itain claimed the ability
to cure diseases by stroking with the hand, and of these the most
notable was the celebrated Irish empiric, Valentine Greatrakes
(1628-1700).

It was asserted, moreover, by certain practitioners, that by magnetizing
a sword it could be made to cure any wound which the sword had
inflicted. And about the year 1625, Dr. Robert Fludd, an English
physician of learning and repute, introduced the famous "weapon-salve,"
which became immensely popular. Its ingredients consisted of moss
growing on the head of a thief who had been hanged, mummy dust, human
blood, suet, linseed oil, and Armenian bole, a species of clay. All
these were mixed thoroughly in a mortar. The sword, after being dipped
in the blood from the wound, was carefully anointed with the precious
mixture, and laid by in a cool place. Then the wound was cared for
according to the most approved surgical methods, with thorough cleansing
and bandaging.

The successful results naturally attending this treatment were
attributed by the _ignobile vulgus_ to the wonderful ointment. There
were sceptics who denied its efficacy, but the new remedy appealed to
the popular imagination. However, a certain Pastor Foster issued a
pamphlet entitled "A Spunge to wipe away the Weapon-Salve," which latter
the writer affirmed to be an invention of the Devil, who gave it to
Paracelsus, by whom it was bequeathed to the eminent Italian physician,
Giambattista della Porta, and finally was acquired by Doctor Fludd. In
reply to this attack, the latter published a vigorous refutation, under
the following caption: "The Squeezing of Parson Foster's Spunge, wherein
the Spunge-bearer's immodest carriage and behaviour towards his
brethren, is Detected; the Bitter Flames of his slanderous reports are,
by the sharp Vinegar of Truth, Corrected and quite Extinguished, and
lastly, the virtuous validity of his Spunge in wiping away the
Weapon-Salve, is crushed out and clean abolished."

In commenting on certain superstitious methods in surgery, which were in
vogue in the sixteenth century, the noted chemist and physician, Andrew
Libavius, a native of Halle, in Saxony, remarked that while wounds are
healed by nature, pretended magical remedies may be of use by directing
the natural forces to the spot, _through the imagination_.

Another favorite remedy, somewhat akin to the weapon-salve, was the
so-called "sympathetic powder," which was said to consist of sulphate of
copper p