It is curious that silver was early appropriated to the treatment of cerebral disorders by the theories of astrology, which associated both the metal and the malady with the influence of the moon: by the time of Linnaeus its medicinal virtues were so far distrusted that he describes only its "power as political, its use, commercial." It retained, however, some reputation in epilepsy, and of late years there has been further evidence of a neuro-tonic power exerted by it rather upon the spinal than the cerebral nervous system, as illustrated in some forms of paralysis.