Anesthesia, is the faculty of rendering the nervous system insensible to outward impressions; during the state thus induced, surgical operations and the most difficult parturitions are devoid of physical suffering. It is the realization of a mythical and poetical dream, which has occupied the mind of man from the earliest ages of his civilization. The abolition of pain, the annihilation of human suffering during the most distressing moments of existence, is indeed a boon, a blessing, which, to trace through all the degrees of its development, must claim our gratitude, as it must interest our curiosity.

Has not the terror of agonized pain, in its most excruciating forms, been painted with artistic power on the imagination of the ignorant, as the representative condition, associated with a state of those who are damned - the poor wretches who are condemned to purgatory, or, worse, to an everlasting state of physical torture? Science has indeed achieved a lasting triumph in the annihilation of pain.

Man's ignorance of the laws which govern his well-being has always made him the victim of disease. He too, is always liable to accidents, or, from a still more inexplicable perversity or obtuseness, he is led to mortal combat against his fellow-men. All kinds of mutilations and injuries follow. The Anaesthetic discovery is made available to render him unconscious, so that the surgeon may repair to the best advantage the diseased or mutilated parts.

It is to the medical profession, that the world is indebted for the accomplishment of the inestimable blessing of inducing insensibility "by the inhalation of narcotic and stimulating vapours."

The vestiges of early history show, that the art of producing a comatose state was connected with the mysterious ceremonies and customs of the priest and the magician.

The Egyptians, in their ceremonies of initiation into the mysteries, used a soporific cake, "composed of honey and medicated grains," (medicatis frugibus). In the mysteries of Trophonius (who was said to have been nursed by Ceres, that is, to have derived his rites from the Eleusinian), the initiated carried the same sort of medicated cake to appease the serpents (Pythons) they met in their passage, so as to cast them into a slumber. Tertullian, who attributes all the mysteries to the devil, and makes him the author of what passes there, mentions the offering of these cakes, "celebrat et panis oblationem." This was, no doubt, made of poppy seeds with honey, the same as the medicatis frugibus. The priestess of Venus is made to prepare the same treat for the dragon who guarded the Hesperian fruit. The poppy juice was always given to those, who were to undergo the ceremony of initiation into the mysteries. Plutarch speaks of a shrub called Leucophyllus, used in the celebration of the mysteries of Hecate, which threw men into a kind of frenzy, and made them confess their innermost thoughts.

Medicine, priestcraft, and magic were practised only by those who had entered the temple.

The Greeks, who borrowed their ceremonies and practices from the Egyptians, used the Atropa Mandragora to allay pain. Some persons, according to Dioscorides, and his commentator Matthiolus, "boil the "root of mandrake in wine down to a third part, and preserve the "decoction, of which they administer a cyathus (about a fluid ounce and "a half), to produce sleep, and to allay severe pains of any part; and "also before operations with the knife, or the application of the actual "cautery, that the operation should not be felt."

Dodineus also affirms that if the wine of mandrake be administered before the application of the cautery, no pain is experienced.

A celebrated Chinese physician, Moatho, about the third century, gave to his patients a. preparation of Cannabis Indica. In a short time they became insensible, during which state he made incisions, amputations, or removed the cause of disease.

Pliny mentions that Roman surgeons employed a marble powder from Cairo called Memphetis. This powder, he says, when mixed with vinegar, causes such numbness to the parts where it is applied, that it can be cut or cauterized without the patient feeling the least pain (obstupescit ita corpus nec sentit cruciatum).

Dioscorides recalls the same fact, and says, this stone of Memphis, so used, is of the size of a talent, greasy to the feel, and of different colours; but this stone, once so celebrated, was soon forgotten.

It is evident, that a powder of marble, when mixed with acetic acid, would have the effect of deadening a part to which it is applied. The evolution of carbonic acid in a nascent state is a powerful local anaesthetic.

Haschisch - Indian hemp - has been used from the time of the early Egyptians; also by the Greeks and Scythians; according to Herodotus, these people were in the habit of inhaling the fumes until it produced a species of intoxication. In the thirteenth century, Theodorus a monk, afterwards a surgeon of great reputation, had learnt from Hugues de Lucques, by whom he had been instructed, the composition of a preparation, having for its object the mitigation of pain during surgical operations, (confectio soporis a chirurgia facienda secundum hominis Hugonem); this compound threw the patient into a state of insensibility. Its composition was opium, suc Morellae, hyoscyamus, mandragora, and lactuca. The surgeon saturated a sponge with this liquid and allowed it to dry in the sun, and when it was required to be used it was moistened with hot water, and placed under the nose until the desired sleep was induced. After the operation, another sponge immersed in vinegar was applied to the nostrils, so as to revive the patient from the slumber induced.

During the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries, various methods were resorted to, to render the patient insensible, but the results seem to have fallen into disuse. Some used compression on the course of the nerves.