is evident that the subject deserves more than a passing
consideration.

It would be vain to seek the origin of their employment, which lies
hidden behind the misty veil of remote antiquity. The eastern nations of
old, as is well known, were much addicted to the use of amulets; and
from Chaldea, Egypt, and Persia the practice was transmitted westward,
and was thus extended throughout the civilized world. Among the great
number of popular amulets in ancient times, many were fashioned out of
metals, ivory, stone, and wood, to represent deities, animals, birds,
and fishes; others were precious stones or cylinders inscribed with
hieroglyphics; necklaces of shell or coral, crescent- or hand-shaped
charms, and grotesque images. Their virtues were derived either from the
material, from the shape, or from the magic rites performed at the time
of their preparation. According to a popular belief, which prevailed
throughout the East in the earlier centuries of the Christian era, all
objects, whether inanimate stones and metals, or brutes and plants,
possessed an indwelling spirit or soul, which was the cause of the
efficiency of all amulets.[5:1] They were therefore akin to fetishes, in
the present acceptation of the term; for a fetish, as defined in the
classification of medicines and therapeutic agents in the collections of
the National Museum at Washington, D. C., is a material object supposed
to be the abode of a spirit, or representing a spirit, which may be
induced or compelled to help the possessor.

According to Juvenal ("Satires," Book III, v, 1), Grecian athletes wore
protective charms in the arena, to counterbalance the magical devices of
their opponents. It is probable that the ethics of modern athletic
contests would not countenance such expedients. But so implicit was the
confidence of the Roman citizen in his amulet, that a failure to avert
sickness or evil of any sort was not attributed to inherent lack of
power in the charm itself, but rather to some mistake in the method of
its preparation.[6:1]

In the time of the Emperor Hadrian (A. D. 76-138), and of his
successors, the Antonines, the resources of occult science, known only
to the initiated few, were believed to be sufficiently powerful, through
the agency of spells and charms, to control the actions of evil
spirits.[6:2] The early Christians readily adopted the pagan custom of
wearing amulets as remedies against disease, and as bodily safeguards,
in spite