A treatise on the sympathetic relation between the stomach and the brain ... in the causation and cure of diseases. With an appendix ... on certain points connected with the treatment of chronic disease and it's [sic] attendant debility / by Charles Wightman.

Date:
1840
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on the sympathetic relation between the stomach and the brain ... in the causation and cure of diseases. With an appendix ... on certain points connected with the treatment of chronic disease and it's [sic] attendant debility / by Charles Wightman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    his character as a physician, and as the author of the well-known treatise on the utility of purgative medicines, by which he brought this method of treatment into far more extensive use, than had been the case previously to it’s publication; it is rio-ht that I should take some notice of the cen- sures that have, in these latter years, been levelled at this respected individual and his followers. If I were called upon to say, who, in my opinion, within the last thirty-five years, (the time now elapsed since the date of the treatise,) had con- ferred the greatest benefit on the human race by his improvement in the practice of the healing art, I should without hesitation pronounce the name above-mentioned. But the terms, which some censorious persons have applied to Dr. Hamilton’s doctrines and practice, are by no means justified, truly, because certain indiscriminating and injudi- cious men have carried the practice to an extent, which was never contemplated by the eminent author himself; to which it was never carried in his own experience ; and against which, indeed, in his treatise, he expressly states his cautious admo- nitions. I have often in meditation wondered, how the treatment of various diseases, in which the exhibition of purgatives has been proved to be so necessary and advantageous, had been con- ducted before the general introduction of this class Q 3