Τὴν δ᾿ἀπαμειζόμενος προσεφη Πολυμητις Ὀδυσσευς Πυρ νυ̃ν μοι πρώτιστον ἐνὶ μεγάροισι γενέσθω. Ως ἔφαθ’. ουδ’ἀπιθησε φιλη τροφος Ἐυρυκλειος Ἠνεγκεν δ᾿ ἄρα πυρ και θηιον. αυταρ Ὀδυσσευς Ἒυ διεθέιωσεν μέγαρον και δῶμα και ἀυλήν. ΟΜΗΡ. ΟΔΥΣ. Χ. Bring sulphur straight, and fire, the Monarch cries; She heard, and at the word obedient flies. With fire and sulphur, cure of noxious fumes, He purg’d the walls and blood-polluted rooms. POPE. This practice was probably founded in superstition, rather than the knowledge of nature. That some divine influence should be ascribed to fire was very natural, as the principal deities of the ancients were only personifications of the elements; and it is worthy of remark, that their name for sulphur signifies _something divine_ το θεῖον, which was probably owing to its being found in those chasms of the earth, in Sicily and Italy, which were supposed to communicate with the infernal regions; for the whole Greek mythology relating to these was taken from the phænomena attending the subterraneous fires in those parts. It is curious farther to remark, in other instances, how facts useful to mankind, the truth of which has been confirmed in later times by the more enlightened knowledge of nature, were first suggested by some superstitious circumstance. Thus the wound received by Sarpedon could not be cured, according to the Poet, till, by divine intimation, he was desired to apply to it the rust of the spear with which it had been inflicted, in consequence of which it healed. But the weapons in those days were made of brass, so that the rust of the spear must have been the _ærugo æris_, which has been found by the experience of modern surgery to be one of the best detergents in ill-conditioned sores. It is probably, from a false analogy, founded on some such incident, that an idea prevails among the vulgar, which has become proverbial, that some part taken from the offending body is good in all external injuries. Thus some part of a mad dog is said to have a virtue in curing his bite. Herein may be seen the difference of that knowledge which is suggested by superstition, and that which is acquired by the observation of nature. [54] A loggerhead is a large round mass of iron, with a long handle to it. [55] A fact, related in Anson’s Voyage, is also strongly in proof of the same opinion. When the rich Spanish prize was taken, it was necessary to crowd the prisoners into the hold, for fear of an insurrection, which was to be dreaded from their numbers; yet, when they arrived in China, none of them had died, nor had any disease broke out. They suffered only in their looks, being wan and emaciated to a great degree.