Pneumonia : its supposed connection, pathological and etiological, with autumnal fevers; including an inquiry into the existence and morbid agency of malaria / by R. La Roche.

  • La Roche, R. (René), 1795-1872.
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Pneumonia : its supposed connection, pathological and etiological, with autumnal fevers; including an inquiry into the existence and morbid agency of malaria / by R. La Roche. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    formation has taken the place of sound and accurate learning; that in a field Avhere men of well-disciplined and well-stored minds, and rich in accurate observation—men who have within their reach the means of testing the statements of other investigators, whose standing is equal to their own—men who live, as it were, in an atmosphere of science, have failed; it is scarcely to be expected that individuals of ordinary capacity, with little experience, and as little reading, who are unused to accurate processes of scientific investigation and close induction, and who possibly move within localities where opportunities for prosecuting the requisite researches on a sufficiently enlarged scale are, in a great measure, wanting, will reap laurels, and assume a conspicuous place in the ranks of medi- cal reformers, or add greatly to the stock of useful knowledge. The cause of these successive and repeated efforts at revolution- izing the science in some or all of its parts, of this reluctance to pursue the common track, and of this disposition to discard opinions long entertained, and to substitute others of a contrary character, need not be made here the subject of detailed examina- tion. That in some cases the result is due solely, or in a great measure, to a craving after notoriety—to the ambitious desire to be pointed out by medical or rather by unprofessional men, as authors of brilliant discoveries, and as gifted agents of scientific and practi- cal improvements; in other words, that the guiding impulse is more frequently the desire for personal advancement and pecuniary gain, than a due regard for the interest of science, we have every reason to conclude. Equally true is it, that we may sometimes trace this result to the mere desire of gratifying the innocent and harmless vanity to which some individuals, especially young medi- cal men, fresh from the schools, are keenly alive, that of seeing their names in print; more particularly if they can so appear in con- nection with something really or seemingly new, and calculated to attract attention. These lucubrations, though of no earthly value to any one in a scientific or other point of view, are to their pro- • mulgators objects of vast importance; and hence the desire to see them spread out in the pages of a medical journal, side by side with the contributions of older and better known physicians. We may also suppose that, in some instances, it is the offspring of the foible which nature has infused into the composition of some happy individuals, who imagine themselves endowed Avith the faculty of unravelling the most intricate mysteries of the science, and of