The hydropathic encyclopedia : a system of hydropathy and hygiene in eight parts ... designed as a guide to families and students, and a text-book for physicians / by R. T. Trall, M.D.

  • Russell Trall
Date:
1853
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The hydropathic encyclopedia : a system of hydropathy and hygiene in eight parts ... designed as a guide to families and students, and a text-book for physicians / by R. T. Trall, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    cation of bis doctrines did not allay the wordy warfare still waged be- tween tbe Chemists and Mathematicians, until it was revived and re- fined by the genius and energy of the next successful adventurer in the field of medical theory. This was Stahl, who was bom at Anspach, in 1660. He undoubt- edly saw the sad deficiencies and gross errors in the prevailing theories, and, perceiving that neither chemical nor mechanical reasoning, nor bot-h, could ever explain the phenomena of life, he referred vital ac- tions to the operation of a principle he called anima. From a closo observation of the influence which the mind exercises over the body, he came to the conclusion that all the vital functions were produced and sustained by the influence of an animating and superintending spiritual principle. This principle prevents or repairs injuries, coun- teracts or removes morbific causes, and, in fact, appears to be the ag- gregate of what modern physiologists speak of as the organic instincts. But, as an exception to the general rule, the theory of Stahl did in- fluence his practice very considerably, for, instead of the rash and dangerous potencies and processes then in vogue, his views, in the lan- guage of an eloquent historian, tended to repress the energy of the practitioner still more than the pathological doctrines of Hippocrates. They did, indeed, cause him to trust more to his presiding deity—the great physician, Nature—and less to artificial drags and destructives. Happy would it have been for the human race if a more inert practice had continued to this day, to repress the energy of the practitioner, for sad experience, and the constantly accumulating catalogue of human ills and chronic maladies, unheard of in former days, sufficiently dem- onstrate that success in curing disease holds a much nearer relation to the inertness than to the energy of the practitioner, as far as active poisons are concerned. The doctrines of Stall], and the extraordinary metaphysical acuteness with which they were supported, had an extensive influence on medi- cal opinions; but about that period there were so many rival medical schools evolving new theories, each advancing their claims to notice with great zeal and ability, that it was impossible for any one hypothesis to be generally received. The Solidists.—Hoffman, the contemporary of Stahl, was also his colleague in the University of Halle, as well as his rival, and an equal aspirant for name and fame. He wrote voluminously, and the princi- pal theoretical notion which he originated was a modification of the Stahlian doctrine of vitality. Instead of referring the operations of the animal oconomy to an anima, he imputed them to a nervous injlitence.