The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1903-03-29

obey the laws of cleanliness and NOT allow
your patient to become infected. The ig-
norance Of incompetent nurses has sent
many patient to the grave II you vol
unfairly enter your noble profession in
tellectually unqualified, you are commit
ting a sin against the human race just as
surely as Is the ignorant switchman who
throws open the wrong switch end sends
the passenger train crashing into the
freight train which has been sidetracked.
II did not know" in the sick room is
about as criminal as Il did not think or
81 forgot In this age of fine training
schools for nurses it is just as much every
curses business to learn how to think
right as 1t Is to learn how to do right.
Cure Soul and Body.
The ideal nurse should be a Christian
woman. During the dark night when the
black winged death angel Is lowering,
wing and wing, beside the white winged
birth angel, or when in the crisis of pneu-
monia or typhoid the life seems to be
hanging by a slender thread, no intelli-
gent nurse is SO competent to bend over
the bed as the one who believes in God
and prayer and the one who can ask for
the divine blessing when she pours out
the medicine or places the ice bag on the
fevered brow. A great deal of Florence
Nightingale's power over her patients
was due to the fact that she could tell
the physically helpless and the dying
about the Good Physician who was able
to cure the sufferers soul as well as his
body. The Crimean soldiers had a better
chance for getting well In this world
, when Florence Nightingales mere pres
ence made these rough men stop their
swearing and Influenced many of them
to turn their lips toward heaven with
| beseeching prayer We know that one of
the benehcent tasks of a nurse is to in
spire patients with peace of mind and of
| heart. Therefore, is not the ideal nurse
doubly fitted for her work when she can
fmpart to the sufferers soul a knowledge
of the peace that passeth understanding?
Was that nurses practical usefulness
married by her faith in God about whom
DR.. Banks relates this thrilling incident?
During one of the bloody battles of the
civil war wounded youth was carried
into the field hospital He tossed upon
his cot crying and moaning: do not let
me die! oh. l am afraid to die oh, / am
afraid to die!' The Christian nurse
walked up to his side and placed her
hands firmly upon his shoulders Then
she said: Boy If you have to die. don't
be coward Die like a mani" Then,
after she had quieted him a little she sat
by his side and began to tell him of that
Christ who was waiting to be his Saviour,
whether he lived or died. After awhile
tears of penitence rolled down the lads
cheeks. He put his faith In Christ Then,
with perfect confidence and trust in the
divine forgiveness. like a little child, he
went to sleep In his Saviours arms Do
you not feel that Christian nurses prac-
teal usefulness Is enhanced when, during
the convalescing hours, she can talk upon
the higher, the spiritual themes of life
and send her patient forth from the sick
room with noble aspirations to do right?
You KNOW as well as | know that much of
the sickness of this world is due to the
direct results of sin. Therefore, Is 1t not
In one sense essential for an ideal nurse
to be Christian woman, so that she
may fight against the cause as well as the
results of many siclSnesses?
Why Nurses Should be Christians.
But there is another reason why the
nurse should be Christian woman. No
| young girl who enters this noble profess
sion is morally and spiritually safe unless
she enters 1t with the divine arm of pro-
lection enclrcling her. We talk about the
temptations which confront an average
actor and actress. Mary Anderson, once
the uncrowned queen of the American
theatre, has warned young girls against
the temptations. Actors like Edwin
Booth would never allow their daughters
TO follow in their footsteps. Some of us
would rather see our daughters dead than
hear that they were going upon the stage
But the temptations of the stage have
their counterpart in the perils, more sub
tie and no less menacing, of the nurses
career. The breaking of the home ties
the silence of the sickroom, the evils Of
the hospital, the unprincipled lives of
many physicians and the perils which
must necessarily arise In the discussion
OF certain eases-all conspire to overthrow
the spiritual life of one who may have
entered the nurses profession with the
highest and noblest of purposes All
nurse, you realize only too well that the
words of warning which l speak have a
far-reaching and overpowering meaning:
therefore II you are going to enter this
profession In your own strength | beg of
you to stop before 1t is too late Better
scrub In the kitchen, stand behind the
counter be n chambermaid or anything
that Is honorable however humble rather
than attempt to be trained nurse with
out Christ by your side As noble
Christian woman trained nurse has the
grandest opportunities for usefulness: as
one who is not divinely protected she Is
In weekly and daily-aye perhaps In
hourly-danger of spiritual overthrow.
The ideal nurse should be a brave wo-
shot and shell, shows no greater percent
age OF loss of life than found among the
trained nurses In our contagious hos
pitfalls. The soldier who charges the enc
N.Y. breastworks Is looking death in the
lace with no Drawer eye than the uni
formed nurse who times the pulse of the
smallpox patient or the young girl who
offers to go with the physicians into the
quarantined city afflicted with yellow
fever Then there are the dangers which
may affect the patients as well as the
nurse, which result from delrium. The
other day | read an account of a case
In which the quick witted bravery of
nurse saved the life of a raving patient
committed to her charge Having stepped
out of the room for little, when she re-
turned she found the patient standing by
his bed with knife in his hand, ready to
cut his throat. Instead of screaming or
running away she fixed her eyes calmly
upon his as she said: II would not cut
my throat with such dull knife as that
If | were you. Let me have it; l know
where TO get a sharper one" The delir-
ious patient hesitated moment Then he
handed ii to her. Then she calmly turned
and threw 1t out of the open window as
she said, Now go back to bed or elses
l Will call for help to put you there"
All, that was bravery That was bravery
as great as Lieutenant Cushing exhibited
when he tried to blow up the ironclad
ram Albermarle at Plymouth, n. c., or
as General Funston exhibited when, with
a handful of followers, he invaded Aguin-
aldo's headquarters and captured the
chief of the Filipino armies 1.lat is the
kind of physical and moral courage which
many nurses have to possess in order to
ft116 ha Of