These freaks of nature are equally extended to animate as to inanimate
bodies; and the human species, as well as the brute creation, affords
numerous specimens, not only of redundance and deficiency in her work,
but a variety of other phenomena not well understood. The march of
intellect, however, it is to be hoped, will be as successful in this
instance, as in obliterating the hobgoblins of astrologers and quacks
who so long have ruled the destiny and health of their less sagacious
fellow-creatures;--and when the public shall become persuaded of the
advantages which science may derive from occurrences similar to those we
shall enumerate in the next chapter, it will be more disposed to offer
them to the consideration of scientific men.

FOOTNOTES:

[114] The author of a book, entitled "_Talismans justifies_" pronounces
a talisman to be the seal, figure, character, or image of a heavenly
sign, constellation or planet, engraven on a sympathetic stone, or on a
metal corresponding to the star, etc. in order to receive its
influences.

[115] Acts of the Apostles, chap. xxviii. v. 3.

CHAPTER XIV.

ON THE MEDICINAL POWERS ATTRIBUTED TO MUSIC BY THE ANCIENTS.

The power of music over the human mind, as well as its influence on the
animal creation, has been variously attested; and its curative virtues
have been no less extolled by the ancients.[116] Martianus Capella assures
us, that fevers were removed by songs, and that Asclepiades cured
deafness by the sound of the trumpet. Wonderful indeed! that the same
noise which would occasion deafness in some, should be a specific for it
in others! It is making the viper cure its own bite. But, perhaps
Asclepiades was the inventor of the _acousticon_, or ear-trumpet, which
has been thought a modern discovery; or of the speaking-trumpet, which
is a kind of cure for distant deafness. These would be admirable proofs
of musical power![117] We have the testimony of Plutarch, and several
other ancient writers, that Thaletas the Cretan, delivered the
Lacedemonians from the pestilence by the sweetness of his lyre.

Xenocrates, as Martianus Capella further informs us, employed the sound
of instruments in the cure of maniacs; and Apollonius Dyscolus, in his
fabulous history (Historia Commentitia) tells us, from Theophrastus's
Treatise upon Enthusiasm, that music is a sovereign remedy for a
dejection of spirits, and disordered mind; and that the sound of the
flute will cure