Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1899-06-03
GREAT IS THE DOCTOR.
He Makes a Blessing of Science and a
Beuediction Of Humbug.

Blocking out this letter in my mind,
find it will be chiefly devoted to doc
tors, although I have no i'll will against
them. They are of all blessings the
greatest in time of need. They play
the most benevolent and beautiful con-
fdence game in the world, for they are
supposed to know all about things
which nobody knows anything about.
Most of us know the glorious relief the
doctor brings with him for even when
he cannot heal the body he brings COM
fort to the mind and takes RESPONSE
bility which nobody else can assume.
He is ray of light in dense and
dangerous darkness, kindly guide in
trackless desert, great power lift
ing away a pressing weight. When he
says the danger is over or the patient
better, his voice is sweet as any music
chanted by heavenly choir, and the
heart sings jubilant in response to it.
He is a splendid institution, a good
providence, a present and potent help
in the time of greatest trouble and fear
the human life can know. Yet, like
men of other trades, when he departs
from the sure ground of common sense
and goes to following theories, he is as
likely as anybody else to develop him
self into most unreasonable and fam
tastic ass and sometimes he becomes
fakir, consciously or unconscously.
A very eminent specialist read a pa
per here few days ago in which he
laid it down as a fact that day dream
ing-air castle building-is both a
symptom and cause ofinsanity. He
knows more about brain cells and
nerve structures than do, of course /;
but when we get into the abstract
realms of the human mind we are on
equal ground, for both of us must judge
from our experience and observation
in life. And say he is an ass. Nine
tenths of the lunatics in the asylums
are people without imagination. Show
me one dreamer committed by the
Judge of probate, and I will show you
10 men and women who have confined
themselves to the hard facts of life and
have been driven mad by them. The
truth is, day dreaming and castle
building are reliefs for the mind. The
capacity to dream in daylight is the
capacity to rest the castles in the air
are castles of refuge in which the tired
and oppressed mind may find hiding
places, for the time at least, from
swarms of besetting and wounding
cares and unfortunate and relentless
facts. I believe day-dreaming and
caste-building have saved countless
millions of people from lunacy. 10
get away from things as they are to
things as we would have them is joy
and strength. The day-dream is a
stimulant and narcotic for the mind,
and as useful and necessary as things
having the same effect on the body.
Of course it can be used to excess and
can make minds effeminate and value
less. Of course that happens, as 1t
happens that other good things are
used to harmful excess. A man died
in Bellevue hospital yesterday from in-
ordinate tea drinking and as matter
of fact there are doctors who will tell
you tea is poison-they usually do not
use it Just as others will tell you it is
not only harmless but helpful-they
usually do use it. But, however, tol-
Grant l am of the foibles of other doc.
tors T must insist that this ailienist
have been talking of is an ass. am
sure he is.
Doctors follow fashions as obedient-
ly as the women they deride-that IS,
town doctors do. The country doctors
plug along and everybody says they
are behind the time; but notice they
pull through about as many of their
patients as anybody else does-for
people who can afford to pay for it.
A well-to-do young married woman
told me a few days ago that young
woman is not regarded as being in So
ciety now unless she has undergone d
surgical operation. Nearly every mar
ried woman she knew had been cut or
sawed into one way or another. She
had been under the knife twice, and so
far as she knew aud believed, it was
not necessary either time. She told
me two stories. One was of woman
who was informed chat she had ap-
pendicitis and that an operation was
necessary to save her life. Being a
very determined woman and having
opinions of her own, she positively re-
fused to allow d knife near her, and the
whole shooting match of consulting
NJ. D's abandoned her Indignantly.
She went to work just as if she had
been a poor woman in the country and
treated herself for an old fashioned
case of cramp collie with hot water
and flannel and was we'll the next day.
The doctors could not cut her with
knives; but they cut her acquaintance,
and two of them actually refused to
speak to her because she wouldn't die
when they said she must; and she
laughed in their faces.
The other story illustrates the fact
that it is not always the doctors fault.
A conscientious man had woman
patient who insisted that she must
j