MASSAGE, a usually performed by the hands, such as friction, kneading, roll ing and percussion of the external tissues of the body, either to relieve pain or to assist a cure, or with some hygienic object in view. A male massagist is known as a masseur, a fe male as a masseuse. Massage in some crude form has always been used by savages as well as by the civilized. It was mentioned by Homer and Hippocrates, having been one of the luxuries of the ancient Greeks and, among the Romans, was largely used by gladiators, and to make slaves more comely by filling out their tissues. Sometimes it was done by medi cal practitioners, often by slaves and priests and those appointed to anoint the wrestlers be fore and after they exercised. Hippocrates says that °rubbing can bind and loosen, can make flesh and cause parts to waste; hard rub bing binds; soft rubbing loosens; much rub bing causes parts to waste; moderate rubbing makes them Manual treatment of the body was long ago practised by the Chinese, and the Japanese, Turks, Egyptians and people of various have employed it in u some form from early times.
Often the use of massage is associated with that of certain active and passive move ments known as the Swedish movement-cure (q.v.), established by Fehr Henrik Ling. His system of gymnastics became popular in spite of opposition and of the fact that it was largely a revival of old methods of treat ment. In 1873 Mezger, of Amsterdam, and in 1877 S. Weir Mitchell of Philadelphia pushed forward the cause of massage. To-day it is considered by physicians as a branch of medi cal treatment, useful in certain cases if rightly administered, but capable of doing harm when improperly applied. Unfortunately the laity frequently look upon it as a sole means of re lief or cure. Much depends upon the judgment and skill of the masseur, as the special reaction of the individual patient has to he considered and, on the other hand, a skilful operator can accomplish more in a quarter of an hour than an ignorant one can in an hour. The proced ures in massage may be placed under four heads: stroking (the eifieurage of the French), kneading (malaxation), friction and percus sion. Stroking is performed over surfaces with the palm of the hand or its radial border, or with the pulps of the fingers, or the sides of the knuckles. Kneading is the grasping of muscles, etc., with both hands or between the thumb and fingers of one hand, and rolling and squeezing them. Friction is a peculiar and forcible cir cular rubbing. Percussion is the striking or beating of a part, either with the hand or an instrument called a percussor or muscle-beater. A special technique of massaging the face, and particularly the ears and eyes, has had surpris ingly gratifying results in preventing deafness and curing certain types of blindness, for in stance, where an embolism of a central artery of the retina has been removed by massage.
It is claimed that the modern system of mas sage makes the blood circulate more freely, strengthens muscle-fibres, causes effusions and exudations to be absorbed, improves secretory and excretory action, and invigorates the whole system. It is frequently used with good re sults to stimulate assimilation and invigorate digestion to soothe nervous irritability, relieve pain and arouse nerve-force, to equalize the circulation, to remove morbid deposits from around joints, to restore mobility, and for the correction of obstinate constipation and other disordered conditions.
From the point of view of the modern study of unconscious mentality it will be seen that those persons who are the greatest advocates of massage will be the ones who are uncon sciously satisfying a desire for stroking, knead ing, friction and percussion. Such a method of curing their ills will make an immediate and a strong appeal to their instincts. This pre supposes a physical and mental make up, pre disposed by early development, to seek and get satisfactions from the skin and muscle sensa tions derided from manipulation at the hands of another. This mental disposition is in mod ern times well recognized in psychoanalysis (q.v.), which, however, goes at the treatment in another way. For any diseases which may be helped by massage, there is a cause in the way in which the mind unconsciously regards the pleasures derived from the manipulation of the skin and muscles. If, for instance, the individual is of such a mental constitution that, because of early environment, he has been led to derive more than ordinary pleasure from being stroked, kneaded, rubbed or even beaten (and the history of the development of massage shows that such persons are quite numerous) ; such an individual will be the more likely to contract diseases of the type which are on rec ord as having been remedied or cured by mas sage. He will develop those diseases instinct ively without knowing the connection between them and the unconscious wish which is the cause of the specific incidence of the symp toms. This practically amounts to saying that the diseases which are enumerated as having been cured by massage are diseases which are virtually selected by the unconscious because of the fact that their treatment will involve the gratification of wishes for just such specific stimulation of the muscular, tendonous and cutaneous end organs. The patient will do well under such a treatment, at least, partly be cause a source of unconscious gratification closed to him possibly since early childhood has been through massage reopened to him.