A letter to the allopathic doctors of Dayton / by H. Wigand.

  • Wigand, H. (Henry)
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A letter to the allopathic doctors of Dayton / by H. Wigand. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    and is driven to and fro upon the waves without your knowing where you are, and how and where you are going to land!— One of you says: this Remedy is the proper one for such a disease, another says: no, I found that such a one proved more efficacious. Each of you has his own notions; each one has his own way of experimenting upon his fellow beings. What a confusion! What a nonsense! What quackery! But, our system is very old, you remark. It is 3000 years old, and must be right. Nobody should doubt, that it is all right, even if it is wrong. Yes, Gentlemen, it is very old; it belongs to the dark ages, and it is a shame, that in this enlight- ened 19th century such a system is still propagated, should still find its advocates! It is very old; so old, that a great many of you, perchance, never have known or, never have inquired how this glorious system originated! Do you know who has been the father of this beautiful child? Why, learned Sirs, in olden times, when we had no regular M. D's. and of course very few diseases, Shepherds, witches and old woman did all the Doctoring. These individuals discovered, that certain roots, herbs, &c, would, when taken in large doses produce sweating, diarrhoea, vomiting, &c, and which, when their friends or neighbors were sick, they urged them to take, assur- ing them that they certainly would be benefited by them, for such a man, such a woman or such a child haa1 used the same Remedy with remarkable success. Well, later, so many different herbs, roots, and other things were discovered, which would produce vomiting, purging, &c. that it became necessary, in order not to forget the one or the other of these medicines, to give them certain names, and clasi- fy them. They had a dozen or more things which would purge, and they called them Cathartics; another dozen which would produce vomiting and they called them Emetics &c. Many years after this foundation to the present allopathic Materia medica was laid, people became more intelligent, more rational and some of them were anxious to know, why and upon what principles these vomits, Cathartics, Diaphore- tics, &c. were administered! Why, said the Doctor, with much dignity we based this our treatment of diseases upon observations in nature. We saw, that, when a dog wants to vomit, he eats grass; here the origin of Emetics. We observ- ed, that a bird called Ibis, uses his bill, which is of consider-