V. Healers 110

VI. Talismans 138

VII. Amulets 158

VIII. Charms 189

IX. Royal Touch 224

X. Mesmer and After 249

XI. The Healers of the Nineteenth Century 273

Index 309

PREFACE

The present decade has experienced an intense interest in mental
healing. This has come as a culmination of the development along these
lines during the past half century. It has shown itself in the
beginning of new religious sects with this as a, or the, fundamental
tenet, in more wide-spread general movements, and in the scientific
study and application of the principles underlying this form of
therapeutics.

Many have been led astray because, being ignorant of the mental
healing movements and vagaries of the past, the late applications,
veiled in metaphysical or religious verbiage, have seemed to them to
be new in origin and principle. No one could consider an historical
survey of the subject and reasonably hold this opinion. It is on
account of the ignorance of similar movements, millenniums old, that
so much, if any, originality can be credited to the founders.

The object of this volume is to present a general view of mental
healing, dealing more especially with the historical side of the
subject. While this is divided topically, the topics are presented in
a comparatively chronological order, and thereby trace the development
of the subject to the present century.

The term "mental healing" is given the broadest possible use, and
comprehends any cures which may be brought about by the effect of the
mind over the body, regardless of whether the power back of the cure
is supposed to be deity, demons, other human beings, or the individual
mind of the patient.

It is hoped that this may contribute to the knowledge of a subject
which is of such wide-spread popular interest.

George Barton Cutten.

Wolfville, Nova Scotia,
_December 1, 1910._

ILLUSTRATIONS

Bas-relief representing the Gallic AEsculapius
dispatching a demon _Frontispiece_

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Cure through the Interces