The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1874-02-12

| prHt1c HYsrgSe.-It is not long since an
ACCOMPLISHED physician, being asked by 4
,oynaa what real advance had been made
| in his profession within the century, replied
that during the past generation the most
astonishing strides had been MADE III every
department of medicine except therapeutics
70 say that great deal more is knownabout
disease, except in the matter OF curing II,
than used to be known does not carry much
comfort to the lay mind. And yet, in fact,
the advance in medical science has Dccn
such as to contribute most powerfully ana
directly TO the physical well-being OF nun,
kind. Therapeutics really does d"ihutc III
the light OF recent discoveries 10 q suOoI
dinatc place among medical science notn
the supreme place which it once oocupleu.
THE vulpor adare that prevention is better
tho, c,rn has hecomc u scientific maxim,
and ia supplcmcnted by the maxim that
nrevention il more feasible than cure. 10
nreserve health is the business OF hygiene,
and il il only Of late years that hygiene
| has come to be reccSnizeQ for what 1t now
indispuaby is--the most Important of med
| zeal sciences. People are coming to see that
| there is no panacea, either discovered or dis.
coyerlble, which can restore to the yigor of
human health the constitution which, at
first weak from Inherited transgressions OF
the laws Of health, has been still further
shattered by the wiful or ignorant trans
greSsions of the poSsessor Of it, to whom his
body is no longer an instrument, but
burden.
This is the first principle of modern physi-
ologists. and it is this principle which DIR.
Carroll sustained and Illustrated in an ora
ton before the Medical Department of the
University of New York. The Grafton de.
fhap fbot m
which it was Immediately addressed. ln!cl-
lioent persons are coming now to understand
that their physical Well.bcing is not Il myS-
terry of which physician only holds the
KEY, but most practical matter which rests
very Mainly with themselves, and upon the
conditions of which it behoorcs them
TO inform themselves. But intelligent
layneu have not yet arrived at a
real Knowledge Of the truth, which all com.
petcnt physicians know, tfat to take care of
their own health they must take care Of tic
health of whole classes too ignorant and TOO
weak to look out for themselves. The filthy.
ill-yentilute0, and ill-draned sluns of a
great city like this spread the infection Of
their foulnesS beyond their own limits, aud
degrade the sanitary condition of the whole
community Which their existence di>graces.
The pcstilcnce generated by the filth of the
>lunS will infect the quarters Of which the
Inhabitants may be aware Of the conditions
of health and may for their own parts OBJ
serve them. Mir. Carlyle's story of the
poor woman whom rich men refused to
recognize as member Of the human family |
and to saccor, and who finally "proved her
sts;crlood by injecting seven of them with
typhus fever has a sanitary rs well as |
moral lesson. Even short OF pestilence the
mischief which tue tenement-hou>es oil New |
York may do to the inmates of its mansions |
is incaleulaBle. Happily, although it is in
calculable, il is perfectly preycntable. Wei
say that intelligent laymen have not real |
knowledge Of this fact. If they had they
would assuredly take measures to improve |
the physical condition Of their neighbors as
we'll as their own.-NeD YJrk World.