The psychical tendencies of medical science / by A. O. Kellogg.

  • Kellogg, A. O. (Abner Otis), 1818-1888.
Date:
[1859?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The psychical tendencies of medical science / by A. O. Kellogg. 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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    treatment of disease, both physical and mental, (though by these terms we would not be understood as speaking of two distinct and always separable entities ; we regard the connection as too intimate, ever to admit of complete separation,) and to show that this influ- ence is in operation in conditions and under circumstances which have not hitherto been sufficiently recognized and acknowledged; and in further proof of this we shall here attempt to examine how far the psychological element has contributed, and still continues almost imperceptibly to contribute to the success of so many conflicting theories and systems of medicine ; and not to those which we have dignified with the names of theory or system only, but to the many forms and phases of charlatanism, which, like parasites, have at- tached themselves to what is now a great, noble, and must become ultimately, a perfect science. In the first place let us consider that most specious, popular, fash- ionable, and, for quite obvious reasons to the attentive observer, suc- cessful medical innovation known as homeopathy, from a psychologi- cal point of view. This most fanciful system maintains, as is well known, that all diseases are cured by the administration of medicines which are ca- pable of inducing in the healthy system disordered actions analogous to those brought about by the disease. With the theory, per se, we shall not quarrel. It may, or may not be quite as true as other theories of obscure and imperfectly understood actions, for aught we know : we therefore leave this an open question. The means, how- ever, by which the theorists suppose they bring about the action in question, we can not, even with the utmost stretch of credulity, rec- ognize. Indeed, when they tell us of the potency of the decillionth part of a grain, of a substance like charcoal, nearly if not quite inert, we are inclined to smile at the wonderful credulity of the hu- man mind, and are only prevented from laughing outright by the thought that this credulity is in itself a powerful curative agent of a character strictly psychological.