The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1869-03-14
PATHOLOGY AND POLITICS.

II is hardly to be said tina. politics, as COM
monty understood, have made any advance,
in a fundamental sense, from the most an
Gent down to the most modern constitutions
ofgovernment The reason of this Is doubtless
to be found in the metaphysical, or theologlco-
metaphysical nature of the premises on which
they have proceeded. These premises, sub
jected to 10 analysis, accepted without verl-
fication as absolute conceptions, and set up
with sacvanental implicitness of faith as
priori points of departure, constituted, SO to
speak, a dynasty of intellectual fetiches whose
oracles have scofed at vital truths and have
had no mercy on mankind. Hence it is that
history reeounts 80 dreary an oscilla-
ton between the various theories and
forms of government, democratic, aristo-
cratic, autocratic, and all notifications OF
these AS long as all political schools
persisted in applying to actual situations the
deductions of unverifed and arbitrary dog
mas-such, for example, as the divine right
of kings to reign, the divine right of MAORI
ties to govern, the divine right of all human
beings to political equality-and at the same
time contemptuously ignored essential facts
of existing society, it was impossible that
government of any form or denomination
could afford any definite, Ineligible and
satisfactory assurance of peace, and order,
and social welfare and progress. 1t is only
of late years that the idea of society being
great natural organism liable to ills analogous
to those of the human body, and demanding
treatment analogous to that bestowed on
patient by wise and skillful physician,
has begun to dawn upon minds which
made any pretense to the culture of
political philosophy. In the words
of Professor Goodwin Smith, the world is
beginning to discover that politics are not
matter of passion and defamation, but OF
science, and that it is only by treating them
scientifically that any results useful to the
community can be achieved" In following
out this thought, it is almost startling,
though it should be by no means discourag-
ing, but auspicious rather, to observe the
many and intimate analogies that exist be-
tween the pathological phenomena Of man the
individual and the pathological phenomena of
mankind as a social organism. This rela-
ton is forcibly suggested by remarkable
though unpretentious essay from the pen OF
H. Backus, of Alabama intended to demon
strate the point of agreement among the pa
| biological phenomena of the human system.
| The idea of the unity of diseases, to be
sure, is nothing new to the medical profess
sion. 1t is, indeed, as old as Hippocrates,
| who asserted that ''the nature of all affec-
| tons is the same" that ''they differ only in
relation to their seat" that atheir essence is
one, and so is the cause that produces them. !"
| But the peculiar ground on which this essay
| NAV claim attention is the exhaustive CO.
| gency of its argument to establish, by the
! inductive method, that all pathological phe-
nomena are results of congestion, and to
establish, by the deductive method, that all
exciting causes of disease produce congestion,
and that the treatment of all special diseases
| illustrate the treatment of congestion. OBJ
| struction, dilatation and debility are regarded
as merely marks of congestion, while this
term is convertible with pressure which is
itself receivable into gravitation, that king OF
forces in the universe of matter. Infamma-
ton, fever, hypertrophy of the heart spring
from congestion; or, rather, they are conser-
vatory reactions against state of engorge-
ment and obstruction which will be fatal to
life if not removed. Thus the us medicatriz
nature operates to restore the disturbed
equilibrium of the vital fluid. And were il
not for the so-called active diseases, the pas.
siye diseases would invariably destroy the
life of the sufferer.
Now is there not corresponding point o.
unity among the pathological phenomena o.
the social organism? We firmly believe thai
it will at length be recognized as one of the
most familiar maxims of sociology that al
disorders of society, however distinct anC
heterogeneous they may appear, must be uni
ted in the fact of flowing from the same NOR
bid condition. Biological unity, whether il
the case of an individual or in the case o
that organic mass of individuals called society
p1esumes pathological unity. In either case
there is one condition of health, and there i
one condition of sickness. There cannot b
two. And this leads us to another step to b
taken in the parallel. Those maladies which
threaten the dissolution of society cor
respond with the passive diseases whicl
threaten the death of an individual in othe
words, are receivable into state of con
gestion, obstruction, debility, morbid pres
sure. In proportion to the vigor of tn
social organism will be the febrile excitement
and energy, and possibly tumult and convul
sion, to eliminate hurtful matters, clear on
INSTRUCTED channels, and restore health
equilibrium. 1t has been common ignol
antly to regard these reactive manifestation
as original diseases, and to deal with ther
accordingly. But they are, in fact, conservf
tory efforts in the direction of relief an
|, cure. On the other hand, their absenc
Il while morbifc agencies arc at work is one {
| the most ominous of symptoms. Debility
! then too profound to admit of reaction, an
the people who, through years of polite,
wrong and degradation, or of industriai It
preston, or of social depravity, have arrive