every two hours all that day-so that there is no earthly agent, however powerful, even in a small quantity, that may not, by farther diminution, be adapted to any state and strength-to any age or condition of life for which you may be desirous of prescribing it. In this respect, medicine resembles every thing in nature. In the case of colors, for example,-the most intense blue and the deepest crimson, by the art of the painter, may each be so managed that the eye shall not detect, in his design, a trace of either one or the other. In the case of the infant just mentioned, the dose of prussic acid was about the twenty-fourth part of a drop, and its good effects were very immediate and very obvious. Nevertheless, when the attending practitioner came in the morning to see the little patient, then completely out of danger, he was so horrified by the medicine which had produced the improvement, that he stated to the family he could not, in conscience, attend with me any longer. He accordingly took his leave of the child he himself had brought into the world, and all because he-a man-midwife!-could not approve of the treatment that saved its life. Yet this very person, without hesitation, let loose all at once the Eight lancets of the cupping instrument on the head of the same infant, whose age, be it remembered, was under six months! Gentlemen, though I will not condescend to name the individual who, having so heroically, in this instance, swallowed the camel, found such a difficulty afterwards in approaching the gnat, I may state for your diversion that he is a very great little man in his way-being no less than one of Her Majesty's principal accoucheurs-a proof to you that "Court-fools" are as common as ever. Indeed, the only difference I see in the matter is this-that whereas in the olden times such personages only exhibited in cap and bells at the feast and the revel, they now appear in a less obtrusive disguise, and act still more ridiculous parts on the gravest occasions. One very great obstacle to improvement in medicine has been the very general preference given by Englishwomen to male over female practitioners of midwifery; for by means of that introduction, numbers of badly-educated persons not only contrive to worm themselves into the confidence of families, but by the vile arts to which they stoop, and the collusions and conspiracies into which they enter with nurses and each other, they have in a great measure managed to monopolise the entire practice of physic in this country. To check the career of these people, Sir Anthony Carlisle wrote his famous letter to the Times newspaper, wherein he declared that the birth of a child was a natural process, and not a surgical operation." Notwithstanding the howl and the scowl with which that letter was received by the apothecaries, it is pleasing to see that the public are now beginning to be aware of the fact that more children perish by the meddlesome interference of these persons, than have ever been saved by the aid of their instruments. How many perish by unnecessary medicine, common sense may form some notion -for the fashion of the day is to commence with physic the moment the child leaves the womb-to dose every new-born babe with castor oil before it has learnt to apply its lip to the nipple! Who but an apothecary could have suggested such a custom? Who but a creature with the mind of a mechanic and the habits of a butcher, would think of applying a cupping instrument behind an infant's ear to stop wind and convulsions? The nurses and midwives of the last age knew better. Their custom in such cases was to place a laurel-leaf upon the tongue of the child. The routinists laughed at what they called a mere old woman's remedy, and declared that it could have no effect whatever; they little knew that its strong odor and bitter taste depended upon the prussic acid it contained! Gentlemen, you may get many an excellent hint from every description of old women but the old women of the profession-the pedantic doctors, who first laugh at the laurel-leaf as inert, and yet start at the very medicine upon which its virtues depend, when given with the most perfect precision in the measured form of prussic acid men who, in the same mad spirit of inconsistency, affect to be horrified at the mention of opium or arsenic, while they dose you to death with purgative physic, or pour out the blood of your life as if it were so much ditch water! Gentlemen, there is such a thing as HEREDITARY PERIODICITY. If you take a particular family, and, as far as practicable, endeavor to trace their diseases from generation to generation, you will find that the greater number die of a particular disease. Suppose this to be pulmonary consumption. Like the ague, which makes its individual revisitations only on given days, you shall find this disease attacking some families only in given generations-affecting every second generation in one case; every third or fourth in another. In some families it confines itself to a given sex, while in the greater number, the age at which they become its victims is equally determinate-in one this disease appearing only during childhood, in another restricting itself to adult life or old age. By diligently watching the diseases of particular families, and the ages at which they respectively reappear, and by directing attention in the earliest stages of constitutional disorder to those means of prevention which I have in the course of these lectures so frequently had occasion to point out to you, much might be done to render the more formidable class of disorders of less frequent occurrence-mania, asthma, epilepsy, and consumption might thus, to a certain extent, be made to disappear in families where they had been for ages hereditary. But alas! then, for the medical profession, the members of which might in that case exclaim, "Othello's occupation's gone!" LECTURE VIII. THE SENSES-ANIMAL MAGNETISM-THE PASSIONS-BATHS-EXERCISE HOMEOPATHY. GENTLEMEN, The CAUSES of DISEASE, we have seen, can only affect the pody through one or more of the various modifications of nervous perception. No disease can arise independent of this-no disease can be cured without it. Who ever heard of a corpse taking the Small-pox? or of a tumour or a sore being healed in a dead body? A dreamer or a German novelist might imagine such things. Even in the living subject, when nerves have been accidentally paralysed, the most potent agents have not their influence over the parts which such nerves supply. If you divide the pneumo-gastric nerves of a living dog-nerves which, as their name imports, connect the BRAIN with the Lungs and Stomach-arsenic will not produce its accustomed effect on either of these organs. Is not this one of many proofs that an external agent can only influence internal parts BANEFULLY, at least, by means of its Electric power over the nerves leading to them? Through the same medium, and in the same manner, do the greater number of our Remedial Forces exert their SALUTARY influence on the human frame. But whether applied for good or for evil, all the forces of nature act simply by Attraction or Repulsion. The Brain and Spinal Column-the latter a prolongation of the former-are the grand centres upon which every medicine sooner or later tells, and many are the avenues by which these centres may be approached. Through each of THE FIVE SENSES, the Brain may be either beneficially or banefully influenced. Take away these, and where would be the joys, sorrows, or the DISEASES of mankind? We shall first speak of SIGHT. The view of a varied and pleasant country may, of itself, improve the condition of many in varids-while a gloomy situation has too often had the reverse effect. There are cases, nevertheless, in which pleasant objects only pain and distract the patient by their multiplicity or brightness. Night and 'darkness, in such circumstances, have afforded both mental and bodily tranquillity. The presence of a strong light affects certain people with headache; and there are persons to whom the first burst of sunshine is troublesome, on account of the fit of sneezing it excites. A flash of lightning has caused and cured the palsy. Laennec mentions the case of a gentleman who, when pursuing a journey on horseback, suddenly arrived at an extensive plain. The view of this apparently interminable waste affected him with such a sense of suffocation, that he was forced to turn back. Finding himself relieved, he again attempted to proceed; but the return of the suffocative feeling forced him to abandon his journey. The common effects of gazing from a great height are giddiness, dimness of sight, with a sense of sickness and terror; yet there are individuals who experience a gloomy joy upon such occasions; and some become seized with a feeling like what we suppose inspiration to be a prophetic feeling, that leads them to the utterance and prediction of extravagant and impossible things. Others again, under such circumstances, have an involuntary disposition to hurl themselves from the precipice upon which they stand. Sir Walter Scott, in his Count Robert of Paris, makes Ursel say, "Guard me, then, from myself, and save me from the reeling and insane desire which I feel to plunge myself in the abyss, to the edge of which you have guided me." Any kind of motion upon the body may affect the Brain for good or for evil; and through the medium of the Eye novel motion acts upon it sometimes very curiously. Who of you has not experienced giddiness from a few rapid gyrations? Everything in the room then appears to the eye to turn round. If for a length of time you look from the window of a coach in rapid motion, you will become dizzy; the same thing produces sickness with some. Many people become giddy, and even epileptic, from looking for a length of time on a running stream; with others, this very stream-gazing induces a pleasurable reverie, or a disposition to sleep. Apply these facts to Animal Magnetism*-compare them with the effects of the manipulations so called, and you will have little difficulty in arriving at a just estimate of their nature and mode of action. What is animal magnetism? It consists in passing the hands up and down before the eyes of another slowly, and with a certain air of pomp and mystery; now moving them this way, now that. You must, of course, assume a very imperturba * [Three years ago, viz., in 1845 when I published my first American edition of this work, I was almost as sceptical on this subject as Dr. Dickson. But my scepticism has been much shaken since, and I am constrained to think with Hamlet, that, "there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy.' Nor would it be a sound philosopical objection to say that it is liable to be abused; since that is the lot of every gift of Providence-to quote again a passage from Shakspeare, that accurate observer: "Naught so vile that on the earth doth live, Our author admits, which indeed can hardly be denied, that the action of medicines, both of the mineral and the vegetable kingdoms, is electric, or, what is the same thing, magnetic. Why should we infer the higher kingdom, the animal, to be deficient in, instead of possessing in a higher degree, a power so subtle and so important? May it not yet be demonstrated that the two forms of electricity, now known as the positive and the negative, are simply, the one, the motion of the particles of the light of the sun, the other, the motion of the particles of his heat-both together, with their varieties of intercourse, constituting the all of mineral and vegetable power, and the all of physical life, and their disturbance or imperfect adjustment in the human body, the all of physical disease, or disorder? W. T.] ble gravity, and keep your eye firmly fixed upon the patient, in order to maintain your mental ascendancy. On no account must you allow your features to relax into a smile. If you perform your tricks slowly and silently in a dimly-lit chamber, you will be sure to make an impression. What impression-Oh! as in the case of the stream-gazer, one person will become dreamy and entranced; another, sleepy; a third, fidgetty, or convulsed. Who are the persons that, for the most part, submit themselves to this mummery? Dyspeptic men, and hysteric women-weak, curious, credulous persons, whom you may move at any time by a straw or a feather. Hold up your finger to them, and they will laugh; depress it, and they will cry! So far from being astonished at any thing I hear of these people, I only wonder it has not killed some of them outright-poor fragile things! A few years ago I took it into my head to try this kind of pawing in a case of epilepsy. It certainly had the effect of keeping off the fit; but what hocus-pocus has not done that? I have often done the same thing with a stamp of my foot. In a case of cancer upon which I tried the "passes," as these manipulations are called, the lady got so fidgetty, I verily believe, if I had continued them longer, she would have become hysterical or convulsed! That effects remedial and the reverse, however, may be obtained from them, I am perfectly satisfied. Nor do I mean to deny that in a few-a very few instances, these, or any other monotonous motions, may produce some extraordinary effects effects which, however, are the rare exception instead of the general rule. Whatever any other cause of Disease may produce on the human body, these manipulations may by possibility occasion-Somnambulism, Catalepsy, or what you please. There is no more difficulty in believing this than there is difficulty in believing that the odour of a rose, or the sight of a cat, will make certain people swoon away. This much, then, I am disposed to admit. But when the animal magnetisers assert that the senses may be transposed, that the stomach may take the office of the eye, and render that beautiful organ, with all the complete but complex machinery by which it conveys light and shadow to the Brain, a work of supererogation on the part of the Creator, I turn from the subject with feelings of invincible disgust. If it be objected that the magnetisers have produced persons of both sexes who with their eyes closed and bandaged read a book placed upon their stomach by means of that organ, through waistcoat, boddice, and heaven knows what all!-I reply, that the charlatans of all countries every day perform their tricks with a swiftness that altogether eludes the unpractised eye. Thousands of persons have seen the Indian juggler plant a mango-stone in the ground, and in the course of a few minutes do what nature can only do in the course of years, make it successively produce a plant with leaves, blossoms, and lastly, fruit! How this trick is done, the witnesses who describe it know no more than you or I do how the magnetisers perform their juggleries; but few who have seen the Indian trick believe in the reality of any one of the various transformations with which their eyes have been cheated. Gentlemen, the transposition of the senses, is only an old whimsey newly dressed up under the name of "clairvoyance." We read in Hudibras of Roscrucian virtuosis, Who see with Ears and hear with Noses! The greater part of the influence of external impressions upon the eye, as upon other organs, depends upon novelty solely, for pomp and pageantry affect the actors and the spectators in exactly opposite ways. With what different feelings, for example, the courtier approaches his sovereign, from a person newly presented!" The one, all coolness, looks only for an opportunity of improving his advantages while the other's only care is not to make a fool of himself. How different the effect of a punishment parade upon the raw recruit and the old soldier! In a regiment of veterans, a thousand strong, you will not find a man move from his place, no, nor a countenance change its cast or hue, while lash follows lash, and the blood flows in streams from the back of the culprit. The same scene enacted before a body of newlyenlisted lads of equally numerical strength, will alter the expression of every face; nay, half-a-dozen or more will drop, some fainting, some vomiting, some convulsed and epileptic. A medical student of my acquaintance, the first time he saw an amputation, not only fainted, but lost his sight for nearly halfan-hour; yet the same student afterwards became celebrated for his manual dexterity, and the coolness and steadiness with which he performed his amputations. To use a vulgar phrase, familiarity breeds contempt. How awkward most persons feel when, for the first time, they experience a ship's motion at sea! The young sailor, like the young surgeon, soon gets cured of his squeamishness; for the disposition to be sea-sick vanishes after a voyage or two. Now all this ought to convince you of the necessity of changing your remedies in disease; for what will produce a particular effect one day will not always do it another. With the body, as with the mind, novelty and surprise work wonders. Do you require to be told that you can influence the whole corporeal motions through the organ of HEARING? I have stopped the commencing epileptic fit by simply vociferating in the ear of the patient. The atoms of the brain, like the atoms of other parts, cannot do two things at once; they cannot, at one and the same moment of time, maintain the state of arrest which constitutes attention, and the state of motion on which the epileptic convulsions depend. Produce cerebral attention in any way you please, and there can be no epilepsy. In this way, a word may be as efficacious as medicine. Certain sounds, on the contrary, set the teeth on edge. The influence of melody upon the diseases of mankind was so fully believed by the ancients, that they made Apollo the god both of medicine and music; but sweet sounds, like the other sweets, are not sweet to every body. Nicano, Hippocrates tells us, swooned at the sound of a flute; what would he have done had he been obliged to sit out an opera? Many people are melancholy when they hear a harp; yet the melancholy of Saul was assuaged by David's harping. Some persons become frantic when a fiddle plays, And others when the bagpipe sings i' the nose Every body has heard of the wonderful effects of the Ranz des Vaches, that air which, according to circumstances, may either rouse the Switzer to the combat, or stretch him hopeless and helpless upon the sick bed from which he shall rise no more. Oh! these national airs have marvellous effects with many people! I have known them produce and cure almost every disease you can name; but their influence in this case greatly depends upon association. Captain Owen had more faith in an old song as a remedy for the tropical fever, from which his crew suffered, than in all the physic prescribed for them by the ship's surgeon. The singing of a long-remembered stanza, he assures us, would, in a minute, completely change for the better the chances of the most desperate cases. Upon what apparently trifling things does not life itself often turn! It may be a sound, A tone of music, summer's eve or spring A flower, the wind, the ocean, which shall wound, Striking the ELECTRIC CHAIN with which we're darkly bound.-BYRON. How strangely some people are affected by SMELL! Who that had never seen or experienced it, would believe that the odour of the rose could produce fainting? or that the heliotrope and the tuberose have made some men asthmatical? There are persons who cannot breathe the air of a room containing ipecacuan, without suffering from asthma. The smell of musk, so grateful |