One
Hydra's Heads and
Medusa's Blood
There is only one health, but diseases are many. Likewise, there appears
to be one fundamental force that heals, although the myriad schools of
medicine all have their favorite ways of cajoling it into action.
Our prevailing mythology denies the existence of any such generalized
force in favor of thousands of little ones sitting on pharmacists' shelves,
each one potent against only a few ailments or even a part of one. This
system often works fairly well, especially for treatment of bacterial dis-
eases, but it's no different in kind from earlier systems in which a spe-
cific saint or deity, presiding over a specific healing herb, had charge of
each malady and each part of the body. Modern medicine didn't spring
full-blown from the heads of Pasteur and Lister a hundred years ago.
If we go back further, we find that most medical systems have com-
bined such specifics with a direct, unitary appeal to the same vital prin-
ciple in all illnesses. The inner force can be tapped in many ways, but all
are variations of four main, overlapping patterns: faith healing, magic
healing, psychic healing, and spontaneous healing. Although science de-
rides all four, they sometimes seem to work as well for degenerative
diseases and long-term healing as most of what Western medicine can
offer.
Faith healing creates a trance of belief in both patient and practi-
tioner,
as
the latter acts as an intercessor or conduit between the sick
mortal and a presumed higher power. Since failures are usually ascribed
to a lack of faith by the patient, this brand of medicine has always been a