Identifier: funnysideofphysi01unse (find matches)
Title: The funny side of physic : or, The mysteries of medicine, presenting the humorous and serious sides of medical practice. An exposé of medical humbugs, quacks, and charlatans in all ages and all countries
Year: 1874 (1870s)
Authors: Crabtre, A. D.(Addison Darre)
Subjects: Medicine Medicine Quacks and quackery Quackery
Publisher: Hartford, The J. B. Burr publishing co.
Contributing Library: Yale University, Cushing/Whitney Medical Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Open Knowledge Commons and Yale University, Cushing/Whitney Medical Library

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who waited the kings touch reallybelieved that he solicits Heaven. Hence the cure. Thecoin which he hung about the neck of these strangely vis-ited people, all swollen and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,called their attention continually to the healing benedic-tion. Pyrrhus, who was placed upon the throne by force ofarms B. C. 306, was said, to cure the evil by the graceof God. Valentine, who only held his throne — A. D. 375— by the help of Theodosius, not by the grace of God —claimed to cure scrofula by the latter power, as did ValentineII., whose wicked temper ended his life in a fit of passion. The subject of the following sketch claimed also divinepower : — Herr Gassner. The Devil understands Latin. It seems from the following truthful account of HerrGassner, a clergyman at Elwangen, that the devil can under-stand Latin, as well as quote Scripture. About the year1758 this clergyman became so celebrated in curing diseasesby animal magnetism, that the people came flocking from
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THE DEVIL UNDERSTANDS LATIN. 471 Switzerland, the Tyrol, and Swabia, in great numbers, tobe cured of all sorts of ailments, a thousand persons arrivingat a time who had to lodge in tents, as the town could notlddge them all. His modus operandi was as follows. Dressed in a longscarlet cloak, a silken sash about his loins, a chain about hisneck, and wearing, or holding in one hand, a crucifix, andtouching with the other the diseased part, and in the Latintongue commanding the disease, or the evil spirit, which-ever the case was termed, to depart, in the name of JesusChrist, the patient was usually healed. Dr. Schlisel says,that Gassner spoke chiefly in Latin, in his operations, andthe devil is said to have understood him perfectly. The Austrian government gave him its assistance. Theexcitement became great. Elwangen was overcrowded bypeople, rich and poor. Riches flowed into the coffers of itstrades-people, though Gassner took nothing directly for hiscures. Hundreds of patients arrived

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