Nebraska advertiser. [volume] (Brownville, Nemaha County, N.T. [Neb.]) 1856-1882, 1862-08-23
BROWNVLLE, NEBRASKA, SATURDAY, AUGUST %, 1862.

please; learn the opinion of the meta
physicians, study the movements of tho
philosophical schools, and you shallat once
be introduced into the very centre of the
] French, English, or German medicine
take, at will, such or such medical epochs
you shall soon perceive how obscure il is
on the. contrary, restore to it its philo.
sophical element, or read some pages re.
presenting the philosophy of the epoch
and the results you will obtain shall be SC
wonderful, so striking, that the effect viii
j be irresistable; directly lhe enigma shall
disappear, an unexpected light, precision
and clearness shall enter into your mind
4 If, therefore, we wish to obtain the full
comprehension of a system. we must es-
innate it in comparison with the epoch Of
the general philosophy to which it belongs.
How many things we shall learn which,
heretofore, were to US enigmas not 10 be
decyphered, dead letters, sealed hero
glyphics @ aif'e
The important events offered by the
history of philosophy will almost always
give US the reason of the changes which
pEaedicine offers at various epochs. Al
though each of the culminant periods Of
history has, as it were, its thought, its
archetypical idea which casts its refec-
tion upon science, nevertheless are they
not merely juxtaposited without any other
means of union, without any other fxa-
ton than the order Of date in order to
have perfectly complete idea of an
epoch, we must know about all of them |;
be initiated in the physico chemical and
physiological discoveries corresponding to
i, that ws mag know from whence il
comes, whittier il tends; finally embrace
a one glance, IL tkeir SUGGESTIONS. in
their vicissitudes the panorama Of idsass
of theories from their first principles,
their developments through ages to the
actual epoch. Notwithstanding all that
has been said, the number and diversity
of the philosophical system of which the
study of man has been the object, are not
such as we might be taught to presume
by close observation, we may easily per-
ceive, with evidence, the three or four
intermixed roots of all the philosophical
systems, which, under diverse integu-
ments, are reduced to some fundamental
differences, TO small number of princi-
pies opposed and always opposing, and
still inseparable, successively triumphant,
periodically reproduced in all ages with
variations of particulars, SO that if the
heat of the combat is great, the arena is
very narrow. $50 true 1t is" says M.
Andral, 'that the human mind is forced
to choose among a very small number of
solutions out of which it is impossible TO
extricate itself; this is the reason why
philosophical problems have not changed
in nature from the time of Thales to our
present days, and have received the same
solutions at all times.n
Indeed, the number of philosophical
doctrines. to which the medical systems
have relations, is not indefinite; those
doctrines are computed, and the human
mind is not allotted to establish, theory
absolutely new for the deduction of the
first ideas. The evolutions of thought
are reduced to four spirltualism, sensu-
alism, scepticism and mysticism. These
four doctrines, whose value is very differ
ept, include the whole philosophy; In
deed, it is not given man to propose
general explanation which does not arise
either from the senses, or from mere
thought, or from doubt, or from extacy.
Man is doomed eternally to go through
these four evolutions. The essence of
all medical doctrines is therefore b0and
BY fliation, more or less neressarys 70
one or the other Of these intellectual eyO-
Iuvons OF 10 several at once. L Is there
fore wrong to proclaim inferior divisions
of theories and systems, which, notwlth-
standing their number, might be reduced
to a much narrower circle of doctrines.
It is impossible, forsooth, to know the his
tory of medicine, if we ignore the history
of philosophy; the revolutions of the one
have been, in their successive phases
subordinate to the revolutions of the other,
each of the great conceptions by which
philosophers have pretended to embrace
the ensemble of things created, have been
reflected in the science of man, have left
therein their profound and indelibIe mark;
each has given birth to some prospective
views. to some medical theories, and left
therein its frequent germ immense chain
which, starting from HiPpocrates, has
grown in length at every period, and
offers to-day work worthy the illustri-
Gus dead, who, for centuries, have suces-
siyely toiled for its improvement.