The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-06-07
BENEOICTIoN FOR DOCTORS.
REV. TALIAGE breaches TO THE
MEDICAL MEN.

shut ont From the Realm of Phnr-
macy and Thernpeutics-The
world Wants Divine Directed
Physicians-Nan of Medicine nnd
the Minister often Together in the
Home of Distress.
New York. June st is not often that
men of one profession have much encour-
agement for men of another profession,
but this sermon prepared by Dr. Talmage,
contains enthusiastic words of a clergy
man TO physicians. The text is II Chron.
1912. 10. 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 medicine are Civ
ing diplomas to young doctors. and at the
canital and in many of the cities medical
associations are assembling to consult
about the advancement of the interests Of
their profession, I feel this discourse is
appropriate.
In my text is King Asa with the govt
ated his blood. and my text presents him
with his inflamed and bandaged feet on an
ottoman. In defiance of Cod whom he
hated. he sends for certain conjurors or
ouacks. They come and give him all sorts
of lotions and panaceas. They bleed him.
They sweat him. They manipulate him.
They blister him. They poultce him.
They scarify him. They drug him. They
cut him They Kill him. He was only a
Young man. and had a disease which,
though very painful. seldom proves fatal
20 young man, and he ought to have
got well; but he fell a victim to charla-
tanry and empiricism. 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 ne
sought not to the Lord, but to the physi-
clans. And Asa slept with his fathers.
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 out from the realm OF
pharmacy and therapeutics. II Asa hau
said "Oh, Lord, l am sick; bless the
instrumentality employed for my recoV-
ervv' "Now. servant go and get the
best doctor you can find"-he would nave
recovered in other words the world
wants divinely directed physicians. There
are a great many such. The diplomas
they received from the academies of medi-
cine were nothing compared with the d.
ploma they received from the Head Ply
stefan Of the universe, on the day when
they started out and he said to them:
eco heal the sick, and cast out the devils
of pain, and open the blind eyes, ana UNI
stop the deaf ears" God bless the doc
tors all the world over! and let all the
nd and
ries, and asylums, and domestic circles OF
the earth respond: Amen"
Men of the medical profession we often
meet in the home of distress. We shake
hands across the cradle of agonzed in
fancy. We Join each other In an attempt
at solace where the paroxysm of grief de-
mands an anodyne as well as a prayer.
We look into each others sympathetic
faces through the dusk, as the night of
death is falling in the sick NDom. We do
not have TO climb over any barrier to-day
in order to greet each other, for our pro-
fessions are in fun sympathy. You. doc
tor, 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 out of It. In
the closing moments of our earthly exist
ence when the hand of the wife, or moth
er, or sister, or daughter, shall hold our
right hand, it will give strength to our
dying moments, If we can feel the tips
of your fingers along the pulse of the left
wrist We do not meet to-day, as on 9TH
er days, In houses of distress, but by the
pleasant affairs OF God, and l propose a
sermon of helpfulness and good cheer. As
in the nursery children sometimes re-enact
all the scenes of the sick ROOM so to-day
you play that you are the patient and that
/ am the physician, and take my preserp-
ton just once. 1t shall be tonic, Sc
datVe, a dietetic, a dsinfectant, a slim
a 10
rs there not balm in Gilead? Is there
not a physician there?
In the first place I think all the medical
profession should become Christians be-
cause 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 IL be that of the Christian minis
try, has received so great an honor as
yours. Christ himself was not only preach
er, but physician, surgeon, aurist, oph-
thalmotologist, and under his mighty pow
er optic and auditory nerve thrilled with
light and sound, and catalepsy arose from
IT'S ut, and the club-foot was Strengthened
and anchylOss went out of the stffened
tendons, and the foamiug maniac became
placid as a child, and the streets Of Jeru-
salem became an eXtemporized hospital
crowded with cOnValescent victims of cas-
ualty 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
men so approach the gods as when they
Try TO give health TO other men," Charles
TX. made proclamation that all the Pro-
testants in France should be put to death
on ST. Bartholomew day. but made one
exception. ana that the case OF Pare. the
father OF French surgery. The battlehelds
Of the American revolution welcomed Drs
Mercer ana Warren. and Rush. When
the French army was entirely domoralizcd
az fear Of the plague. the leading surgeon
OF that army inoculated himself with the
plague to show the soldiers there was no
contagion In a.: and their courage rose.
and they went on To- the conflict. GOD has
honored this profession an the
way through. oh. the adj
Vanccment from the days when Hippo
crates tred TO cure the great Pcuclos with
hellehore ana fax seed poultices down to
far later centuries when Halter announc-
ed tho theory of respiration, and Harvey
the circulation OF the blood. and Ascoli
the uses Of the lEmuhufle xgeeele and