The consideration of hypnotic cures does not appertain to our theme. Far from these being primitive methods, they represent what is most modern and advanced in psycho-therapeutics. FOOTNOTES: [146:1] Francis J. Shepherd, M.D., _Medical Quacks and Quackery_. [147:1] F. A. Mesmer, _Mémoire sur la Découverte du Magnétisme Animal_; Paris, 1779. [151:1] _The Cosmopolitan_, vol. xx, p. 363. [152:1] Braid, _Neurypnology_, p. 338. [153:1] _The Cosmopolitan_, February, 1896. [154:1] H. Bernheim, M.D., _Suggestive Therapeutics_, p. 111. CHAPTER XIV ANCIENT MEDICAL PRESCRIPTIONS From early times it was a universal custom to place at the beginning of a medical prescription certain religious verses or superstitious characters, which formed the invocation, or prayer to a favorite deity.[155:1] Angelic beings were frequently appealed to, and among these the Archangel Raphael was thought to be omnipotent for the cure of disease. John Aubrey, in his "Miscellanies," relates that a certain physician, Dr. Richard Nepier, a person of great piety, whose knees were horny with much praying, was wont to ask professional advice of this archangel, and that his prescriptions began with the abbreviation "R. Ris." for _Responsum Raphælis_, Raphael's answer. The name of Raphael was often seen on amulets and talismans. But our information regarding this angel is derived chiefly from the Book of Tobit, where Raphael is represented as the guide and counsellor of the young Tobias. In one of the later _Midrashim_, Raphael appears as the angel commissioned to put down the evil spirits that vexed the sons of Noah with plagues and sicknesses after the Flood, and he it was who taught men the use of "simples," and furnished materials for the "Book of Noah," the earliest treatise on materia medica.[156:1] A recent writer affirms that ℞ is the emblem of the sun-god _Ra_, and signifies "In the name of _Ra_," or "_Ra_, God of Life and Health, inspire me."[156:2] This deity was regarded as the Supreme Being, not only by the Egyptians, but by other heathen people of antiquity, because the sun was the greatest and most brilliant of the planets. In Egyptian hieroglyphics[156:3] _Ra_ was represented as a hawk-headed man, holding in one hand the symbol of life, and in the other the royal sceptre. The medical symbol ℞, still in use at the present day, owes its origin, however, neither to the angel Raphael nor to the god _Ra_. It is the ancient sign of Jupiter. This sign, which also symbolized the metal tin, had many modifications, some of which were as follows: Z, ♃, Ψ.