CONCERNING INSECTS AND RELATED REMEDIES IN 



MEDICINE. 



Such remedies as are of animal or insect origin have been used 

 from the earliest date, in medicine. As indicated in the following 

 pages, which concern only a few of these, the record of their employ- 

 ment and introduction reaches, in all directions, back into antiquity. 

 The references in Moufifet's History of Insects (1658) are particu- 

 larly interesting, in that nearly every authority named in that remark- 

 able citation of authorities of the olden time, were referred to as 

 enthusiastic believers in insect remedies. 



In Homeopathic medication many remedies of this description 

 are however employed, being now favorites. In Eclectic therapy but 

 four are given authoritative recognition, these four being the subject 

 of the present treatise. 



There is, however, no reason why such substances as the toxins 

 of insects and reptiles possessed of energetic physiological reactions 

 should not have therapeutic qualities, if remedies like beef gall, musk, 

 and castor (likewise heinooms' of the past), are given pharma- 

 copeia] recognition. In Eclectic medicine, however, spongia, apis, 

 tela aranecBj and cantharides are the only ones having any conspicuity. 

 All of these, excepting the last, are highly valued by a great number of 

 Eclectic physicians, and are being increasingly employed by physicians 

 of other schools. 



The history, descriptions, and therapeutic record of these four 



remedies, of which one only, spongia, is not of insect origin, are 

 considered in more or less detail in the following pages. The follow- 

 ing, from the pen of Mr. John Thomas Eloyd, briefly but yet compre- 

 hensively introduces the subject: ^ 



Insects have been used in Chinese medicine from time immemorial.* 

 The Greeks and the Romans employed insects as far back as the time of 

 Christ, perhaps much earlier. But it was not until the Middle Ages that 

 they came into universal use, being then presumed to cure almost every 

 ill that affects mankind. Since that time, most insects have fallen into dis- 

 repute as remedial agents. The number of spiders employed has gradually 

 diminished until, at the present time, barely a half dozen species are utilized. 

 "Home practice," however, of the older generation still recommends some 

 almost forgotten insect remedy, as for example Lumbricus, angle worm 

 oil, to cure rheumatism. 



A list of the insects used in medicine during the seventeenth century 

 would enumerate almost every insect then known to man. At that period, 

 religionists believed that every creature was made to be of some special 

 benefit to man. In order to apply this theory to the hordes of insects, pre- 

 sumably created only to serve human interests, they were identified, wher- 

 ever possible, as remedies for disease. A few, however, received little or no 

 attention in medicine, their usefulness to man being accounted for in some 

 other way. Thus apis, the bee (of importance in medicine at the present 

 day), was much overlooked, evidently because its service to man in the 

 making of honey was deemed reason sufficient for its creation. In the case 

 of one insect, Mouffett (1658) states that he has found in it no medicinal 

 properties, but he expresses a strong conviction that at some time the pur- 

 pose of its creation will be discovered. — /. T, Lloyd, Cornell University. 



* From the admirable paper of Professor Albert Schneider, of California, titled, Some Ob- 

 jfieHGnable and Unusual Chinese Drugs Imported into the United States, we reproduce the names 

 r-oiily of insect and connected remedies. The uses accompanying these are to be found in the 

 above paper, contributed to the Pacific Pharmacist^ J^uly, 1910. 



Beetles, Carrion Beetles, Dragon Fly, Cantharides, Centipedes, Cocoons, Crickets, Earth 

 worms. Eggs of Silk-Worms, Black Flies, Red Flies, Parasitized Insect I^arvas, Insect Skins 

 Dried Leeches, Maggots, Scorpions, Silk-worm Pupa, Spiders, Wasps' Nests. ' 



