The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-05-24
MODERN MEDICAL PROGRESS.


contained all the secrets Of medicine. The
volume was opened and every page but one
found blank; on this was written, 3keep the
head cool, the feet warm and the digestive
organs in order" This legacy to suffering
world typifed justly enough the requirements
Of medical art at the close of the eighteenth
century. Empiricism, authority and theory
ruled the medical practice of the world at that
time. A sound therapeutics had gone
no further than to quiet the nervous
system, to equalize the circulation
and provide for the normal action
of the nutritive organs. The physicians of
that age dosed and bled by the books. They
had their theories of planetary influence, ami
NAL spirits and occult force, and treated ac-
cording to the theory they CHANGED to believe
in. Medical practice, as rule, in spite Of
conservatives like Boerhaave and Sydenham,
deserved and received the ridicule of Moliere
and the satires of Montague. The theories
of Cullen and Brown, of this age, were intro
duced by Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, and were
dominant among American practitioners.
Parallel with them was Hahnemann, who ig-
nored all previous medical knowledge, denied
that medicine was branch of natural science,
or that there is any curative power in the
human system, and involved what was already
known with his theories of like curing like,
of the potency of dilutions, and the treat
ment of symptoms.
Medicine was without physiology or pathol-
ogy, and the new force which made rational
system possible was the work done in physiol-
ogy by John Hunter, of England, and in
pathology by Bichat, of France. Hunters
discovery of the circulation, his founding of
the Hunterian Museum, his method Of inves
united whole, has served as model for zoolo-
gists and medical men of the age which fol-
lowed him. Bchat died young-1771-1802-
but his Anatomy Applied to Physiology
and Medicine" first showed plainly
the relations of simple tissues to COM
pick organs and the distinction be-
tween organic and vital functions. Between
Aristotle and Bichat," says Buckle. II can
find no middle man." He showed that power
depends ON structure, and that these can only
be understood as the tissues composing them
are studied. Following the hint of Bichat
Agassiz saw the intimate relation of the or
ganization of fishes to their scaly coverings,
and Cuvier and Owen the relation of the teeth
of animals to their whole organization This
unity of organization discovered by Hunter
and Bichat is the basis of modern physiology,
pathology and therapeutics. The progress in
the medical sciences was akin to that in poll
tics and government, in social life, in theology
and religion.
Medicine, to be sure, is not yet enfran-
chised from superstition, empiricism, ignorance
and speculation. But in the last century it
has affiliated with the other natural sciences
and has advanced by the same methods and
appliances, it is more and more like zoology
gathering to itself basis of fact and demon
stration. Preventive medicine and hygiene
are now coming to the front, and have saved
countless lives. Within less than fifty years
organic and physiological chemistry have been
essentially created, and have achieved brill
liant results; physiology has become COM
mon branch of primary education, and has re-
vealed so much that the timid tremble at
the audacity of its methods, and in
animals has been stopped by law. Within
this century the reflex and the auto
matte action of the nervous centers has been
evolved; the ophthalmosccpe, the stethoscope,
the laryngoscope, the sphygmograph. the
spectroscope, the microscope, the clinical Their
mometer have all been introduced as aids in
diagnosis Last and most important, the
anasthetic agents-ether, chloroform, nitrous
oxide and chloral-have robbed surgery and
even death of half its terrors and made va
rious kinds of abdominal surgery possible. Eff
dusions into the pleural cavity are successfully
removed; the natural history of trichinm is un-
derstood All of these helps and knowledges
are the comm on property of every doctor;
medicine has its current literature, and the
discovery of one is at once the fortune of all.
Such are some of the achievements of medi-
cine within the last century, and they certain
ly justify the enthusiastic regard in which
physicians hold their profession, and they de-
serve, as they have received, the gratitude of
mankind. 1t is also gratifying to observe that
many of the most important aids are from
American sources, and the old question of
Sydney Smith in the Edinburg Review,