Ecclesfield, April 24. 1850.
_Charms._--I beg to represent to the correspondents of the "NOTES AND
QUERIES," especially to the clergy and medical men resident in the
country, that notices of the superstitious practices still prevalent, or
recently prevalent, in different parts of the kingdom, for the cure of
diseases, are highly instructive and even valuable, on many accounts.
Independently of their archæological {430} interest as illustrations of
the mode of thinking and acting of past times, they become really
valuable to the philosophical physician, as throwing light on the
natural history of diseases. The prescribers and practisers of such
"charms," as well as the lookers-on, have all unquestionable evidence of
the _efficacy_ of the prescriptions, in a great many cases: that is to
say, the diseases for which the charms are prescribed _are cured_; and,
according to the mode of reasoning prevalent with prescribers, orthodox
and heterodox, they must be cured by them,--_post hoc ergo propter hoc_.
Unhappily for the scientific study of diseases, the universal
interference of ART _in an active form_ renders it difficult to meet
with _pure specimens_ of corporeal maladies; and, consequently, it is
often difficult to say whether it is nature or art that must be credited
for the event. This is a positive misfortune, in a scientific point of
view. Now, as there can be no question as to the non-efficiency of
_charms_ in a material or physical point of view (their action through
the imagination is a distinct and important subject of inquiry), it
follows that every disease getting well in the practice of the charmer,
is curable and cured by Nature. A faithful list of such cases could not
fail to be most useful to the scientific inquirer, and to the progress
of truth; and it is therefore that I am desirous of calling the
attention of your correspondents to the subject. As a general rule, it
will be found that the diseases in which charms have obtained most fame
as curative are those of long duration, not dangerous, yet not at all,
or very slightly, benefited by ordinary medicines. In such cases, of
course, there is not room for the display of an imaginary
agency:--"For," as Crabbe says,--and I hope your medical readers will
pardon the irreverence--
"For NATURE then has time to work _her_ way;
And doing nothing often has prevailed,
When ten physicians have prescribed, and failed."
The notice in your last Number respecting the cure of hooping-cough, is
a capital example of what has just been stated; and I doubt not but many
of your correspondents could supply numerous prescriptions equally
scientific and equally effective. On a future occasion, I will myself
furnish you with some; but as I have already trespassed so far on your
space, I will conclude by naming a few diseases in which the charmers
may be expected to charm most wisely and well. They will all be found to
come within the category of the diseases characterised above:--Epilepsy,
St. Vitus's Dance (_Chorea_), Hysteria, Toothache, Warts, Ague, Mild
Skin-diseases, Tic Douloureux, Jaundice, Asthma, Bleeding from the Nose,
St. Anthony's Fire or The Rose (_Erysipelas_), King's Evil (_Scrofula_),
Mumps, Rheutmatic Pains, &c., &c.