The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1875-09-30
Che J,1telligemeer,
The Family Physician.

The Family Physician.
If any where there were to be found
among men parallel to the Good Shep-
herd. how instinctively should we all
turn for it to our family physician!
Who is there that. like him, seems to
stand between us and the outer darkness Z?
Who is there that, like him, knows our
frame and the dust of which we are
made? Who is there to whom, as to
him, we confess our defects, and with
whom we make capital out of our weak
nesses? He is to us the visible represen-
tative of the dispenser of life an death !;
we hang upon his word for sentence or
reprieve; when he comes in at the door
we feel as though he brought safety in
with him; when he goes by the window
we send our blessing after him.
He is but man; he pursues science
founded on shifting sands; his work is
largely experimental, and in many places
he gropes in more than twilight gloom.
But to our ignorant helplessness his lin
tied knowledge seems to be the clear
sight of god, his slightest averment a
thing to treasure up and consider care
fully for its store of truth, his decision
an affair as immutable as the laws OF the
universe. If we die, we cling to his hand
as we step into the dark river, while he
is like the comforting rod and staff of
Scripture; if we live, we feel as though
it we're through his determination and
because of his effort.
Not that we ignore, by any means, the
great and merciful Power behind him !;
but we recognize him as the agent of that
Power, who has put into his hands, as
it were, the issue of birth and the grave.
The doctor, indeed, seems to us unlike
all other men. He is impersonal as a
spirit. We send for him in our troubles;
we 90 to him with our grievances; we
confess to him the ailments we would
hide from all the world; we no more try
to "put the best foot forward" with him
than we would if he were omnisclent,
for we are aware that unless he sees us
as we are he can afford us no aid. He,
indeed, and no other, is the Tomb OF
Secrets" He is acquainted with the in
ner recesses of households, with the his
tories of tortured lives; he knows over
what home peace broods; he knows
where neglect and contention and abuse
work havoc, and where the dark strains
run in the blood from generation to gen.
Grafton, to reveal themselves some day in
foul fungus or distraught brain. 10 all
he brings consolation of his own, a
delicate sympathy, promise OF the whole
that he has, an assurance of best effort,
q sense that every thing which skill and
science can do is being done, and that
the rest is only in the hands of God.
And when we are in the dreadful pres
ence of some sickness whose unknown IS
sue touch upon the awful mysteries of
death, who is there that comes into the
room so like the commander of the forces
of light scattering those of darkness as
tie family physician? Who seems, like
him, to be the actual vicegerent OF the
great spirit Of good fighting the inroads
of evil? How he labors, how indetatiga--
bic he is, how he suffers with us, and
wrestles with fate for us He rises IN the
dead of night, perhaps to walk through
with furious storm, perhaps to skate over
the frozen rivers, perhaps to drive miles
in biting wintry winds. Light comes in
with him then out of the thick darkness.
In the morning he brings in the outside
yigor of the healthy world. He is sure to
come and gives us reinsurance just when
the sun is departing and taking all our
little cheer with him as the dreadful night
sets in again. And when the balance
hangs so that hairs weight may incline
it either way, up into the dark region
where all abandon hope, then he spends
sleepless nights beside US, discards less
serious matters, is away only on flying
visits, makes our woes his own, and man
ifests on his errand of mercy all the de-
votion of love.
And what motives are they that urge
him to this sublime unselfishness, this
work and suffering? Not money, or the
love of it; for he is paid at best but a
pittance, and seldom collects the half OF
his dues. Not fame for when his day is
done, and he lies down for his long and
well-earned rest, his name soon follows
him, or lives only in the grateful recollec-
tion of the generation he has served and
saved. In almost any other path in life he
could acquire far more of either of these
perishable things, with infinitely less cost
to himself. 1t can, then, be only the love
of science and the love of his fellow-men
that spur him to this heroic duty, to this
unfailing self-sacrifce; and beyond his
success from day to day, the chiefreward
he has is that his very work at once re-
fines and enlarges his nature, and gives
his soul all the time stronger and no.
bier existence.
Never, then, can we pay or attempt to
pay to our family physician the obliga-
ton ofgratitude that we owe to him. His
steady labor, his enthusiastic research,
his utter self.forgetfulness, his sponta-
neous eympathy, hisunsailing tenderness
neither gold nor gifts, neither words,
acts, can ever make the account even with
him for the abnegation and surrender
such things imply; and all that we can
do is with our whole hearts to acknowl-
edge the debt
- Tt is the easiest thing in the world
to deny the supernatural; to dispose of
-, Nh anoroopo with q r,1iat smile of in