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314 THIRD PERIOD—MODERN TIMES
some time, and their alveoli are in consequence obliterated, it will be
better to have recourse to Lamorier's method. This method may besides
be useful, according to Bordenave, either when all the teeth are sound and
it would consequently be a pity to sacrifice any of them, or in special cases
(such as large polypi of Highmore's antrum, extraneous bodies, etc.)
in which the Cowper-Drake operation would not afford sufficient space.
L. B. Lentin, a German, in 1756, published a pamphlet^ in which he
recommended electricity as a means of cure for toothache. Other writers
recommended the use of the magnet, which means of cure had already
been advised for various affections by Patacelus. During the latter half
of the seventeenth century, Talbot, Weckes, and P. Borelli related
J. J.
several cures of headache and toothache by the use of the magnet. In
the eighteenth century F. W. Klaerich, a medical man in Gottingen,
wrote that he had used the magnet advantageously in not less than 130
cases of toothache." We find it recommended later by others, Brunner,
and particularly G. Teske, who, in 1765, wrote a pamphlet entitled
J.
Neiv experiments for the curing of toothache by means of magnetic
steel.^
He considers the use of the magnet as the most efficacious of all remedies
against toothache, and believes its action to be similar to that of electricity.
In the following year, however, the belief in the new means of cure
was sensibly shaken by F. E. Glaubrecht, who declared that although
the magnet calms or causes the cessation of the pain at first, it returns
constantly and with much greater violence.* The curing efficacy of the
magnet in cases of toothache was highly vaunted in France by Condamine.''
Pasch attributes the effects of the magnet to the chill produced in the
parts to which it is applied; in proof of this he adduces the fact that if the
magnet becomes heated by being kept some time in the hand, it lojses its
efficacy altogether, whilst on the other side one may obtain thfe; very
same beneficial results with a simple steel spatula, just on account ^f the
action of the cold; finally, he adds that the chill produced by the magnet
on the affected part explains very well not only the good, but also the
bad effects which it produces in many cases, such as increase of the pain,
inflammation, tumefaction, and even at times spasmodic contractions."
Thenceforth the enthusiasm for the magnetic cure diminished gradually,
all the more so inasmuch as that shortly after the celebrated English

' Von der Wirkung der elektrischen Krscliiitterung im Zahnweh.
^ Geist-Jacobi, p. 165.
' Neue Versuche zu Cuririuifi; der Zahnsclimcr/en vermittelst eines magnetischen Stahles,
Konigsbcrg, 1765.
F. E. Cllaubrccht, Dc odontalgia, Argcntorati, 1766.
''
journal de Medecine, 1767, p. 265.
" jos. (.]. Pastil, Ablumdlung aus der Wandar/nei von din Ziibnen, etc., Wien, 1767.