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Leader (1850-1860), 13th December 1856, Edition 2 of 2, Page 15, . . . *~— "™" . ¦¦ .-' -9 ¦ ¦ ¦ ! ' • ¦ • __ ___ ICitoum.

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      •December 13.1856.1 The Madeb, ________ ...

      • December 13 . 1856 . 1 THE MADEB , ________ 1191 ¦ ^—

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      . . . *~— " ™ " . ¦¦ .- ' -9 ¦ ¦ ¦ ! ' ¦ __ ___ ICitoum .

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      ¦ ' ¦ ¦ ¦ . . ¦ ¦ .. . ——? . ... "• . . ¦ ¦ . . Cr itics are notthe legislators , butthe judges ana police of ltteratuxe . They ao not make laws—they interpret and try to enforce them . —JSdznburgfi Bevieto . .. "¦ . ¦ . ¦ ¦ ' ¦ . ' .. ? . ' ' ¦ ' ' ¦ ¦ ¦ " ¦ ¦

      ... .. . A Cobkesro3rr»Ent Thinks We Wei...

      A coBKEsro 3 rr » ENT thinks we weie not so ' ¦ wideawake' as usual when last ^ week we attributed to De Quikcey the opening paper in tlis mouth ' s ^ Blaclcicood , which , he unhesitatingly asserts , is only a parody of the great q ^ Opium Eater ' s style . In spite of the nudge he has given us , we continue yrh to sleep and snore , and dream that De Quikcey , and not a parodist , wrote ter the paper : if we are still far from . wide awake' on this subject , it is because sk < we resolutely sleep . In truth a suspicion did once or twice flash upon us ^ that we were reading an imitation , hut a . closer scrutiny dissipated that sus- ^ picion . If any writer can imitate Be Quincey ' s marvellous preluding and playing on that noble organ , the English language , so as not only to repro- to duce the manner , which is indeed conspicuous enough , but the -power also , co : which no one else but -Rtjskin has shown himself to possess , then we say that the palm should he awarded him for having accomplished the rarest re £ feat of imitation . When style is parodied consciously , or imitated serni- ™ consciously , we detect the peculiarities of manner , but miss the qualities bj which distinguish the original ; and give his manner a living soul ; and this or is the secret of our contempt for imitators . Johnson ' s antitheses and ^ latinisms , Macaulay ' s antitheses and short sentences , Carxtxe ' s compound m words and abrupt suddenness of effect , or Dj 2 Qujncey ' s confluent , slowly be evolved sentences , are easily imitabie . The difficulty lies elsewhere : ^ it | J lies ia imitating the felicity and force of Joiinson , the epigram , and rare il- ri ( lustration of Macavlat , the pictorial concreteness of Cablyke , or the music and subtlety of De Quince * ; and the writer who has power enough ol for that , will not be likely to waste it on an imitation . .. .. .. . . ' . . . . . ¦ ¦ ;_ ¦ " ¦ - - ' . ¦ ¦ - ¦¦¦ ¦ . w not wise p to cons real 1 by i or I as fact ' - be . ' ! L

      A Very Piquant Contrast Is Brought Into ...

      A very piquant contrast is brought into relief by a writer in the Revue des Deux Monties , in a . paper on Greet and Chinese vases , the contrast of two Nations as they represent themselves lu Art : the one idealizing and ennobling itself , the other caricaturing and degrading itself . The -world out of China , knows little of tlie Chinese except in such representations as Chinese artists have given on vase ' s , tea-cups , & c . In all these we have the same type , the Chinese ideal , round head , large eais , eyes lurching upwards towards the temples , a single lock of hair , a grinning gash of a nioutb , and a stomach of aldermanic emphasis ; and if we compare this type with the Grecian type , with its noble front , its large simple contour , its regular features , aiid majestic form , we might almost deny the community of species between the two . M . J 3 etjlk , referring to the Chinese type , says , " II est peu fait pour toucher la race caucasienne ; elle en plaisante . " And so little brotherhood do we admit with ugliness so grotesque , that , as lie says , " the history of China leaves us indiilerenfc , its sorrows even cause us mirth . " When the newspapers narrate that many thousand rebels have been cut .. to pieces , these atrocities only seem to . us hizctrres : a Chinese is too distant from us for neighbourhood , too ugly for brotherhood : pour vtre notrc procltain , 7 m Clniiois cdtrofi loin ; pour etrc noire semllable , il est trojrlaicV After this , who will repeat the platitude about beauty being only skin-deep ? As if men and women were in the habit of divesting themselves of their dermal covering , to . show that underneath they were lovely enough ! As if it made any difference whether the beauty was many fathoms or only the twentieth of a line in depth ! Beauty is one of God ' s gifts ; and every one really submits to its influence , whatever platitudes he may think needful to issue . TLc Greeks Understood this influence which , as M . Beule says , " r ^ pandle respect autour " d ' unc race , do memc quo les representations magnifiques soutiennent la innjeste des rois . " How , think you , should we ever have relished the immortal fragments of Greek literature if our conceptions of Greek men and women bad been formed by contemplation of figures sudi as those of Chinese art ? Would any pulse have throfcbed at the Labdiioidan tale had the descendants of Labdacus risen before tlie imagination -with obese rotundity , large ears , gashes of mouths , and no nose to speak of ? Could we , with any sublime emotions , picture to ourselves Fo-Ti on the Promethean rock , or a Congou Antigone wailing her unwedded death ? Ajax , in the darkness of madness , slays a flock of sheep , mistaking the sheep for ungrateful Greeks , and wo contemplate him awakening to the sense of humiliation and despair ^ with emotions which would scarcely arise if for the broad-chested Greek were substituted a Souchong Aj \ x with tremulous head wncging in smiling idiocy . No , the Chinese have cliosen to caricature themselves , and the world takes them at their word ; the Greek with nobler error chose to deify themselves , and the world will ever think of them as godlike .

      Tub Wise Physician. Lectures On The Prin...

      TUB WISE PHYSICIAN . Lectures on the Principles and Methods of Medical Observation and Research . ^ By Thomas Lavcock , M . D . Adam and Charles IHaclc . It has been remarked on many nn . occasion that the wiser a physician is , tie more sceptical is he of medicine . Only tlio quacks arc confident , for ignorance is always absolute . The profound complexity of u human or ganiem , reached , an it is , through so ninny m-enuos of inappvcemUlo influence , the total impossibility of our distinguishing and eliminating onecause in eases where a p lurality of causes are necessarily operating , and the y C - » , * W l- I ! C

      : ai ™ tl , S ; P | s ; u i > ^ t fact that important changes are taMng place in recesses of the organism not serutable by any means in our power , must for ever render the Axt of Medicine delicate and diflicult . A . recognition of its difficulties is , however , of incalculable benefit to the physician . He learns to make allowance for possibilities , hidden yet potent ; he learns to be wary in forming conclusions ; he learns to be vigilant over his oven precipitate tendencies . The very fact-that Medicine is an Art and not a Science , consequently to be definitely taught , but oniy indicated , will always keep tip the distinction between the skilful and the unskilful physician . Raphaels and Canovas are not to be made . Yet Raphaels and Canovas may learn from predecessors certain general rules wherewith to guide their own attempts . And for medical , students Dr . Laycock has , in , the work before us , sketched some of these guiding rules , not to make physicians "wise , but to make the wise more alive to what is required of them . It is a treatise on medical logic , or the Methods of observation ? and is as interesting to hilosophical as to medical students . See for example how he warns the student against the common fallacy as the value of mere observation , which in our * matter-of-fact ' country is tantly lauded as the best of all methods : —• But , after all , -unlearned experience is not the best guide , nor empirical knowledge science ; and tins is a fallacy against which I must warn you ; for it is a very common one . Medical practitioners in all ages , noting the great value of simple experience , and seeing how far away from truth and common sense men have "been led theories and hypotheses , have put simple experience forward as something better more instructive than , the combination of observation with theory— -esteeming them only mischievous elements , and to "be avoided at all cost . Now , this notion is , in , a theoretical notion ; for experience itself teaciaes us two great principles or maxims as to what is termed theory or hypothesis—namely , irst , that theory cannot dispensed with in observation ; and secondly , that theory , rightly used , is a necessary element not only in the advancement , but in the practical application of all human knowledge . Let me illustrate these propositions by facts drawn from experience , and by arguments upon those facts . He cites Sydenhana , who constantly inculcated , this necessity ^ of empirical observation , and this is the citation : — "In writing the history of a disease , " he says , " every philosophical hypothesis whatsoever that has previously occupied the mind of the author should lie in abey-»• ance . This being done , the clear and natural phenomena of the disease should T ) _ e f noted—these , and these only . They should be noted accurately , and in all their minuteness , in imitation of the excLuisite industry of those painters-who represent in 1 their portraits the smallest moles and the faintest spots . " In these directions , Sydenhain is -influenced by two hypotheses— . first , that just as there are species _ of , plants , there are also species of diseases , which have their clear and natural phenomena ; and secondly , that nature , in the production of disease , is " uniform and con-2 sistent . " He therefore roundly asserts , what is in fact contrary to the experience ot s -us all , " that for the same disease in different persons the symptoms are for the most 1 -part the same , and the selfsame phenomena that you would observe m the sickness of a Socrates yon would observe in tlie sickness of a simpleton . " Now , diseases ^ are e really series of events , and not well-defined objects , as plants or animals , and these r events vary as infinitely in combination as fhe natures of the individuals to whom S they happen ; so that it is a medical proverb or maxim , that hi piactice Ko two „ cases are alike . " ¦ ¦ . tue

      ^ n v J \ j j < ^ . ; s In truth , empiricism is choked with hypothesis , and labours under disadvantage of not knowing its hypotheses to he such . What then , vou will ask , is the nature of hypothesis or theory in medicine , and what the use ? I will endeavour to explain to you . Experience shows that , in medicine , as in every other branch of human knowledge , thought itself is impossible without hypothesis or theory . We instinctively desire to understand all that we observe to occur . No man can be content with mere perceptions , for these are only the stimuli - to thought . After obseryation comes comparison with ^ hat we already know , and conclusion or inference from the comparison . This conclusion is a theory , which would be perfectly true if the data were complete and correct ; but they are not . Our observations are imperfect , our knowledge is imperfect—our conclusion , therefore , reflects the imperfection of our observations and of our previous knowledge , and is never true , but always hypothetical or theoretical ; varying from the truth , just in proportion as we are ignorant or imperfect observers . Having drawn our conclusion—that "is , formed our theory—we may or may not rest satisfied with it . If we wisely doubt , then we desire to verify it by observation or experiment iorifto conclusion be as to something attainable , > ve endeavour to attain . And this , is . only , another way of testing the theory by experience . To theory , then m ^ thie . sense ,, tu at is , tested by observation or experiment , or experience , we owe all true progresa in knowledge , for empirical knowledge is stationary . To be able to theorize and yet discriminitte between what is fact and what hypothesis , is the test of a scientific mind In direct ^ f ^ " £ such a mind is the sclf-stjlcd * practical man , ' who never ' fuddles himselt ; with theories . Dx-. Laycock well says , of such -men : — They arc unhealtating believers in phrases , in the ^™ ° * Wn &<>™> a " * . classes of drugs . For each symptom they have a remedy , and talk of ton » cj alteratives nstrincents , febrifuges , not being in the least aware , apparently , that every ; ^ thT ^ wl ^^ P ^ " VCry d 0 Ubtful ^ COry - ThBy ^ rS th v 1 Uieorists in practice of the worst kind , because they do not even suspect that they J a rtlSoreScal So for from being practical ia their methods > of _ £ 2 *™^* » ^ say , adapting it to tlie morbid conditions in which tho individual is involved ^ as a ' Sv—thev only look at special or isolated morbid states . The result is , the aclmi-1 stration for the " cure of disease of a frightful farrago of drug ., more ^ angerous even i than the nullities of homoeopathy . This error has had a very seriously injurious in-5 fluenco on the profession as a , whole , as well as upon medical art . ,.-,-. s It is these ' practical men' wlio , untrained in the rigorous school of phir losonhv approach the most complex questions with confidence , and do not f e ^ rshowThem ^ lyes aware of the 'Vitality of causes' with which they have to deal i as '^ tactic al men , ' they lix on one cause , one palpable factor , and with it work tlie whole sum . Here is a good example : — Until within tho lost twenty yonrs , it was nn micontroverted doctrine in Enfi lnnd that re ft , and especially the plum , was the ' cause of tho diarrhoea and cholera irovalont in ho tovnfl ami villnfioa during the hot months of summer . Even so ff s October 18 8 , tho Hnglish General Board of Health set forth this theory in Sofl o ?« l noUncation to the boards of guardians as to tlie moans to fo -Joptcd ftr the prevention of cholora-in Avhich we have this paragraph : " It will o in " . '« ' ?« also o abstain from fruit of all kind ., though ripe and ^ en coo ^ , » nd whetoor dried or i . rcservcd . " lly way of proof , certain facts are subjoined , as thus . » ° hrc null ca ^ s [ of cl , « Wtl . » t } iavoi « -t occurred to sallors . ho hj d bjj , l at I lamburg , and who were brought sick to Hull , turned out , on m < iuny , to Ua ^ c i . w

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 13, 1856, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_13121856/page/15/