d, that
consist of Words, Characters, Spells, and Charms, which can do no good
at all, but out of a strong conceit, as Pomponatius proves; or the
Devil's policy, who is the first founder and teacher of them."[90]

"To this kind," says Bingham, "belong all Ligatures and Remedies,
which the Schools of Physitians reject and condemn; whether in
Inchantments or in certain marks, which they call Characters, or in
some other things which are to be hanged and bound about the Body, and
kept in a dancing posture. Such are Ear-rings hanged upon the tip of
each ear, and Rings made of an Ostriche's bones for the Finger; or,
when you are told, in a fit of Convulsions or shortness of Breath, to
hold your left Thumb with your right hand."[91]

Unfortunately the wearing of amulets did not stop with the early
civilizations or even with the Middle Ages. People in our own
supposedly enlightened age indulge in them. The negro carries the hind
foot of a rabbit, and the children see great virtue in a four-leafed
clover; men carry luck pennies, and certain stones are worn in rings
and scarf pins; camphor is worn about the person to avert febrile
contagion, and anodyne necklaces of "Job's tears" and other equally
harmless and inefficacious substances are placed on babies to assist
them in teething. The camphor and necklaces are probably not supposed
to be endowed with magical power, but a mistaken medical virtue is
assigned to them.

There was neither rule nor reason for the composition of most amulets,
and one would have to be well acquainted with the superstitions of the
various ages to account for them. Sometimes the shape, rather than the
material of which they were composed or the inscription on them, was
the efficacious factor. Perhaps material, shape, and inscription would
be combined in one object; or many objects, each purporting to contain
magical properties, might be grouped for special efficacy, as when
inscribed pieces of different stones of peculiar shape were formed
into necklaces or bracelets.

Precious stones were often employed as amulets, and some even ground
them up and took them internally in order to be more sure of their
magical effects. "Butler quotes from Encelius, who says that the
Garnet, if hung about the neck or taken in drink, much assisteth
sorrow and recreates the heart; and the chrysolite is described as the
friend of wisdom and the enemy of folly. Renodeus admires precious
stones because they adorn king's