Observations placeholder

As described in Illustrations Of The Influence Of The Mind Upon The Body In Health And Disease, Designed To Elucidate The Action Of The Imagination - Daniel Hack Tuke, M.D., M.R.C.P.,

CHAPTER XVI. INFLUENCE OF MENTAL STATES UPON DISORDERS OF SENSATION, MOTION, AND THE ORGANIC FUNCTIONS.
SECTION I. — Influence of Mental States upon Disorders of Sensation.

Odontalgia. — We all know how one common, but painful, affection — toothache — is removed temporarily or permanently by Fear or by the Imagination. Familiar with instances of this kind, we can readily believe the statement made by Dr. Ranieri Gerbi, Professor of Mathematics in Pisa, in a pamphlet entitled "Storia Naturale di un Nuovo Insetto" — the insect here referred to being called by him curculio antiodontalgieus. Its virtues were wonderful, for if squeezed between the fingers, they had only to be applied to the tooth to relieve its aching. Dr. Gerbi states that by this process, which clearly owed its efficacy to the Imagination of the sufferers, he cured 401 cases out of 629. I am indebted to Dr. Millingen's work for this reference. It is unnecessary to multiply examples of so notorious a fact as the magical power of the influence in question ; an influence not only well known to the dentist, but to everyone on his way to that dreaded personage, who, wishing to believe that the operation is not requisite, begins by doubting whether the pain is after all so very bad, and by the time he sets his foot on the step of the dentist's door, convinces himself that he is entirely free from it.
And so he is ; at any rate, for a time.