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1016 &$$ QLtaHet* [Saturday,
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THE MEDICAL QUESTION OF THE DAY. The att...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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The People's Institute In Westminster. T...
and we trust that the subject will be duly and not tardily considered . The People ' Institute for Westminster and Pimlico might be made an excellent model and beginning .
1016 &$$ Qltahet* [Saturday,
1016 & $$ QLtaHet * [ Saturday ,
The Medical Question Of The Day. The Att...
THE MEDICAL QUESTION OF THE DAY . The attentive reader will remember that , early in the present year , we devoted three articles to the explanation of the twofold idea of Homceopathy , thinking ( as we certainly did and do ) that the Hahnemannian movement in Medicine had become a subject of vast public importance . That article had scarcely been published when ( as the spirit of coincidence would have it ) there commenced a struggle between the old and new schools of practical medicine , originating in a spasmodic effort on the part of the former to put the latter down . It appears that the young heresy had been actually making inroads into the membership of the College of Physicians at Edinburgh , formerly a
professionguild of doctors enjoying a monopoly of practice in ttt € Candlemakers ' -row and other streets or closes of A \ ild Reekie , and now a sort of honorary club of sufeh medicos as are able and willing to pay down £ 100 , & c . Well , the professor of Pathology in the College at Edinburgh , a former treasurer of the College of Physicians itself ( whom it had even delighted to honour with a service of plate ) , a London physician , and the superintendent of the water-cure hospital at Benrhydding , being all fellows of the Royal College , have ( notwithstanding their £ 1 OO honours 1 ) dared to investigate and accept the theory of specifics and the practice of infinitesimal doses . It has , therefore , behoved the orthodox majority to express its disgust at the conduct of its recusant associates . Thanks to the
constitution of the College and the dreadful common sense of a possible Scottish jury , however , it could not expel the four offenders without incurring the risk of as many actions of damages . They proposed and passed a series of resolutions against Homoeopathy and Homceopathists , and all such lukewarm brethren as should have any dealings with Homceopathists . These resolutions were chiefly remarkable for being supercilious and
illcomposed . The secretary , Mr . Alexander Wood , tried to add insult to injury ; addressing a copy of said resolutions , for example , to Professor Henderson , under the designation of " Practitioner of Homoeopathy . " The resolutions were proposed by Dr . Christison , the well known professor of the old Materia Medica , whose peculiar craft is in danger from the progress of the Materia Mtdica Pura of Hahnemann ; but their syntax is too loose and absurd for his practised pen .
It is worthy of notice that persons holding by the majority which carried those resolutions , brought the fact of their having been carried before the public in the Witness newspaper , an organ which , however , did the Homoeopaths the justice of letting them speak for themselves in its columns . At all events , it was thus the Allopathic party that first thrust the question into the popular arena , where , it must be confessed , tliey have been fairly beaten . It is unnecessary to follow the successive steps of this orthodox rise to crush poor Homoeopathy , for everybody must be more or less familiur with them ; and there is a sameness in all those measures of
resistance to the aggressions of discovery , which is sufficiently uninteresting to the student of scientific ( and especially medical ) history , as well as very uninstructive to the general reader . Suffice it that the Edinburgh College of Surgeons soon sent forth a feeble echo of its elder sister ' s denunciation . Then the West of . England Provincial Medical Association , apparently as favourable a specimen of the Plebs Medica us could well be gathered together , met at Brighton , and congratulated the Edinburgh colleges on . their noble stand . Nor did the provincials fail to outdo the metropolitans in all the
courtesies of medical conflict , like the Abigail of a railing mistress . A London association joined in the crusade . Next came the rejection , commonly called the plucking , of a candidate for graduation by the Medical Faculty of the University of Edinburgh , because of his adhesion to Homoeopathy ; followed by tho hoinologation of the principle of Mich rejection by the fuculty containing a single medical professor , but one so luminous that they call him Day ! of St . Andrew ' s , and jiIro that of King ' s College , at Aberdeen . It in alleged that the ( Glasgow examiiiators are inclined to be as exclusive ; so that Scottish medicine uj fairly in
arms against the uptdart I This movement of the orthodox majority is peculiarly unwise in every point of view . If lloinu ; - nothy bo false , they inuy bo mire that it will
speedily die . If it be partly true and partly false , their opposition can only perpetuate the adhesion of error with which it is encumbered . If it be true—v < b xyctis I But in any case their angry and contemptuous recriminations have only consolidated the numerous existing followers of Homoeopathy , brought the latent power of the new doctrine very prominently before the public , interested not a few medical men and thousands of the laity in the therapeutical question , conveyed a deep impression of their own intolerance and highhandedness to the public mind , and in every way
promoted the cause they have wished to extinguish . Ten years ago there were some ten homoeopathic practitioners in Great Britain , now there are some two hundred ; in ten years there will be two thousand , at the same rate of increment . Right or wrong , Homoeopathy has the ball at its feet for many years to come , thanks to those of the opposite faction . If wrong , posterity will blame the colleges almost as much as the sectaries themselves . If right , it will just be one instance more of God ' s making the wrath of man to praise Him—that is til !
Out of all this commotion there has arisen , amongst other things , a society for the protection of Homoeopathic students ; and we wish to say a moderate word about it and its object . Long custom has made it necessary to obtain either a doctor ' s degree , or a surgeon ' s diploma , as the indispensable preliminary to entering upon the practice of medicine . The public looks for it as a guarantee of the bearer ' s having really and regularly
studied medicine . It accordingly does seem very hard that a young man , who has passed through a full curriculum of medical study according to rule , should be refused his diploma , because he is a Homceopathist . One ' s sense of justice revolts against it . Homoeopathists have risen as one man to resent it . Yet there is something to be said on the other side of the question too . It is far from an easy knot to loose .
It must not be forgotten by the Homceopathists , and it will not long be forgotten by the public , that the Allopathic School with its venerable names has a conscience as well as Hahnemann and his disciples . The men of the old faith sincerely and even devoutly believe in their hearts of hearts that this exhibition of infinitesimals is an awful delusion , awful in relation to the patient , and awful as regards the progress of medical science .
Disbelieving it , they must view it with something like horror . They must lament , despise , and oppugn it . We do not say they have acted scientifically by the alleged discovery of Hahnemann ; we think they have not ; but , conceiving Homoeopathy as they do , they are bound in honour to do all they can to quench it ; and so all in honour they do . They no more persecute the Homceopathists than these persecute them . The only difference is that they have the power more in their hands—the Universities and what not .
Now , if a young Homoeopath present lumself for examination before an Allopathic professor of the practice of physic , he must answer him as a Homoeopath ; and , answered homoeopathically , the professor is bound to reject him . It is the professor ' s profound opinion that the candidate is ignorant of the true art of healing , that , in fact , he cannot practise physic , and he must report him incapable . It has been speciously said that such a candidate may answer his examinator impersonally . Away with such a thought ! Far be such Jesuitry
from the courts of science I No ; the implicit , if not tlic explicit formula of such an examination is , What would you do in thi 3 case and in that ? And the man of honour who has accepted Homoeopathy , can answer the formula in only one way . lie can only say , the Allopathic method in bucIi a case i « so-and-so ; but , being a Hoinoeopathist , I should follow my own rule of treatment . In short , it is our unhesitating opinion that it in competent for an orthodox examinator in the practice of physic , or the Materia Medica , to reject a
Homoeopathic aspirant ; and also that no such aspirant has a moral right to a diploma from any existing board us at present constituted . We think it a thousand pities that such cxiunina ^ ors should not see that even so great a diflerclpcc in opinion and practice in quite compatible with the idea of both Allopath and lloiiiouopatlt enjoying their honours mm emoluments side by side ; but now the question is mooted , wo cannot but see and assert that there is no protection possible to the homoeopathic candidate , according to the prevailing system of degrees and diplomas . Just suppose that the profenHora of Edinburgh College , mid tho
majority of the students were Hahnemannian in conviction and in practice . If a candidate came before the former , denying his sacred Homoeopathy and asserting the rights of the fatal lancet and the poisonous drug , he would surely send him back as a dangerous person , and wholly unfit to practise the beneficent profession of healing . At all events if the faculty should recklessly let such a heretic loose upon society , wearing their testimonial to his
having truly and usefully studied medicine , the public would assuredly be struck into suspicion by their latitudinarian notion of the art of healing , take it for granted that the whole affair was a juggle . Such is precisely the position of the Edinburgh faculty with their degree , mutatis mutandis . There is no escape from their dilemma except the frank profession of absolute scepticismomen quod Dii avertant !
What , then , is to be done in this emergency ? Since young Homoeopathic physicians must have some sort of doctorship or diploma , by way of general certificate to the public , how shall it be accorded them ? Three several plans have occurred tous as meeting the difficulties of the case . The first condition of all and several pf these three plans is that iGoyernnieritj , f in // consideration of the large number of responsible and influential British subjects adhering to Homoeopathy , put forth her authority in the matter .
1 . Two Homoeopathic examinators , one in the practice of physic and the other in the Materia Medica , might easily be added to some one or more of the existing boards ( that of University College , for instance ) , and Homoeopathic students entitled to claim examination on these subjects at their hands . This is done at several universities in Germany , we understand ; but the British , having more practical faith in their systems , and , therefore , more bigotry against whatever comes in the guise of a critic or a rival , may not be capable of working so reasonable a scheme . It is to be feared that
there would be resistance to the death on the part of any existing board here , against any proposal of this sort . It is too rational , and also too fast-and-loose looking for faithful , fighting , plainspoken , unrefining , single-eyed John Bull . II . The Homoeopathists might have an examining board of their own empowered to grant diplomas of some sort , physicians' diplomas , analogous to surgeons' ones , as accorded by the various Colleges of Surgeons . The advantages of such a board would be manifold . The whole course of study and
of subsequent examination might be modified and shaped anew by sagacious men in these new circumstances . It could easily merge in the old institutions , or altogether give way as soon as Homoeopathy shall have won all the strongholds , as it must eventually do if it be true . It appears to us that such a board is attainable at one stroke . It could not be refused to 200 practitioners and some 200 , 000 laymen , counting amongst the number , bishops , lords , judges , generals , men of letters , members of Parliament , great merchants , and all sorts of intelligent people .
III . It is at the same time pretty obvious , that many long years will pass before Homoeopathy is fairly and universally received as part and parcel of the science and art of medicine . It and several other great subjects have , doubtless , a long and arduous gauntlet to run , before reaching the goal towards which they press . The next half century seems to be dedicated to contests of almost every kind , and this is one of the high places of the field . In these circumstances , Homoeopathy bad better establish its own school of medicine at once , and demand a charter from the commonwealth . Let it body out
its own curriculum of study , prescribe its own practical training , appoint its own teachers , and award its own diploma . It in a poor ana pitiful thing that it should be driven to tao sectarian an extreme ; but it has done all it could to avoid such a consummation ; it is now fairly driven forth of the paternal root ; and nothing remains for it but to found its own fortunes . The time for conciliation will come . In the mean tiiye , it must be schisumticnl in order to a nobler scientific catholicity in the long run . It could never fail in such an effort . Dividing t » o
medical mon and the public equally among tlie existing medical schools , each of them cannot iepreKunt more than two hundred doctors and two hundred thousand patients . Then the cause <> i Homoeopathy is young , aggressive , strong m taiti i flushed with enthusiasm , allied to much Unit i » youthful and vigorous in the newest movements <> human thought , and growing like a K '"" t ' roin ycur to year . It bus likewiao a glorious opporiu-
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 25, 1851, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_25101851/page/12/
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