MS IITUIK. 



generally translates the last two wordu) wan evi.j. ntlv the MOM 

 pereoas as the Scribe*. Their office was to administer the sacrinow 

 UK! to explain the law. They had seat* in the Sanhedrim, and were 



i ... \ ........ i . . m i|]j . m it ''<-: ' tUn| 



(Mark zii. 3S), which wai effected by enlarging the border of their 

 garment with a fringe. In the time "i Christ they appear to have 

 been for the most part Pharisees, but they ilul not fonii a tact. 

 r' lt,Uitrk,t JitaitrSrlerbudk, art. ' Schriftgelchrte.') 



>?o^j, trriptura). Thin word means aim ply a irri/iu;/, 

 but it ha* long been used to designate the sacred books of the Old and 

 New 'lY-tv.ucnt. It u thus repeatedly lued in the New Testament in 

 reference to the Old Testament, and in one passage Peter applies it 

 to the Epistles of Paul, and very probably he meant to include under 

 the word aome of tin- .iiln-r lx>k of tin- New Testament which w ! 

 then written. (2 Peter iii. 16.) The different forms in which this 

 word occurs in the New Testament are " the Scripture," " the Scrip- 

 tures," " the Holy Scriptures," " inspired Scripture." (2 Tim. iii. la ; 

 compare Smith's ' Script. Test to the Messiah, chap, ii., note A.) The 

 term a Scripture is also used for a passage in the Scriptures. (Aru- 

 CBvrii.v ; IUBI.I:; CANON ; and the titles of the different books of the 

 Bible.) 



SCROFULA, or SCROPHULA, the technical name for the disease 

 that i* popularly called " the King's Evil : " the origin of the Utter 

 term will be explained presently ; that of the former is very obscure 

 ,-iud uncertain. \Ve find the word scrofula, or rather tcrofttlir in the 

 plnr.il. employed for the first time to signify the present disease, or 

 one supposed analogous to it in cattle, by Vegetius (' De Re Veterin.', 

 lib. iii., cap. 23, ed. Schneider). It is generally admitted to be derived 

 from the Latin terofa. or scrupha, " a sow," although the reason of the 

 derivation U by no means clear. The same analogy, whatever it may 

 have been, influenced also the Greek and Arabic writers in naming the 

 disease, as the former call it xoipas, or x"ip<" s ; ant ' the latter// 

 (Aricenna, torn, i., p. l. r >4 ; 1. 3(i, p. 194 ; 1. 30, vol. ii., p. 73, 1. 12, ed. Rom., 

 1583, fol ; Albucasis, ' De Chirurg.,' lib. i., cap. 22, p. 60, ed. Oxon.. 1 778, 

 4to.), both of which words are intimately connected with xicine. The 

 classical Latin term for the disease is'struma' (Celsus, 'De Medic.,' 

 lib. v., cap. 28, J 7; Pliny, ' Hist. Nat.', lib. viiL, cap. 77), or ' strums' 

 in the plural (Celsus, lib. i., cap. 9 ; Pliny, lib. xxii., cap. 16), which is 

 also a word of which no satisfactory derivation has been given, as 

 probably few persons will agree with Dr. Good in deriving it from 

 trrpvua, ' congestion,' or ' coaoervation,' as of straw in a litter, feathers 

 in a bed, or tumours in the body." 



The vulgar English name applied to it, namely, " the King's Evil," 

 commemorates the virtues of the royal touch, to which, from the time 

 of Edward the Confessor till the reign of Queen Anne, multitudes of 

 persons afflicted with scrofula were subjected. A similar custom pre- 

 vailed in France ; and miraculous powers for the cure of scrofula were 

 likewise claimed for different Romish saints, for the heads of certain 

 noble families, for the seventh son, and for many consecrated springs. 

 The royal touch requires some further notice. That the kings of 

 England for several centuries actually exercised their touch for the 

 cure of scrofulous complaints is proved by abundant historical 

 authority ; and scarcely any of our old historians, who wrote during 

 a period of at least five hundred years, have omitted taking notice 

 of this strange and unaccountable fact. We have not room here 

 to give the evidence fully, and must refer those who wish to inquire 

 more deeply into the subject to ' A Free and Impartial Inquiry into 

 itiquity and Efficacy of Touching for the King's Evil,' 1722, by 

 William Beckett, an eminent surgeon ; ' Charisma, sive Donum Sana- 

 t ion is : sen Explicatio totius Quftstionis de Mirabilium Sanitatum 

 Gratia, in qua pnccipuc agitur de solenni et sacra cui Reges Angliic, 

 rite inaugurati, divinitus medicati sunt,' &c. &c., 1597, by William 

 Tooker, afterwards dean of Lichlield ; ' Charisma Basilicon, or the 

 Koyal Gift of Healing Struimos, &c.' 8vo., Lond., 1684, by J. Browne ; 

 ' Several Chirurgical Treatises, 1 Lond., 1676, foL.and 1719, 8vo., 2vols., 

 by Richard Wiseman, principal surgeon in the army of Charles I., and 

 serjeant-surgeon to Charles II., whom Haller (' Biblioth. Medic. Pract.,' 

 toui. iv., p. 399) calls " insignis certe et peritissimus chirurgus." The 

 question u examined at some length by Bishop Douglas, in his ' Crite- 

 riuu ; or Miracles Examined,' ic. &c., p. 191, ed. 1754, who, while he 

 denies the alleged miraculous powers, fully admits the reality of the 

 cures. See also Colquhoun'a ' Isis Revelata : an Inquiry into the 

 Origin, Progress, and Present State of Animal Magnetism,' Edin., 1836, 

 2 vols. 8vo., who also allows (vol. i., p. 87) " the sanative efficacy of 

 the procew," but connects it with the phenomena of animal magnetism. 

 Among the most curious parts of the subject, it may be mentioned 

 that the old Jacobites considered that this power did not descend to 

 Mary, William, or Anne, a* they did not possess a full hereditary title, 

 or, in other words, did not reign by divine right. The kings of the 

 house of Brunswick have, we believe, never pnt this power to the proof ; 

 and the office for the ceremony, which appears in our Liturgy as late as 

 171'.'. lias been silently omitted. The exiled princes of the house of 

 Stuart were supposed to have inherited this virtue. Carte, in the well- 

 known note to the first volume of his ' History of England,' mentions 

 the caw of one Christopher Level, who, in 1716, went to Avignon, 

 where the court was then held, and received a temporary cure ; and 

 when Prince Charles Edward was at Holyrood House, in October, 1745, 

 he, although only claiming to be prince of Wales and regent, touched a 



.SCROKM.V. 



female rhild for the king's evil, who in twenty-one days is said to have 

 been perfectly cured. 



The history of this delusion carries with it a great lesson. It is very 

 it that the changed circumstances either of body or mind in 

 which persons who submitted to the royal touch were placed produced 

 the favourable result* which have been recorded. It has been the 

 same with popular systems of medical treatment up to the present 

 day. The beneficial action of some agent is assumed, quite independent 

 of any inquiry into the fact of its possessing any curative power at all, 

 and the other circumstances by which the cured person is surrounded, 

 which have really effected his cure, are entirely overlooked. 



Scrofula U defined by Dr. Good (' Study of Mod.') to be, "indolent 

 glandular tumours, frequently in the neck, suppurating slowly and 

 imperfectly, and healing with difficulty ; upper lip thickened ; skin 

 smooth; countenance usually florid;" which agrees almost exactly 

 with the definition given by Cullen in his ' Nosology.' 



Later writers have, however, given a more, extended view to the 

 term scrofula, or scrofulous, and made it to include that general state 

 of the system of which the indolent glandular tumour is but one 

 symptom. The swellings and ulcerations which are so common in 

 scrofula are found to be connected with alterations in the nutrition of 

 the tissue of a similar kind to those which take place when tubercle of 

 the lungs is present. [PHTHISIS ] Hence some writers have described 

 a state of the whole system which they have called tuberculosis, in 

 which cither scrofula or pulmonary consumption occurs. It seems 

 now agreed by the best pathologist* that the same general state of the 

 system which produces tubercle in the lungs produces the various 

 forms of scrofula, including the indolent swellings of the definition of 

 Good and Cullen. On this subject Mr. Paget, in his ' Surgical I 

 logy,' makes the following remarks : " ' Scrofula,' or ' struma," then, 

 is generally understood as a state of constitution distinguished in 

 some measure by peculiarities of appearance even during health, but 

 much more by peculiar liability to certain diseases, including pul- 

 monary phthisis. The chief of these ' scrofulous ' diseases are various 

 swellings of lymphatic glands, arising from causes which would be 

 inadequate to produce them in ordinary healthy persons. The swell- 

 ings are due sometimes to mere enlargement, as from an increase of 

 natural structure, sometimes to chronic inflammation, sometimes to 

 more acute inflammation or abscess, sometimes to tuberculous disease 

 of the glands. But, besides these, it is usual to reckon as ' scrofulous ' 

 affections certain chronic inflammations of the joints; slowly pro- 

 gressive ' carious ' ulcerations of bones ; chronic and frequent ulcers of 

 the cornea, ophthalmia attended with extreme intolerance of light, but 

 with little, if any, of the ordinary consequences of inflammation ; 

 frequent chronic abscesses ; pustulie, cutaneous eruptions frequently 

 appearing upon slight affection of the health or local irritation; habitual 

 swelling and catarrh of the mucous membrane of the nose ; habitual 

 swelling of the upper lip. 



" Now these and many more diseases of the like kinds are amongst 

 us, both in medical and in general language, called scrofulous or 

 strumous ; but though many of them are often coincident, yet it is 

 very difficult to say what all have in common, so as to justify their 

 common appellation. Certainly they are not all tuberculous diseases. 

 Little more can be said of them than that, as contrasted with other 

 diseases of the same forms and parts, the scrofulous diseases are 

 usually distinguished by mildness and tenacity of symptoms ; they 

 arise from apparently trivial local causes, aud produce, in proportion to 

 their duration, slight effects; they are frequent, but not active. The 

 general state on which they depend may be produced by defective 

 food, with ill ventilation, dampness, darkness, and other depressing 

 influences ; and this general state of constitution, whether natural or 

 artificially generated, is fairly expressed by euch terms as ' delicacy of 

 constitution,' ' general debility," ' defective vital power,' ' irritability 

 without strength.' Such terms, however, do not explain the state 

 that they express ; for they all assume that there are in human bodies 

 different degrees of vital power, independent of differences of material, 

 which is at least not proved. 



" Such is the vagueness of ' scrofula' and of the terms derived from 

 it as commonly used in this country. They include some diseases 

 which are, and many which are not, distinguished by the production 

 of tuberculous matter. It has been proposed, but I doubt whether 

 it be practicable to make ' scrofulous ' and ' tuberculous ' commensu- 

 rate terms ; as at present generally employed the former has a much 

 larger import than the latter. The relation between the two is, that 

 the scrofulous constitution implies a peculiar liability to the tuber- 

 culous diseases and they often co-exist. These differences are evident 

 in that many instances of scrofula (hi the ordinary meaning of the 

 word) exist with intense and long continued disease, but without 

 tuberculous deposit ; that as many instances of tuberculous disease 

 may be found without any of the non-tuberculous affections of 

 Hcrofuln ; that as Mr. Simon has proved, while the diseases of ' defec- 

 tive power' may be experimentally produced in animals by insufficient 

 nutriment and other debilitating influences, the tuberculous diseases 

 are hardly artificially producible ; that nearly all other diseases may 

 co-exist with the scrofulous, but some are nearly incompatible with the 

 tuberculous. 



" Now whether we disuse or still use in its vagueness the term 

 ' scrofula,' we may make a group of the ' tuberculous ' diseases, defined 



