Orleans independent standard. [volume] (Irasburgh, Vt.) 1856-1871, 1856-07-25
MAGENDrE ON MEDICINE.


An American medical siadent, writing
from Paris to the American Medical Ca
zette tor June, asserts that he once heard
OF the most eminent
French physicians and physiologis,s--
a lecture somewhat in the fol-
lowing words:
"Gontlemeu-Medicine is a great hum
bug. know II is called a science--sci-
enee. indeed Il is nothing like science.
Doctors are mere empires, when they are
not Charlataus. We are as ignorant as
men can be. Who knows anything in the
..,e..la .l..a... ......ls..ss.s f.antleman. you
have done me the honor to come here te
attend ny lectures, and must tell you
frankly now, in the beginning. that know
nothing in tho world about medicine, and
! don't know anybody who knows any
thing about it. Don't think for moment
that / haven't read the bills advertising
the course of lectures at the Medical
/ School: ] know that this man teaches
anatomy, that man teaches pathology,
another man physiology, such a one the
rapeutics, such another materia mediea-
Et bien ct apres? What's known all
about that? Why, gentlemen, at the
school of Montpelier, God knows it was
famous enough in its day. they discarded
the study of anatomy, and taught nothing
but the dispensary; and the doctors edu-
Gated there knew just as much, and were
quite as successful as any others. j re-
peat it, nobody knows anything about
medicine. True enough, we are gather
ing facts every day. We can produce
typhus fever, for example, by injecting q
certain substance into the veins of dog
that's something we alleviate diabetes
and see distinctly, we are fast approach
ing the day when phthisis can be curet
as easily as any disease. We are col
lecting facts in the right spirit, and dar,
say in a century or so the accumulation
Of facts may enable our successors I,
form medical science; but ] repeat d
you, there is no such thing now as med
ical science. Who can tell me how t
, cure the headache or the gout or dis
ease of the heart? Nobody. Oh 70
tell me doctors cure people. ! gran
you, people are cured. But how are the
r cured? Gentlemen, nature does a grea
dead. Imagination does a good deal
Doctors do-devilish little-when the
don't do harm. Let me tell you, gentle
-men, what / did when / was the hea
physician at Hotel Dieu. Some 5000 O
1000 patients passed through my hand
g every year. l divided the patients int
two classes with one, followed the dis
b pensary and gave them the usual medi
r cines without having the least idea VII
y or wherefore; to the other, gave brea
pills and colored water, without, of cours,
a letting them know anything about it.
d and occasionally, gentlemen, i woul
create third division, to whom I gav
nothing whatever. These last would frc
a good deal, they would feel they wer
neglected, unless they are well drugged-
the fools , and they would irritate then
selves until they got really rick, but o.
tnre invariably came to the rescue, an
4 all the persons in this third class got wel
y There was little mortality among tho.
a who received bread pills and colored ";
h ter, and the mortality was greatest anon
: those who were carefully drugged acco
IS ding TO the dispensary"