Page:On the Fourfold Root, and On the Will in Nature.djvu/366

 THE WILL IN NATURE.

is one of the commonest forms of this practice, and of this Bacon of Verulam, cautious and empirical though he was, attests the efficacy from personal experience. 1 The charming away of erisypelas [bacterial skin infection] in the face by a spell, is another instance, and so often succeeds, that it is easy to convince oneself of its existence. Fever, too, is often successfully combated by spells, &c. &c. 2 That, in all this, the real agents are not the meaningless words and ceremonies, but that it is the will of the operator which acts, as in Animal Magnetism, needs no further explanation after what has been said above. For such as are still unacquainted with charm-cures, instances may be found in Kieser. 3 These two facts therefore, Animal Magnetism and Charm-curing, bear empirical evidence to the possibility of magical, as opposed to physical, influence, which possibility had been so peremptorily rejected by the past century; since it refused to recognise as possible any other

1 Bacon, Silva Silvarum, § 997.

2 In the Times of June the 12th, 1855, we find, p. 10, the following :

" A Horse-charmer.

" On the voyage to England the ship Simla experienced some heavy weather in the Bay of Biscay, in which the horses suffered severely, and some, including a charger of General Scarlett, became unmanageable. A valuable mare was so very bad, that a pistol was got ready to shoot her and to end her misery; when a Russian officer recommended a Cossak prisoner to be sent for, as he was a juggler and could, by charms, cure any malady in a horse. He was sent for, and immediately said he could cure it at once. He was closely watched, but the only thing they could observe him do was to take his sash off and tie a knot in it three several times. However the mare, in a few minutes, got on her feet and began to eat heartily, and rapidly recovered." [Add. to 3rd ed.]

2 Kieser, Archiv für den thierischen Magnetismus, vol. v. heft 3, p. 106 ; vol. viii. heft 3, p. 145 ; vol. ix. heft 2, p. 172 ; and vol. ix. heft 1, p. 128; Dr. Most's book likewise: Über Sympathetische Mittel und Kuren, 1842, may be used as an introduction to this matter. (And even Pliny indicates a number of charm-cures in the 28th Book, chaps. 6 to 17. [Add. to 3rd ed.])

ANIMAL