The external use of the magnet, to cure the tooth-ache and other
disorders, is a remedy brought into fashion in modern times, but
not a new discovery, as supposed by Lessing, who ascribes it to
Paracelsus[93]. It was known to Aëtius, who lived so early as the year
500. That author says, “We are assured that those who are troubled
with the gout in their hands or their feet, or with convulsions, find
relief when they hold a magnet in their hand[94].” He does not however
give any proof of this from his own experience: and perhaps he doubted
the truth of it. The above passage contains the oldest account known at
present respecting this virtue; for the more ancient writers speak only
of the internal use of the magnet.
It is evident therefore that this cure has not been discovered in later
times, but that it has been preserved by the old physicians copying
it from each other into their works. In like manner, many things are
mentioned in the Materia Medica which were used or proposed by the
ancients, but into the properties of which they never made sufficient
inquiry.
Paracelsus recommended the magnet in a number of diseases, as fluxes,
hæmorrhages, &c. Marcellus, who lived in the fifteenth century, assures
us that it cures the tooth-ache[95]. The same virtue is ascribed to
it by Leonard Camillus[96], who lived in the sixteenth century: and
Wecker[97], who was nearly co-temporary, says that the magnet when
applied to the head, cures the head-ache; and adds that Holler had
taken this cure from the works of the ancients[98]. We read also
in Porta[99], that it was recommended for the head-ache; and in
Kircher[100], that it was worn about the neck as a preventive against
convulsions, and affections of the nerves. About the end of the 17th
century magnetic tooth-picks and ear-pickers were made, and extolled as
a secret preventive against pains in the teeth, eyes and ears[101].
[In addition to these external uses of the magnet, in which it was
supposed to act by a peculiar power over the nervous system, it
has been employed on account of its true magnetic properties. Thus
Kirkringius, Fabricius Hildanus, and subsequently Morgagni, have used
it to remove particles of iron which had accidentally fallen into
the eyes. Kircher employed it also to cure hernia. The patient took
iron-filings internally; and the loadstone in the state of powder mixed
with some vegetable substance, thus forming a magnetic plaster, was
applied to the hernia. Even Ambrose Paré states on the authority of a
surgeon, that several patients had been thus cured.
About the 16th and early in the 17th century, two cases occurred,
one near Prague in Bohemia, the other in Prussia, in which a knife
was swallowed, but it unfortunately got too far and passed into the
stomach. By the application of these magnetic plasters, the point
became attracted towards the surface, so that it could be removed by
incision[102].
In the 18th century, after the properties of magnets had begun to be
scientifically investigated, they were made of various forms and their
effects studied in numerous parts of Europe, and many treatises were
published on their supposed properties. Perhaps the most important
and best authenticated, are those of MM. Audry and Thouret. These
experimenters believed that they were effective agents.
Since that time, the use of magnets as remedial agents has been almost
entirely laid aside and forgotten, it having been found that no
constancy was exhibited in the results of their application, and that
their occasional supposed efficacy depended upon other circumstances,
which were overlooked from the sufferers’ attention being engrossed by
the magnet. The application of the magnet to remove small particles of
iron or steel which have accidentally fallen into the eyes, has been
lately revived. In some manufactories, where these minute particles
are constantly thrown off in the grinding of hardware and driven into
the eyes, large magnets are kept fixed at a proper height, so that the
workmen can resort to them immediately. Such is the case for instance
at Fairbairne in Belgium, and we believe the same has been adopted in
some of our own manufactories to catch the floating particles, and
thus to prevent their being drawn into the lungs during respiration.
The reader may form some idea of the effective manner in which magnets
can be applied, from the following incident which occurred to Prof.
Faraday, whilst experimenting with a powerful (electro-) magnet; an
iron candlestick which happened to be standing near its poles on the
table at which he was at work flew to them, attracted with such
violence as to displace or break everything in its way.
In the 18th century, a new supposed magnetic power was discovered,
and with various success has continued to be applied to the delusion
of the public. About 1770, Father Hehl, a jesuit, the Professor of
Astronomy at Vienna, who had great faith in the influence of the
loadstone on human diseases, and had invented steel plates of a
peculiar form, which he impregnated with magnetic virtues and applied
to the cure of diseases, communicated his discoveries to Anton Mesmer,
who subsequently invented animal magnetism or mesmerism. Mesmer made
use of his friend Hehl’s plates to employ the magnet according to
certain notions of his own. In his subsequent experiments magnets were
gradually dispensed with, and as practised in modern times, they have
been found unnecessary. Hence mesmerism or animal magnetism has no
relation to the magnetism of the magnet, and may therefore form the
subject of a future article.
About the year 1798, a man named Perkins invented a method of treating
various diseases with metallic bars called tractors; these were applied
to and drawn over various parts of the body, and were supposed to cure
numerous maladies, such as ulcers, head-aches, &c. These instruments
were patented. A few years afterwards, Dr. Falconer had wooden tractors
made so exactly to resemble those of Perkins, that they could not be
distinguished by the eye; on employing these on a large scale at the
Bath hospital, he found that exactly the same effects and cures were
produced by one as the other. Since that time these tractors have
hardly been heard of, and are now forgotten.
Quite recently, a new means has been contrived in England for deluding
the public, in the form of rings, which are to be worn upon the fingers
or toes, and are said to prevent the occurrence of, and cure various
diseases. They are called galvanic rings. But this invention may be
with propriety classed with the real magnet, animal magnetism and
tractation.
What has been stated relative to the metallic tractors, equally
applies to the magnetic rings; for although by the contact of the two
metals of which they are composed an infinitesimally minute current
of electricity, hence also of magnetism, is generated, still from the
absurd manner in which the pieces of metal composing the ring are
arranged, and which displays the most profound ignorance of the laws of
electricity and magnetism, no trace of the minute current traverses the
finger or toe on which the ring is worn; so that a wooden, any other
ring, or none at all, would have exactly the same effect, as regards
the magnetism or galvanism.]