The Brookhaven leader., 1886-01-28
ALCOHOL.


Medical Practice-It Merely Dlminishes
the Sensibility of the Nervous System
and Brain-An Able Address by Miss
willard Before the students of a Medi-
cal College.
The ladies of the South Side (Chi-
cago) W. c. T. U. recently gave re-
ception to the three hundred students
of the Hahnemann Medical College
Miss Frances E. Willard, President of
the n. W. c. L. u, delivered an ad-
dress pertinent to the occasion, full of
good points and convincing arguments.
A portion of her remarks are given be-
low.
Some illustrations from personal obserya.
uon may hep to make more clear the reason
why the w. &. T. U. is intent upon securing
all possible help from the medical pr professIon,
and why, IN fourteen States. it has already
successfully labored to provide for scientific
instruction in the common schools relative
TO the evil effects of alcoholic beverages.
One stormy afternoon in 1SS2 went with
Mrs L. y CArse, President of Chicago Central
W C. T u, to the Harrison Street Police Sta
ton. AS is generally known, this society has
now police matron at every station in tho
city, whose duty it is to look after the women
brought there for violations of law, and to
minister with sisterly kindness to their needs.
both ply sical and spiritual We found that
many had been brought in that day, but the
matron directed our attention especially to
the most distant cell, where a woman lay
curled up on bench, with an old shawl over
her head She had been brought in drunk
some hours before. AS we stood there think
ing her to be asleep and lame nting, in whis-
percd tones, her sad condition. the woman
arose, came toward us, grasping with a small
white band the bars OF the CELL and spoke to
us IN sweet voice, saying: DO you ladies
really care for one so hopelesaY' We assured
her of our sympathy, and in talk that fol-
lowed learned that she was born in leading
southern city, had graduated from first
class normal college, and been for YearS a
teacher. One spring, about four years pre-
ylous to our meeting. worn out with her
prescr bed an alcoholic beverage as a tonic
From that day she had gone on, little by little,
often reforming, but as often falling into sin.
subsequent investigate on proved that she was
related to a refined and wealthy family in
Chicago They and we have done all in our
power for her. She has been at the Martha
Washington Home and for months has kept
her pledge, only to fall away from it at last.
have mentioned this.one case out of tsn
thousand that come to the knowledge of
practical Temperance workers, because a
single Illustration is often retained in memory
when generalization may be forgotten. and
because this one is type of fully One-half
the cases of 'nebriety among women and per
maps one third i'll men, viz: 1t began by an
alcoholic prescription. 1t is quite probable
that the phy slcian whose ignorant prescrp-
ton was pure and cultured woman's first
step toward ruin. never knew the fact, and
would he unSpeakably aStOunded. not to say
afflicted, If If were brought to his attention. /
said the prescription was an ignorant one
and am prepared to prove 1t on the highest
medical authority.
Sir HeHry Thompson, of London, than
whom the world S mstrOpolis has not phys-
clan more distinguished, makes the following
declaration; alcoholic drinks are perfectly
useless for any of the conditions of life to
which men are subjected save under the most
exceptional conditions, which none but skilled
observers can declare"
Or. Andrew Clark, of London, physician to
the Queen and 20 Gladstone, says 3"AlcOhol is
not only not helper of work but a certain
hinderer, and every man who comes to the
front of profession In London is marked by
this one characteristic, that the more busy he
gets the less in shape OF alcohol ne takes, and
his excuse is; am sorry, but l can not
take il and do my work "
DIR, william B. Carpenter, one or the great
est names in medicine, says: 1T is the duty
OF the medical practitioner to discourage as
much as possible the habitual use of alcohol
ic liquors in however moderate quantity
by all persons in ordinary health. and to
seek to remedy those slight departures from
health which result from the wear and tear
of active life by the means which shall most
directly remove or antag0nze their causes,
instead of by such as SIMPLY pallate their ef-
fects.'
Journal Of Chemistry. says emphatically that
1.-THE banishment OF alcohol would not de-
prve us of a single one of the Indispensable
agents which modern civilization demands.
Neither would chemical science be retarded
hy its loss In no instances of dis
hse in any form is it a medicine which
might not be dispensed with and other agents
substituted.
DIR. James Edmunds founder of the London
Temperance Hospital, states that the mortali-
" there is -four and one-half per cent lower
than in any other hospital taking the same
run of cases" Alcohol is almost never used
in the hospital; is not employed in making
uinctures. a solution of one part glycerine to
two of water, being substituted at cost one
fifth less than that of alcohol tinctures, is now
forin nr fNn Nd
with results that demonstrate the superiority
of this method.
gland, the medicidal use OF alcohol has fallen
off in eight recent years eighty-seven per
cent and the death rate from about eleven
Felix L. oswald, one of the most learned
writers living, whose articles in the
Pop,Iar Science MO,dhly have attained Ma
''I will venture the prediction that before
the middle of the twentieth century the
internal use of drugs will be discarded by all
intelligent physicians Medical science is one
thing and medical dogma Is quite another.
AS DR.. Edmunds wisely says: Forty years
ago the fathers of the very men who now pre-
scribe brandy, wine and ale for almost all dis
eases, prescribed calomel. bleeding and starv-
ing instead. They did this conscientiousy,
too, no doubt. but then. as now. the tendency
of their medicines was to kill rather than
cure.
TO attempt anything more than to cato the
opinions of leaders in the noble profession TO
which you aspire that the reasons, based on
expert testimony why the w. c. I. U. op-
poses the use of alcoholics in medicine may
be clearly understood
We use in our teaching of the young Dr.
Sewelrs plates, made by that distinguished
physician after he had studied with DR.. Beau
mont the stomach of Alexis st. Martin, and
had during a period of forty years dissected
three hundred drunkards, some of whom mad
been distinguished statatesmen in their day.
The awful object lesson presented in these
plates should be carefully considered by ev-
ery medical student in the land
The cumulative testimony of the best scen-
fists explodes the medical dogmas that alco-
bol is either food or a producer of heat, or
that il increases the efficiency of the hearts
action.
In his admirable lecture already quoted
DIR. Davis gives a resume of the expert
ments which have revealed these wonder
ful truths, which have in them the force of
dynamite in exploding the old theories. Lead
ing scientists in France, Germany, England
and America, though working separately. have
reached substantially the same conclusions.
Why the truth has been evolved so slowly is
rendered apparent in this statement OF DR..
N. S. Davis, former President of the American
Medical Association, a physc and scientist
of nifty years experience. as he states In the
pxeface to his recent standard work on '"Jhe