EUTHERAPEIA.

CHAPTER I.

Introduction-The claims of legitimate in opposition to false medical science-Anatomy: its rise, progress, and present state of perfection— An introductory review of the different systems of organs and their functions.

To elucidate the credibility of the Principles of Medicine, to show that these principles may not unfairly be placed in comparison with the accredited conclusions of other kindred sciences, and to vindicate our art amidst the pretensions

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and dogmas of charlatanism-to meditate for a short time on the origin and sad prevalence of disease, to investigate the degree of curative power furnished us in remedial agents, and to compare diseases and their cures and alleviations with corresponding evils and their remedies in the moral world to elucidate, too, the existence of a governing power or degree of inherent curative tendency in the human frame, manifested in the regular course or order of phenomena or symptoms in what are in this respect wrongly called disorders, but, above all, in that happy constitutional aid during their treatment, which we experience in most diseases: to consider to what extent these effects may be relied uponlastly, the indication of a visible intention and even of goodness in the permission by Providence of disease and pain* -such are the subjects which the author would wish to discuss in the following pages. In doing so, he will not confine himself to the present state of our art, but will also take a retrospective glance at its past rise and progress.

The science of medicine has, in all ages, with the intelligent and feeling, occupied a high position. It particularly concerns ourselves-its triumphs the alleviation and cure of a considerable portion of our miseries. We will not quote the heathen philosophers in testimony to its importance or its celestial origin. The Divine Founder of Christianity, with his high commission to his apostles to preach the Gospel, at the same time empowered them to cure the sick. His own miracles were, many of them, those of healing inveterate or incurable maladies, palsies, fevers, epilepsies, insanity, spinal distortion, leprosy, blindness, deafness, and hæmorrhage; sufficient proofs, if our own personal experience, unfortunately, did not afford them, of the urgency of the calls which sickening humanity makes for assistance.†

* On several of these points the author has been anticipated by Dr. Duncan, in his little book, entitled, "God in Disease," 1851; a pleasing addition to our Biblia Medica Sacra.

It has been observed, that without the aid of the physician, some single diseases alone, as small-pox, would have gone far towards extir

Our art, requiring light and assistance from many other sciences, liberally repays on all sides what it borrows. Its humblest professor, too, may pursue the most interesting inquiries; nor need he confine his thoughts to our frail bodies alone; subjects of a higher nature are connected with them, and present themselves to his consideration— matter animated by the vital force, and moreover connected with the mental and immortal part of the human entity.

Far from claiming, as observed already, infallibility for our art, and admitting its deficiencies from causes above alluded to, and from the misapplication of physical laws to explain vital phenomena, aware, too, of the great difficulties attending its study, the occult nature of many diseases, the obscurity in the modus operandi of medicines, the variations in individuals from temperament, habits, and passions, rendering experiment difficult and fallacious, yet we must maintain that the science is, upon the whole, the legitimate growth, for a succession of ages, of reason and observation. Its foundations are strengthened by the acknowledged truths of anatomy, chemistry, and natural philosophy. Our remedies are often not only indicated by theory, but proved by experience, and this last both traditional and of our present time, by their chemical and physical nature, as well as having in most cases effects very capable of demonstration. In few cases do medicines rest upon undemonstrable supposition alone, and we should ever entertain doubts of all such empirical remedies. With respect to the powers of medicines, as well as with regard to many of our pathological doctrines, we often have an accumulation of evidence.

The pseudo-medical professors of the present day are, on the contrary, challenged to demonstrate the power of their

pating our race. In the time of Sydenham one quarter of the mortality of London arose from four diseases-plague, small-pox, dysentery, and scurvy,—which, though still as inherently virulent, are rendered harmless by the knowledge which we have of their etiology, enabling us to accomplish their prevention.