Elements of general pathology : a practical treatise on the causes, forms, symptoms, and results of disease / by Alfred Stillé.

  • Stillé, Alfred, 1813-1900.
Date:
1848
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Elements of general pathology : a practical treatise on the causes, forms, symptoms, and results of disease / by Alfred Stillé. 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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    tians. The two parties saw the same object through different me- dia, and therefore saw it differently. If an impartial umpire could have been found, he would, probably, have given judgment against both parties, declaring that the facts in question were scientific facts,—that they had nothing to do with religion, and, of them- selves, gave as little countenance to the blasphemy of the one, as to the enthusiasm of the other. It is common for persons to imagine that the study of astronomy must be delightful; that it must purify and elevate the soul, and inspire it with sublime conceptions of the Creator of all things. With these laudable sentiments, they open an astronomical trea- tise, and find a sad array of ellipses, parabolas, tangents, paral- laxes, equations of curves, and other algebraic formulas, which have no more to do with the visible or metaphysical relations of the heavenly bodies, than have the letters of the alphabet with the ob- jects they are employed to name. The poetico-religious inquirer closes the book in disappointment, and reproaches astronomy for not teaching him what it never professed to teach,—what, indeed, it was incapable of teaching. He should have blamed himself for not having taken the pains to inquire how that science was to be studied,—what were its legitimate objects, and its appropriate sphere. The same remarks are true of the other sciences, and, to their full extent, of medicine. Whoever would cultivate it with pleasure and profit, must first inform himself thoroughly of its na- ture, capabilities, and aim; for, if he do not, one of two conse- quences will inevitably ensue : either he will fail to accomplish any- thing honourable or useful, let him labour never so assiduously,or he will, sooner or later, abandon the profession in disgust, per- suaded that he has been deceived. He will have found that, in- stead of filling him with veneration of the wonderful contrivances of the human organism, and inspiring him with poetical or devo- tional feelings, it rather tended to diminish his faith, to materialize his speculations, to blunt his sensibilities ; that instead of his find- ing in it exhaustless mines of metaphysical research, of gaining from it any light as to the cause of life, the nature of vitality, the connexion of the soul and body, it not only left him as ignorant of these things as ever, but taught him that they were unattainable,