The Columbian fountain., 1846-09-24
HOMEOPATHY VS.. ALLoPATHY.
OPINIONS
OF eminent Old School Physicians concerning
iFs4a their own System of Medicine. ai.
OPINIONS

OPINIONS
OF eminent Old School Physicians concerning
their own System of Medicine.
z If the knowledge Of the old school Materia
Medica is so uncertain and precarious as lis
own professors and practitioners proclaim it,
how can we reasonably expect it TO be sue
cEssrULLY applied to the treatment Of disease
Here, again, in answer to this question, ] shall
adduce the testimony of distinguished Allopa-
hic physicians and medical writer's
And in the first place shall introduce the
estimation in which the old system is held by
DR.. John Forbes, E. r. S., " Editor of the
British and Foreign Medical Review" !" E One
Of the Queens physicians, &c. &c.--see his
January number, 1916, where he says, lst.
That in large proportion of the cases treated
by Allopathic physicians, Chat is of the old
schooD the disease is cured by Nature and not
by them. Cd. That in lesser, but still not a
small proportion, the disease is cured by Ma
ture in spite of them: in other words, their
interference opposing, instead Of assisting, the
cure. Sd. "That, consequently, in consid-
cradle proportion Of diseases, it would fare as
well, or better with the patients, in the actual
condition of the medical art, as more generally
practised, if all remedies, at least all active
remedies, especially drugs, were abandoned"
" This lamentable condition of medicine, re-
garded as practical art, is. in truth, a fact Of
such magnilude--one SO palpably evident. that
it was impossible for any careful reader of the
history Of medicine, or any long observer Of
the processes Of disease, not to be aware Of it.
What, indeed, is the history of medicine but a
history of perpetual changes in the opinions
and practice of its professors, often extreme
and directly opposed to each other I? And amid
all these changes, do we not find these very
diseases, the subject Of them, remaining (with
some excepions) still the same in their pro-
gress and general event2 Sometimes, no
doubt, we observe changes in the character
and event, obviously depending on the change
in the treatment-and alas! as often for the
worse as for the better" aHe&
g These calculations, it will not be doubted,
disclose lamentable state OF things: but it is
not state to be despaired of, much less is il
one to be concealed as something dsgraceful.
Things have arrived at such pitch, that they
cannot be worse, They must mend or end"
We can hardly refuse our assent 10 the
observations Of the late Sir Gilbert Blame, that
in many cases patients get well in spite Of the
means employed: and sometimes when the
practitioner fancies he has made great cure,
we may fairly assume that the patient has
made happy escape" (Pereira, Lectures on
Pharuacol. Med Gaz. Oct. "a, 1857
Let us now advert TO another fact, most
extensive and valuable kind of proof of the es-
innate placed upon medicine by the veterans
in practice the actual practice Of the more sci.
enti6c physicians of all ages, in the latter part
Of their career, men OF philosophc minds as
well as Of much experience, Il is well known
from the history Of physc, that large proper
ton Of men Of this class, havein their old age,
abandoned much Of the energetic and perturb-
ing medication Of their early practice, and
trusted greatly 10 the remedial powers of ma
lure. The saying Of a highly respected and