Popular medical errors / [James Bower Harrison].

  • Harrison, James Bower
Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Popular medical errors / [James Bower Harrison]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    surely plausible, even before it was confirmed as an established truth by later observations.”* jNJany of the expressions commonly made use of in speaking on medical subjects might be changed with advantage to suit more rational views. Some of them, it is true, are only used metaphorically, and it would not therefore be fair to censure them too rlgidl)^ e hear of the seeds of a disease lurking in the sj'stem — of a complaint flying about, and finally settling upon a particular organ; and these phrases, though for the most part used vaguely, have to a certain extent a bias over the thoughts. There can be but little doubt that very many of the vulgar opinions were in reality at one period the established doctrines of the day; for in this, as in many other cases, it has hap- pened that the better-informed part of mankind have forsaken the doctrines they promulgated by the time the people became familiar with them.f It is the same with the fashions of our dress, and the pronunciation and choice of our words, the generality of mankind being of ne- * Lives of British Physicians, Family Library, p. 72. t They are the fossil words and phrases which show us the vestiges of decayed opinions.
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