undred and forty thousand miles, shall, in one position, act
advantageously upon the vegetation of _beans_, and that in the opposite
position, and at the same distance, she shall be propitious to
_lentils_."

Dr. Lardner gives numerous and extended illustrations of the supposed
influence of the moon on the growth of grain, on wine-making,[38] on the
color of the complexion, on putrefaction, on the size of shell-fish, on
the quantity of marrow in the bones of animals, on the number of births,
on mental derangement, and other human maladies, etc., etc.

[38] On this subject the prevailing opinions in different countries
disagree, as they do also on some of the others.

The influence on the phenomena of human maladies imputed to the moon is
very ancient. Hippocrates had so strong a faith in the influence of
celestial objects upon animated beings, that he expressly recommends no
physician to be trusted who is ignorant of astronomy. Galen, following
Hippocrates, maintained the same opinion, especially of the influence of
the moon. The critical days, or _crises_, were the seventh, fourteenth,
and twenty-first of the disease, corresponding to the intervals between
the moon's principal phases. While the doctrine of alchemists
prevailed, the human body was considered as a microcosm, or an epitome
of the universe, the heart representing the sun, and the brain the moon.
The planets had each his proper influence: Jupiter presided over the
lungs, Saturn over the spleen, Venus over the kidneys, and Mercury over
the organs of generation. The term _lunacy_, which still designates
unsoundness of mind, is a relic of these grotesque notions, and is
defined by Dr. Webster as "a species of insanity or madness, formerly
supposed to be influenced by the moon, or periodical in the month." But
even this term may now be said, in some degree, to be banished from the
nomenclature of medicine; it has, however, taken refuge in that
receptacle of all antiquated absurdities of phraseology--the
law--lunatic being still the term for the subject who is incapable of
managing his own affairs.

Sanctorius, whose name is celebrated in physics for the invention of the
thermometer, held it as a principle that a healthy man gained two
pounds' weight at the beginning of every lunar month, which he lost
toward its completion. This opinion appears to have been founded on
experiments made upon himself, and affords another instance of a
fortuitous coinci