door of the last
medicine that had been prescribed. By these means the advocates of
amulets and charms, have ever been enabled to appeal to the testimony of
what they are pleased to call experience in justification of their
pretensions, and egregious superstitions; and cases which, in truth,
ought to have been classed, or rather designated, as lucky escapes, have
been triumphantly pulled off as skilful cures; and thus, medicines and
medical practitioners, have alike received the meed of unmerited praise,
or the stigma of unjust censure. Of all branches of human science,
medicine is one of the most interesting to mankind: and, accordingly as
it is erroneously or judiciously cultivated, is evidently conducive to
the prejudice or welfare of the public. Of how great consequence is it,
then, that our endeavours should be exerted in stemming the propagation
of errors, whether arising from ignorance, or prompted by motives of
base cupidity, in giving assistance to the disseminations of useful
truths, and to the perfection of ingenious discoveries.
FOOTNOTES:
[110] Lib. viii. chap. 2. 5.
[111] Langhorne's Life of Mr. Collins
[112] Reverii Praxis Medica, p. 188.
[113] John Ailkin, author of the Navy Surgeon, 1742. Sec Demonologia, p.
64 et seg.