Remarks on "The present state of the theory and practice of medicine" : being a review of Prof. Bennett's published introductory lecture (University of Edinburgh, session 1855-56) : communicated to the Hunterian Medical Society of Edinburgh, (Jan. 11, 1856) / by John M'Gilchrist.

McGilchrist, John, 1821-1864

Date:: 1856

Credit: Remarks on "The present state of the theory and practice of medicine" : being a review of Prof. Bennett's published introductory lecture (University of Edinburgh, session 1855-56) : communicated to the Hunterian Medical Society of Edinburgh, (Jan. 11, 1856) / by John M'Gilchrist. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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$This is the third striking instance, and far fetclied as we shall show it to be, it yet has some presumed connection with the subject; it makes some effort—however futile when examined —at showing what a study of the theory of medicine has accomplislied. In the first ])aragraph of the above quotation, some facts are merely stated : in the second, we have an example of false ana- logy and inconsequent reasoning—a kind of fallacies already more than once encountei'ed in the lecture tinder review—in the present instance reminding us, we confess, of the fabled Jii mountain in labour which brought forth a mouse. Steam andij«; electricity, the two greatest wonder-workers of the age, are, as\-] it were, too good to be lost as illustrations : no matter how, they ji must be got in. They are enlisted in the service of theoretic*: medicine accordingly, and lo! the tape-worm is evacuated byli steam, and so effectually electrified, that the patient is troubled by the astonished parasite thenceforth nevermore! While we allow that the treatment of tape-worm, which, be- sides giving anthelmintics, prohibits the eating of half-cooked animal food, reflects credit on those whose observations led to it, we entirely dissent from the assertion, that such facts are revolutionizing the study of medicine ; and we repudiate the analogy of the steam-engine and the telegraphic ^are. The' observations alluded to (of Kuchenmeister and others), were made on mice, cats, pigs, dogs, &c., for the detection of certain species of cysticerci, tracing them from lower to higher condi- tions and habitats up to man. On the other hand, the experi- ments of Black, Galvani, and their followers—which ultimately led to the construction of steam-engines and electric telegraphs —were made with elements and forces totally different—the imponderable forces, heat and electricity. The things com- pared, therefore, are not merely different in kind, but the results) as disproportionate in degree. Locke, in the early part of his career, was a physician, and we may be sure that—however ignorant of cysticerci, and other jiarasites—when he reasoned as a physician, he did so logically. Suppose Dr. Locke were to revisit this sublunary scene, and, when viewing for the first time the action of a steam-engine, or$