Letter to the physicians of France on homoeopathy / by Count Des Guidi ; translated from the French, by William Channing.

  • Sébastien Des Guidi
Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letter to the physicians of France on homoeopathy / by Count Des Guidi ; translated from the French, by William Channing. 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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    promulgated by our neighbors, surely there is in this circum- stance little for us to boast of, and still less upon which to base an impeachment of its merits ; nemini patrocinetur iniquitas sua.— During more than fifty years we have scarcely known Goethe, except as the author of Werter; what does that prove against Goethe] When De Villers came to name Kant to our astounded philosophers, and Madame de Stael to reveal an entire world in this same Germany so new to us, though filled with our armies and visited in every direction by our officers, did we say to De Villers and to Madame de Stael, Would not all these things have been long since known to us, had they been worth the trouble ] Did we make the same response to Dr. Gall, when he came in person to protest against his virtual outlawry at Paris itself, where but for that visit, he would probably still have been the butt of our dramatic sarcasms 1 But, let us seriously examine this question, since we have reason to believe that it has been seriously raised. Would not, it is asked, a discovery so extraordinary and so important have certainly made the circuit of the globe within forty years if it had been true V* Ah ! from what region are you, good souls ! who think that the salutary and the beautiful, have but to show themselves upon earth, and every where command altars 1 Open your eyes, and you will see with wh at difficulty and tardiness, discoveries the most useful, the most positively and immediately useful, are introduced and accepted. Before Parmentier could naturalize the potato in France, was there not put in requisition all the ascendancy of a superior mind, all the address of a court- ier, and all the patience of a devotee ] Consider the force of interest, of habit and of opinion, which oppose innovation, even with those who have the strongest motives to adopt it; calcu- late the thousand hostilities of those who have, or think they have aught to fear from it; and you will understand why so many excellent things move so slowly, or rather do not move at all; why, for example, popular education, asylums and a hun- dred other institutions of undisputed necessity, are still amongst us, so far from what they ought to be. Vaccination is still scandalously neglected by many mothers, in despite of the constant efforts of philanthropists and physi- cians, in despite of the placards and presses of government, in despite of the terrible devastations which the small-pox makes at intervals among so many deluded families. There are many mines in which, at the hazard of the most destructive explosions, they still disregard that lamp of Davy which costs nothing, and which England has so nobly, so magnificently paid for. The fumigations of Guiton Morveau, long since announced and re- commended with eclat by the ministry, have remained from that time—more than thirty years—unknown, until Smith by em-