Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1897-06-11
PRAISE OF DOCTORS.
REV. DR.. TALMAGE PAYS A HIGH TRlB-
UTE TO THE MEDICAL PROFESSION.

UTE TO THE MEDICAL PROFESSION.
He Takes the Case Of King Asa, who Had
the Gout, and Shows why the Doctors
skill.
New YORK, June ct is not often
that men Of one profession have much
encouragement for men Of another pro
fession, but this sermon prepared By
DR.. Talmage contains enthusiastic
words of Clergyman to physicians. The
text is ii Chronicles xvi, -, 13, "And
Asa. in the thirty and ninth year Of his
reign. was diseased in his feet until his
disease was exceeding great, yet in his
disease he sought not to the Lord, but
to the physicians. And Asa slept with
his fathers. "
At this season of the year, when
medical colleges Of all schools Of medi
cine are giving diplomas to young doc
tors, and at the capital and in many
of the cities medical associations are as
sembling to consult about the advance
ment Of the interests Of their psofes-
sion, feel this discourse is appropriate.
King Asa's Gout.
In my text is King Asa with the
gout. High living and 10 exercise have
vitiated his blood, and my text presents
him with his inhamed and bandaged
| feet on an ottoman. IN defiance Of God,
whom no hated, be sends for certain
/ conjurors or Quacks. They come and
give him all sorts Of lotions and pana-
ceas. They bleed him. They sweat him.
They manipulate him. They blister
him. They poultice him. They scarify
him. They drug him. They cut him.
They kill him. He was only young
man and had q disease which, though
very painful, seldom proves fatal TO
young man, and be ought to have got
well, but he fell victim to charlatan-
~ and empiri,i,m. "And Asa in the
thirty and ninth yCar Of his reign was
diseased in bis feet until his disease
was exceeding great. yet in his disease
be sought not to the Lord, but to the
physicians. And Asa slept with his ia
thers " That is, the doctors killed him.
In this sharp and graphic way the
Bible sets forth the truth, that you have
no right to shut God ont from the realm
of pharmacy and therapeutics. If Asa
had said: 80 Lord, l am sick. Bless
the instrumentality employed for my
recovery" "Now, servant, 90 and get
the best doctor you can find he would
have recovered. In other words, the
world wants divinely directed physi-
clans. There are a great many such.
/ The diplomas they received from the
academies Of medicine were nothing
compared with the diploma they Ie
ceiyed from the Head Physician of the
universe On the day hen they started
out and he said to them, 500 heal the
sick and cast out the devils Of pain and
open the blind eyes and unstoD the deaf
ears" God bless the doctors all tine
world over. and let all the hospitals aud
dispensaries and infrmarius and asylums
and domestic circles of the earth re-
spond, Amen.
Men Of the medical profession we Of
ten meet in the home Of distress. We
shake hands across the cradle Of ago
nized infancy. We join each other in an
attempt at solace Where the paroyysm
of grief demands an anodyne as well az
a prayer. We look into each other :
svmpathctic faces through the dusk as
the nighto death is falling in the sick
room. We do not have to climb over
any barrier today in order to greet each
other, for our professions are IN full
sympathy. You, doctor, are our first
and last earthly friend You stand at
the gates Of life when we enter this
world and you stand at the gates Of
death when we go ont Of it. In the clos
ing moments Of our earthly existence,
when the hand Of the wife or mother or
sister or daughter shall hold our right
hand, it will give strength to our dying
moment if we can feel the tips OF your
fingers along the pulse Of the left wrist
We do not meet today, as on other days
in houses Of distress, but by the pleasant
altars Of God, and l propose sermon
of helpfulness and good cheer. As III
the nursery children sometimes re-enact
all the scenes Of the sickroOm. so today
YOU play that you are the patient and
that | am the physician, and take my
prescription just once. 1t shall be
tonic, a sedaiiye, dietetic, disinfect
ant. a stimulus and an anodyne at the
same time. rs there not balm in Gil
cad? Is there not a physician there?"
An Honorable Calling.
In the first place, l think all the med
ical profession should become Christians
because Of the debt Of gratitude they
owe TO God for the honor he has put
upon their calling. No other calling in
all the world, except it be that Of the
Christian ministry, has received so
great an honor as yours. Christ himself
was not only preacher, but physician,
surgeon. aurist, ophthalmologist, and
under his mighty power optic and au-
ditory nerve thrilled with light and
sound, and catalepsy arose from its tit,
and the olubfoot was straightened, and
anchylosis went out of the stitfened ten
dons, and the foaming maniac became
placid as child, and the streets Of Je-
rusalem became an extemporized hospi-
tai crowded with convalescent victims
of casualty and invalidism. All ages
have woven the garland for the doctors
brow. Homer said
A wise physician, skilled our wounds to heal
| Is more than armies to the public veal
Cicero said, "There is nothing in
which nen so approach the gods as
when they try to give health to other
men," Charles TX made proclamation
that all the Protestants in France should
be put to death on st. Bartholomew S
day, but made one exception, and that
the case Of Pare the father Of French
surgery. The battlefelds Of the Amer
ican revolution welcomed Drs. Mercer
and Warren and Rush. When the French
army was entirely demoralized by fear
of the plague, the leading surgeon OF
that army inoculated himself with the
plague to show the soldiers there was
no contagion in it, and their courage