Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1898-03-12
RELIC OF PAGANISM.
fhe ar" on u Prescription Was Once
Ia .Iuritpr

u
Prayer to Jupiter.
Reminders of timo when NOR
tails were supposed to have close in
tcrcourse with the gods come up
now and then, and often in the luryt
unexpected places. For eAamnle.
there are some 5000 per ons II Chi
cago who daily write invucutioIs
to Jupiter, or Zeus Many times
this number give of their substance
for these talismanic cipherS, hoping
thereby to he rid of some Lo lily i'll.
Now, the curious part of this l;:ttcr
day pagan worship is tEat those
who mako tho sign Of high Olym-
pus' king have little if any thought
of what they are doing, and those
who SO eagerly seek tho "pa1ch-
ments' never suspect they are tax
ing part in meilico-religious rite
of the middle ages. In short, the
"priests of Jupiter are ril ,'sicians
and druggists, the supplicanis their
patients or customers and the rarch-
ments ordinary prescriptions.
In the left hand upper corner of
every physicians prescription or
druggists recipe may be found a
letter "R," having a line drawn
obliquely across its tail
Not one person in ten who writes
a prescription takes the trouble to
recall the significance of that little
stroke across the r." and not one
in a thousand who carries Il pre-
scription to the dispenser knows
anything at all as to the meaning of
the symbol. Physicians and drug
gists textbooks tell us it stands for
recipe and means take OF the
following"
Many of those who write and dis.
pense prescriptions will pause in
their busy moments long enough to
say it is mere arbitrary sign and
means little. if anything, but the
student of ancient things finds in
that we'll known symbol a relic of
the days when prescriptions had to
be blessed OF the gods to be effective
and will tell us it originally meant
MAY Jupiter, or Zeus (or some
other god who happened to be not
overbusy at the time), bless this pre-
scription and bring the patient
health"
ArchBologists, while agreeing as
to the antiquity of this medical
symbol or talisman, differ somewhat
as to its exact original meaning.
The Oldest form of the letter appears
to have been figure like the Eng
lish letter ~" with the lower hori-
Eontal part crossed with Il scepter
shape line. This or some modifica-
ton of it has been from timo imme.
mortal the symbol of the planet
Jupiter, and this is given as therea-
son for placing it at the head of pre-.
scriptions, for the great planet
bearer of the name of the father of
life, was believed in olden days to
have peculiar and pow erful infu-
ence over diseases. This symbol
has also been generally described as
simply tho initial letter for Zeus,
the Greek name for Jupiter, but
this only accounts fo1 part of it, us
1t makes no provision for the scep
terlike stroke, an object which, ac-
companied or intwined by serpent,
was prominent in representations of
Jupiter. Still others have figured
1t us being made up of the initial
and terminal letters of Aatakiel, the
angel and spirit of the great planet.
Some, taking it to DO Il combination
Of "R' and IL" have held that ii
might DO derived from tho name of
Raphael angel Of the sun, while
one, Taylor, says, "Ths telegram
resolves itself into un arm, grasping
a tlundcrbolt, which ia only an
other way Of ascl ib.Ns it to Jupiter.
TIL bu!ls OF testimony, therefore,
seelns to strengthen the fist posi-
ton that the symbol is Il fragmen-
tury and obsolete medical tali.man,
once potent with the unseen 20 Scrs,
but now meaning to the average
person little mLre than 81, an i'll
tustinS mixture and perhaps i'm
proved health. Chicago Post.