The Project Gutenberg EBook of Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery, by
Robert Means Lawrence

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery

Author: Robert Means Lawrence

Release Date: November 2, 2007 [EBook #23293]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PSYCHO-THERAPY AND QUACKERY ***

Produced by Chris Curnow, Fox in the Stars, Michael Zeug,
Lisa Reigel, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
at http://www.pgdp.net

Transcriber's Notes: [Rx] in this text represents the symbol used today
to designate a prescription. [ounce] represents a symbol for ounce, a
symbol that looks like a short 7 on top of a 3. Words in Greek in the
original are transliterated and placed between +plus signs+. Words
italicized in the original are surrounded by _underscores_. A complete
list of corrections follows the text.

PRIMITIVE PSYCHO-THERAPY
AND QUACKERY

BY

ROBERT MEANS LAWRENCE, M.D.
AUTHOR OF "THE MAGIC OF THE HORSE-SHOE," ETC.

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge
1910

COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY ROBERT MEANS LAWRENCE

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

_Published October 1910_

They have observed but little, who have not remarked how much
Imagination contributes to give success to the curative power
of a medicine.
VICESIMUS KNOX, D.D.
_Winter Evenings_, I, p. 154.

The mind has the same command over the body, as the master
over the slave.
ARISTOTLE.

PREFACE

Certain historic modes of healing, including the use of medical amulets
and charms, which have been regarded from early times as magical
remedies, belong properly to the domain of Psychical Medicine. For the
therapeutic virtues of medical amulets are not inherent in these
objects, but are due to the influence exerted by them upon the
imaginative faculties of the individuals who employ them. They afford
powerful suggestions of healing. In this volume the writer has sought to
emphasize the fact that the efficiency of many pri