Medieval practitioners, while utilizing material remedies to some extent, relied more on the resources of occult science, whether in the form of incantations or the revelations of astrology. The adept consulted the stars to determine the prognosis of a case of fever, for example. If he prescribed drugs only, his reputation suffered in the popular estimation. In order to be abreast of the times, the shrewd medieval physician needed to be well versed in star-craft, or at least to make a pretense thereto. It is probable that many patients would have despised a practitioner who looked only to his Herbal and store of drugs, and neglected _Capricornus_ and _Ursa Major_.[14:1] In "Chambers's Cyclopædia," published in 1728, an amulet is defined as a kind of medicament, hung about the neck, or other part of the body, to prevent or remove disease. And a charm is described as a magic power or spell, by which, with the assistance of the Devil, sorcerers and witches were supposed to do wondrous things, far surpassing the power of Nature. According to popular opinion, medicines were of some value as remedies, but to effect radical cures the use of magic spells was desirable. John Atkins wrote, in "The Navy Surgeon, or a Practical System of Surgery" (1737), that the best method of employing medical amulets consisted in adapting them to the patients' imaginations. "Let the newness and surprise," wrote he, "exceed the invention, and keep up the humor by a long roll of cures and vouchers; by these and such means, many distempers, especially of women, who are ill all over, or know not what they ail, have been cured more by a fancy to the physician than by his prescription. Quacks again, according to their boldness and way of addressing, command success by striking the fancies of an audience." Edward Berdoe, in the "Origin and Growth of the Healing Art," comments on the universality of amuletic symbols and talismans. They are peculiar to no age or region, and unite in one bond of superstitious brotherhood the savage and the philosopher, the Sumatran and the Egyptian, the Briton and the native of Borneo. When a medical written charm is wholly unintelligible, its curative virtue is thereby much enhanced. The Anglo-Saxon document known as the _Vercelli manuscript_ by some means found its way to Lombardy. Its text being undecipherable, the precious pages of the manuscript were cut up, to serve as amulets. Apropos of this subject, Charles M. Barrows, in "Facts and Fictions of Mental Healing," remarks that whatever acts upon a patient in such a way as to persuade him to yield himself to the therapeutic force constantly operative in Nature, is a means of healing. It may be an amulet, a cabalistic symbol, an incantation, a bread-pill, or even sudden fright. It may be a drug prescribed by a physician, imposition of hands, mesmeric passes, the touch of a relic, or visiting a sacred shrine.