Democratic Northwest and Henry County news. [volume] (Napoleon, O. [Ohio]) 1894-1905, 1897-06-10

post nouotSu 0Ou anu lOugut DdCA oc1bu
with their keen scalpels.
Heroes Of Medicine.
II we who are laymen In medicine would
understand what the medical profession
has accomplished for the insane, let us
look into tho dungeons where the poor
creatures used 10 be incaroeratnd. Mad
men chained naked TO the wall A kennel
Of rotten straw their only sleeping place.
Room unventilated and unlighted. The
worst calamity Of the race punished with
the very worst punishment And then
come and look at the insane asylums Of
Utica and Kirkbride-sofaeda and pictured,
hbraried. concerted, until all the arts and
0dornments come to coax recreant reason
to assume her throne. Look at Edward
Jenner, the great hero of medicine. Four
hundred thousand people annually dying
In Europe from the smallpox, Jenner finds
that by the incubation of people with vac
cine from a cow the great scourge of na-
tions may be arrested. The ministers Of
the gospel denounced vaccination; small
wits caricatured Edward Jenner as riding
In great procession on the back of COW,
and grave men expressed 1t as their opinion
that all the diseases of the brute creation
would be transplanted into the human
family, and they gave instances where,
they said, actually horns had come out
on the foreheads of innocent persons and
people had begun to chew the oud But
DR.. Jenner, the hero of medicine, went ON
| fighting for vaccination until it has been
estimated that that one doctor in 90 years
has saved more lives than all the battles
of any one century destroyed!
! Passing along the streets Of Edinburgh
few weeks after the death of Sir James
Y. Simpson, saw the photograph of the
doctor In all the windows of the shops
and stores, and well might that photograph
he put in every window, for he first used
chloroform as an an9sthetie agent. In
other days they tried to dull human pain
| by the hasheesh Of the Arabs and the ma
| drepore of the Roman and the Greek. But
| it was left to DR.. James Simpson to intro
| duce ohloroform as an anesthetic. Alas for
the writbing subjects of surgery in other
centuriesl Blessed be God for that wet
| sponge or vial in the hand of the operat.
ing surgeon in the clinical department OF
| the medical college, or in the sickroom of
| the domestic circle, or on the battlefield
amid thousands Of amputations.
| Napoleon after battle rode along the
line and saw under tree, standing in the
snow, Larrey the surgeon, operating upon
the wounded. Napoleon passed on and
"a hours afterward came along the same
place, and he saw the same surgeon operat.
ing in the same place, and he had not left
1t. Alas for the battlefelds without chic.
roform. But now the soldier boy takes o
few breaths from the sponge and forgets
all the pang of the gunshot fracture, and
while the surgeons of the field hospital are
| standing around him he lies there dream
ing of home and mother and heaven. No
more parents standing around a suffering
child, struggling to get away from the
sharp instrument, but mild slumber in.
stead of excruciation, and the child wakes
up and says: Father, what's the matteri
What's the doctor here today for?" Oh,
blessed be God for James Y. Simpson and
| the heaven descended mercies of chloro.
form.
Public Hygiene.
The medical profession steps into the
courtroom, and after conflicting witnesses
have left everything In a fog, by chemical
analyses shows the guilt or innocence OF
the prisoner, as by mathematical demon
stration, thus adding honors to medical
jurisprudence.
This profession has done wonders for
public hygiene! How often they have
stood between this nation and Asiatic
cholera, and the yellow feverl The monu.
ments in Greenwood and Mount Auburn
and Laurel Hill tell something of the
story of those men who stood face to face
with pestilence in southern cities, until,
staggering in their own sickness, they
, stumbled across the oorpses of those whom
they had como to save. This profession
has been the successful advocate of ventila.
tion, sewerage, drainage and fumigation,
until. their sentiments were well expressed
by Lord Palmerston when he said to the
English nation at the time fast had been
proclaimed to keep off great pestilence
"Clean your streets OF death will rGvage,
Notwithstanding all the prayers of this
nation. Clean your streets, and then call
on God for help"
See what this profession has done for
human longevity. There was such fear
! ful subtraction from human life that there
was prospect that within few centuries
this world would he left almost inhabit-
antless. Adam started with whole eter
nifty of earthly existence before him, but
he cut off the most of it and only COM
paratiyely few years were left-only zoo
years of life, and then 500, and then 400,
and then 200, and then 100, and then 90,
and then the average of human life came
to 40, and then it dropped to 1S. But
medical science came in, and since the six
teenth century the average of human life
has risen from IS years to "A, and it will
continue to rise until the average of hu-
man life will be 80, and it will be 60, and
1t will be 70, and man will have no right
to die before 90, and the prophecy of
Isaiah will be literally fulfilled, "And the
child shall die 100 years DID," The mil
, lennium for the souls of men will be the
millennium for the bodies of men. Sin
/ done, disease will be done-the clergyman
and the physician getting through with
their work at the same time
| The Dispensaries.
But 1t seems to me that the most beau
tiful benediction of the medical profession
has been dropped upon the poor. No ex-
cuse now for any ones not having scien-
tiflo attendance. Dispensaries and infirm-
aries everywhere under the control of the
best doctors, some Of them poorly paid,
some of them not paid at all. A half
starved woman comes out from the low
tenement house into the dispensary and
unwraps the rags from her babe, bundle
of ulcers and rheum and pustules, and
over that little sufferer bends the accumu-
lated wisdom of the ages from Esculapius
down to last weeks autopsy. In one dis
penaary in one year 1900 prescriptions
were issued. Why do / show you what
God has allowed this profession to do? Is
it to stir up your vanity? Oh, no. Tho
day has gone by for pompous doctors, with
conspicuous gold headed canes and pow
dered wigs, which were the accompani-
ments in the days when the barber used
to carry through the streets of London
DR.. Brockelsby's wig, to the admiration