New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1854-11-29
WHAT Is QUACKERY .!

clan who undertakes to let his ligh! shiue before
men, is treated as quack. Against this rule we
earnestly protest as asst to those 1t ssigmstizes
injurious to the Press, and prejudicial to the al
aicted and diseased. Let US Illustrate our
meaning:
Aman proclaims some pill or ointment as a
sovereign remedy for all the ills that flesh is heir
10. AMI offers string of certificates of the won
derful cures it has effected in desperate cases Of
Rheumatism, Consumption, Cholera Fever and
Aaue. &c. Now the immense presumption is
that this man is a quack and swindier, and his
nostrum really good for nothing. This is our de-
cided opinion, and We give it for nothing Now
if the presumptive quack wants to advertise his
preparation let him do 50 by all means. IL is
most unlikely to Kill any but natural-born fools,
of which tie supply always seems to be at least
equal to the demand for such. We do not aroi-
trsrily exclude a man from our advertising col
unps because what be proffers seems to US pre-
posterous and likely to damage those who put
faith in it, for, after all, our impression may be
entirely wrong, and the preparation we sc,ii at
really good for something; but we try to educate
pretepses of cbaIlatans can awaken no emotion
but ore of contempt But there is class OF medi-
cal advertise ments which has too long been care
lessly confoupded with quackery, which we would
yiudicate from blind unjust asperson. For In
stance;
Our country is for the most part sparsely settled
as vet and its average standard of medical attain
meDt is not high one. There are thousands OF
townships and scores of counties in which no
practitioner pabe Of treating safely and success
fully the more difficult and less understood dis
esses, can be found. But in the great centsrs Of
population there are doctors who after complet
ing thorough course of general study in medicine,
have turned their whole attention to some parsc-
slar disease or infTmity, ami confne their prac-
tice 10 that. OF course, they can only be 'sus-
tanned and prospered 10 this course by drawing
patients from o wide radius; and how is this to be
secured unless by advertising
Now what We would urge is that this is not
quackery, but a proper and necessary improve
uent OF facilities which the Steam-Press has but
recently rendered available. A doctor who ad-
yertises that he treats Only one class of diseases,
and treats that with very general success, may
indeed be quack; but he 10 not necessarily one
not a quack because he thus advertises Here,
for il stsnce, we have DR.. Robert Hunter, who
seys be can and does cure nyeterate Consumption
BY treatment which he terms Medicated Inhala.
ton and he proffers abundant testimonials from
well known and reliable persons that they have
actually been cured by him Of consumptons after
all other means had been tried without benefit.
Now, suppose these testimonial, to be true, (and
every one interested must examine and judge for
himself what ia the doctors duty in the prem
isesl Should he cit stiA, and wait till he is gray
without attempting to diffuse knowledge Of his
discovery Such course it seems to u.s. would
be positively iDhuman. lie ought, on the con-
trary, to spread the knowledge of bis treatment
as widely and as promptly as possible, and thus
save many precious lives. OF course this rule
to be successfully engaged in treating Diseases Of
the Lungs, the special scourge of the Northern
States. And so of practitioners under kindred
circumstances In other branches Of the healing art
But take a more questionable case: Here is
DR.. Samuel Gilbert, Though we understand his
education was that of tailor, notofs PHYSICIAN
WHO claims to have discovered sovereign anti
dote for Cancers, and to be extirpating hundreds
if lot thousands of these fearful afflictions-and
unless msny patients, including eminent physi-
clans, are all dupes and swindlers, he actually
does it. Suppose him grossly deficient in medi-
cal knowledge, and yet able to cure Cancers
which .killful surgeons dare not touch, deemiDg
it safer to let them entirely alone, what then
Why, then, we say, he ought surely to advertise
as fully and widely as possible so that those suf.
feriDg from cancerOus affections which no ordi-
nary medication will reach, may be led TO in-
quire for themselves whether his preten-
sions are founded in fact or. fraud. And
herein is evolved one of the most impor
tant uses Of newspapers-to give every one
q chance, on some terms, to make himself heard
to prefer each his modicum Of access to the
public ear, leaving readers to make their own in
quiIies and form their own judgments. For the
good of the public as well as of the press, we
trust the plain distinction between Quackey and
Publicity will heneeforth be more clearly drawn,
ard that vender may seek in modest and rational
language to call attention to some discovery or
improvement in medical science without being
stigmstized as q quack. Hitherto, Quackery
has fouIished because science and skill have in
good part surrendered to it the shortest and
easiest mode of access to the popular sppehen-
zion. 1t should be otherwise hereafter. The
professional etiquette which forbids young
ply stefan to advertise, and all physicians to make
known what they can severally do beat, is alb
turd and unsuited to the sge we live in. 1t should
be mo lifted or overborne.