S TIG MA TIZA TIOK 667 



1. Pass a law that no prescriptions containing opium or its 

 preparations can be filled more than once at the druggist's with- 

 out having the physician renew it. The extra cost of calling on a 

 doctor when the medicine ran out would deter many poor people 

 from acquiring the habit. Such a law would also make the doc- 

 tors more guarded in prescribing opiates for trivial ailments. 

 With the law in force, and the druggists guarded by strict regis- 

 tration laws, we could soon trace the responsibility to its proper 

 source, and then, if these safeguards were not enough, physicians 

 could be fined for administering opiates save in exceptional cases. 



2. The great preventive to the habit is to keep the body 

 in such a state that it will not require sedatives or stimulants. 

 The young men and women in our cities have too big heads, too 

 small necks, and too flabby muscles. They should forsake medi- 

 cine, and patronize the gymnasium. Let them develop their mus- 

 cles and rest their nerves, and the family doctor, who means well, 

 but who can not resist the tendency of the age, can take a pro- 

 tracted vacation. Unless something of the kind is done soon, the 

 residents of our American cities will be all opium-slaves. 



^t» 



STIGMATIZATION. 



By Eev. EICHAED WHEATLEY, 



THE stigmata — what are they ? Wounds resembling those 

 received by the Lord Jesus Christ at his crucifixion. When 

 fully developed they consist of one in the palm of each hand, one 

 on the dorsum of each foot, each indicating the place where a 

 nail was driven in the act of nailing Christ to the cross, and one 

 on the side, showing the effect of the Roman soldier's spear- 

 thrust. Sometimes, in addition to these, there are signs upon the 

 forehead, corresponding to the lacerations caused by the thorns. 

 Stigmatization is the technical ecclesiastical term for the forma- 

 tion of such resemblances. 



Gorres acknowledges that in all Christian antiquity no known 

 examples of stigmatization occurred. They are peculiar to the 

 later eras of Christian history. Roman Catholicism has usually 

 enumerated about eighty instances, but in 1873 Dr. Imbert Gour- 

 beyre, professor in the School of Medicine of Clermont-Ferrand, 

 in Belgium, and a writer attached to that religious system, en- 

 larged the series so that it now comprehends one hundred and 

 fifty-three cases, of which eight are living and known to him. Of 

 all these instances that of Francis Bernadone, canonized as St. Fran- 

 cis d' Assisi, in Italy, is the first and most commanding. Born in 

 1186 and dying October 4, 1326, he is said to have received the stig- 



