purpose to follow these speculations, or to give an account of the
doctrines of the mechanical physicians, who believed that every
operation of the animal economy was explained by comparing it to a
system of ropes, levers, and pulleys, united with a number of rigid
tubes of different lengths and diameters, containing fluids which, from
variations in their impelling causes, moved with different degrees of
velocity: or of the chemical physicians, whose manner of theorizing and
investigating would have qualified them better for the occupation of the
brewer or of the distiller than for that of the physician. All these
speculations are idle fancies, without any evidence whatever to support
them; and it has been argued that, for this very reason, they must have
been without any practical result, and that, therefore, if they were
productive of no benefit, they were, at least, innoxious. No opinion can
be more false or pernicious. These wretched theories not only
pre-occupied the mind, prevented it from observing the real phenomena of
health and of disease, and the actual effect of the remedies which were
employed, and thus put an effectual stop to the progress of the science:
but they were productive of the most direct and serious evils. It is no
less true in medicine than in philosophy and morals, that there is no
such thing as innoxious error; that men’s opinions invariably influence
their conduct; and that physicians, like other men, act as they think.
Asclepiades, whose mind was full of corpuscles and interstices, was
intent on finding suitable remedies, which he discovered in gestation,
friction, and the use of wine. By various exercises he proposed to
render the pores more open, and to make the juices and corpuscles, the
retention of which causes disease, to pass more freely. Hence he used
gestation from the very beginning of the most burning fevers. He laid it
down as a maxim that one fever was to be cured by another; that the
strength of the patient was to be exhausted by making him watch and
endure thirst to such a degree that for the first two days of the
disorder he would not allow them to cool their mouths with a drop of
water. Abernethy’s regulated diet is luxurious living compared to his
plan of abstinence. For the three first days he allowed his patients no
aliment whatever; on the fourth, he so far relented as to give to some
of them a small portion of food; but from others he absolutely withheld
all nourishment till the seventh day. And this is the gentleman who laid
it down as a maxim that all diseases are to be cured “_Tutò, celeriter
et jucunde_.” To be sure he was a believer in the doctrine of
compensation; and in the latter stage of their diseases endeavoured to
recompence his patients for the privations he caused them to endure in
the beginning of their illness. Celsus observes that though he treated
his patients like a butcher during the first days of the disorder, he
afterwards indulged them so far as to give directions for making their
beds in the softest manner. He allowed them abundance of wine which he
gave freely in all fevers; he did not forbid it even to those afflicted
with phrenzy; nay, he ordered them to drink it till they were
intoxicated; for, said he, it is absolutely necessary that persons who
labour under phrenzy should sleep, and wine has a narcotic quality. To
lethargic patients he prescribed it with great freedom, but with the
opposite purpose of rousing them from their stupor. His great remedy in
dropsy was friction, which, of course, he employed to open the pores.
With the same view he enjoined active exercise to the sick; but what is
a little extraordinary, he denied it to those in health.
Erisistratus, who was a great speculator, and whose theories had the
most important influence on his practice, banished blood-letting
altogether from medicine, for the following notable reasons: because, he
says, we cannot always see the vein we intend to open; because we are
not sure we may not open an artery instead of a vein; because we cannot
ascertain the true quantity to be taken; because if we take too little,
the intention is not answered; if too much, we may destroy the patient:
and because the evacuation of the venous blood is succeeded by that of
the spirits, which thus pass from the arteries into the veins;
wherefore, blood-letting ought never to be used as a remedy in disease.
Yet, though he was thus cautious in abstracting blood, it must not be
supposed that he was not a sufficiently bold practitioner. In tumour of
the liver, he hesitated not to cut open the abdomen, and to apply his
medicines immediately to the diseased organ; but though he took such
liberties with the liver, he regarded with the greatest apprehension the
operation of tapping in dropsy of the abdomen: because, said he, the
waters being evacuated, the liver which is inflamed and become hard like
a stone, is more pressed by the adjacent parts, which the waters kept at
a distance from it, whence the patient dies.
One physician conceived that gout originated from an effervescence of
the synovia of the joints with the vitriolated blood: whence he
recommended alcohol for its cure: a remedy for which the court of
aldermen ought to have voted him a medal. A more ancient practitioner
who believed that the finger of St. Blasius was very efficacious “for
removing a bone which sticks in the throat,” maintained that gout was
the “grand drier,” and prescribed a remedy for it which the patient was
to use for a whole year, and to observe the following diet each month:
in September he must eat and drink milk; in October he must eat garlic;
in November he is to abstain from bathing; in December he must eat no
cabbage; in January he is to take a glass of pure wine in the morning;
in February to eat no beef; in March to mix several things both in
eatables and drinkables; in April not to eat horse-radish; nor in May
the fish called Polypus; in June he is to drink cold water in a morning;
in July to avoid venery; and lastly, in August to eat no mallows.
A third physician deduced all diseases from inspissation of the fluids;
hence he attached the highest importance to diluent drinks, and
believed that tea, especially, is a sovereign remedy in almost every
disease to which the human frame is subject: “tea,” says Bentakoe, who
is loudest in his praises of this panacea, and who, as Blumenback
observes, ‘deserved to have been pensioned by the East India Company for
his services,’ “tea is the best, nay, the only remedy for correcting
viscidity of the blood, the source of all diseases, and for dissipating
the acid of the stomach, as it contains a fine oleaginous volatile salt,
and certain subtle spirits which are analogous in their nature to the
animal spirits. Tea fortifies the memory and all the intellectual
faculties: it will therefore furnish the most effectual means of
improving physical education. Against fever there is no better remedy
than forty or fifty cups of tea swallowed immediately after one another;
the slime of the pancreas is thus carried off.”
Another physician derived all diseases from a redundancy or deficiency
of fire or water. He maintained that where the water predominated the
fluids became viscid, and that hence arose intermittent fevers and
anthritic complaints. His remedies are in strict conformity to his
theory. These diseases are to be cured by volatile salts, which abound
with fiery particles; venesection in any case is highly pernicious;
these fiery medicines are the only efficacious remedies, and are to be
employed even in diseases of the most inflammatory nature. “Life,” says
Dr. Brown, “is a forced state:” it is a flame kept alive by excitement;
every thing stimulates; some substances too violently; others not
sufficiently; there are thus too kinds of debility, indirect and direct,
and to one or other of these causes must be referred the origin of all
diseases. According to this doctrine the mode of cure is simple: we have
nothing to do but to supply, to moderate, or to abstract stimuli. Typhus
fever, in this system, is a disease of extreme debility: we must
therefore give the strongest stimulants. Consumption and apoplexy,
also, are diseases of debility; of course the remedies are active
stimulants. Humanity shudders, and with reason, at the application of
such doctrines to practice. And not less destitute of reason, and not
less dangerous in practice, is the great doctrine of debility
promulgated by Cullen. This celebrated professor taught that the
circumstance which invariably characterized fever, that which
constituted its essence, was debility. The inference was obvious, that,
above all things, the strength must be supported. The consequence was,
that blood-letting was neglected, and that bark and wine were given in
immense quantities, in cases in which intense inflammation existed. The
practice was in the highest degree mortal; the number of persons who
have perished in consequence of this doctrine is incalculable. So far
then is it from being true that medical theories are of no practical
importance, that there is the closest possible connection between the
speculations of the physician in his closet, and the measures which he
adopts at the bed side of his patient. Truth to him is a benignant power
which stops the progress of disease, protracts the duration of life, and
mitigates the suffering it may be unable to remove: error is a fearfully
active and tremendously potent principle. There is not a medical
prejudice which has not slain its thousands, nor a false theory which
has not immolated its tens of thousands. The system of medicine and
surgery which is established in any country, has a greater influence
over the lives of its inhabitants than the epidemic diseases produced by
its climate, or the decisions of its government concerning peace and
war. The devastations of the yellow fever will bear no comparison with
the ravages committed by the Brunonian system; and the slaughter of the
field of Waterloo counts not of victims, a tithe of the number of which
the Cullenian doctrine of debility can justly boast. Anatomy alone will
not teach a physician to think, much less to think justly; but it will
give him the elements of thinking; it will furnish him with the means of
correcting his errors; it will certainly save him from some delusions,
and will afford to the public the best shield against his ignorance,
which may be fatal, and against his presumption, which may be
devastating.
We have entered into this minute detail at the hazard, we are aware, of
tiring the reader; but in the hope of leaving on his mind a more
distinct impression of the importance of anatomical knowledge than could
possibly be produced by a mere allusion to the circumstances which have
been explained. In all ages formidable obstacles have opposed the
prosecution of anatomical investigations. Among these, without doubt,
the most powerful has its source in a feeling which is natural to the
heart of man. The sweetest, the most sacred associations are
indissolubly connected with the person of those we love. It is with the
corporeal frame that our senses have been familiar: it is that on which
we have gazed with rapture: it is that which has so often been the
medium of conveying to our hearts the thrill of extacy. We cannot
separate the idea of the peculiarities and actions of a friend from the
idea of his person. It is for this reason that “every thing which has
been associated with him acquires a value from that consideration; his
ring, his watch, his books, and his habitation. The value of these as
having been his is not merely fictitious; they have an empire over my
mind; they can make me happy or unhappy; they can torture and they can
tranquillize; they can purify my sentiments and make me similar to the
man I love; they possess the virtue which the Indian is said to
attribute to the spoils of him he kills, and inspire me with the powers,
the feelings, and the heart of their preceding master.” It is nothing,
the survivor may justly say, to tell me, when disease has completed its
work, and death has seized its prey, that that body, with which are
connected so many delightful associations, is a senseless mass of
matter: that it is no longer my friend, that the spirit which animated
it and rendered it lovely to my sight and dear to my affections, is
gone. I know that it is gone. I know that I never more shall see the
light of intelligence brighten that countenance, nor benevolence beam in
that eye, nor the voice of affection sound from those lips: that which I
loved, and which loved me, is not here: but here are still the features
of my friend: this is his form, and the very particles of matter which
compose this dull mass, a few hours ago were a real part of him, and I
cannot separate them, in my imagination, from him. And I approach them
with the profounder reverence; I gaze upon them with the deeper
affection because they are all that remain to me. I would give all that
I possess to purchase the art of preserving the wholesome character and
rosy hue of this form that it might be my companion still: but this is
impossible: I cannot detain it from the tomb: but when I have “cast a
heap of mould upon the person of my friend and taken the cold earth for
its keeper,” I visit the spot in which it is deposited with awe: it is
sacred to my imagination: it is dear to my heart. There is a real and
deep foundation for these feelings in human nature: they arise
spontaneously in the bosom of man, and we see their expression and their
power in the customs of all nations, savage as well as civilized, and in
the conduct of all men, the most ignorant and uncultivated no less than
the most intelligent and refined. It has been the policy of society to
foster these sentiments. It has been conceived that the sanctity which
attaches to the dead, is reflected back in a profounder feeling of
respect for the living; that the solemnity with which death is regarded
elevates, in the general estimation, the value of life; and that he who
cannot approach the mortal remains of a fellow creature without an
emotion of awe, must regard with horror every thing which places in
danger the life of a human being. Religion has contributed indirectly,
but powerfully, to the strength and perpetuity of these impressions; and
superstition has availed herself of them to play her antics and to
accomplish her base and malignant purposes. It is not the eradication of
these feelings that can be desired, but their control: it is not the
extinction of these natural and useful emotions that is pleaded for, but
that they should give way to higher considerations when these exist.
Veneration for the dead is connected with the noblest and sweetest
sympathies of our nature: but the promotion of the happiness of the
living is a duty from which we can never be exonerated.
In ancient times the voice of reason could not be heard. Superstition,
and customs founded on superstition, excited an influence which was
neither to be resisted nor evaded. Dissection was then regarded with
horror. In the warm countries of the East the pursuit must have been
highly offensive and even dangerous, and it was absolutely incompatible
with the notions and ceremonies universally prevalent in those days. The
Jewish tenet of pollution must have formed an insuperable obstacle to
the cultivation of anatomy amongst that people. By the Egyptians every
one who cut open a dead body was regarded with inexpressible horror. The
Grecian philosophers so far overcame the prejudice as occasionally to
engage in the pursuit, and the first dissection on record was one made
by Democritus of Abdera, the friend of Hippocrates, in order to discover
the course of the bile. The Romans contributed nothing to the progress
of the art: they were content with propitiating the Deities who presided
over health and disease. They erected on the Palatine Mount a temple to
the goddess Febris, whom they worshipped from a dread of her power. They
also sacrificed to the goddess Ossipaga, who, it seems, presided over
the growth of the bones, and to another styled Carna, who took care of
the viscera, and to whom they offered bean-broth, and bacon, because
these were the most nutritious articles of diet. The Arabians adopted
the Jewish notion of pollution, and were thus prohibited by the tenets
of their religion from practising dissection. Abdollaliph, who
flourished about the year 1200, a man of learning and a teacher of
anatomy, never saw and never thought of a human dissection. In order to
examine and demonstrate the bones, he took his students to burying
grounds and earnestly recommended them, instead of reading books, to
adopt that method of study: yet he seems to have had no conception that
the dissection of a recent subject might be a still better method of
learning. Christians were equally hostile to dissection. Pope Boniface
the 8th issued a bull prohibiting even the maceration and preparation of
skeletons. The priests were the only physicians, and so greatly did they
abuse the office they assumed, that the evil at length became too
intolerable to be borne. The church itself was obliged to prohibit the
priesthood from interfering with the practice of medicine. All monks and
canons who applied themselves to physic, were threatened with severe
penalties, and all bishops, abbots, and priors who connived at their
misconduct were ordered to be suspended from their ecclesiastical
functions. But it was not till three hundred years after this
interdiction, that, by a special bull which permitted physicians to
marry, their complete separation from the clergy was effected.
In the 14th century, Mundinus, professor at Bologna, astonished the
world by the public dissection of two human bodies. In the 15th century,
Leonardo da Vinci contributed essentially to the progress of the art, by
the introduction of anatomical plates which were admirably executed. In
the 16th century, the Emperor, Charles the 5th, ordered a consultation
to be held by the divines of Salamanca, to determine whether it was
lawful, in point of conscience, to dissect a dead body in order to learn
its structure. In the 17th century, Cortesius, professor of anatomy at
Bologna, and afterwards professor of medicine at Messina, had long begun
a treatise on practical anatomy which he had an earnest desire to
finish, but so great was the difficulty of prosecuting the study even
in Italy, that in 24 years he could only twice procure an opportunity
of dissecting a human body, and even then with difficulty and in a
hurry; whereas, he had expected to have done so, he says, once every
year, according to the custom of the famous academies of Italy. In
Muscovy, until very lately, both anatomy and the use of skeletons were
positively forbidden; the first as inhuman, and the latter as
subservient to witchcraft. Even the illustrious Luther was so biassed by
the prejudices of his age, that he ascribed the majority of diseases to
the arts of the devil, and found great fault with physicians when they
attempted to account for them by natural causes. England acquired the
bad fame of being the country of witches, and opposed almost insuperable
obstacles to the cultivation of anatomy. Even at present the prejudices
of the people on this subject are violent and deeply-rooted. The measure
of that violence may be estimated by the degree of abhorrence with which
they regard those persons who are employed to procure the subjects
necessary for dissection. In this country there is no other method of
obtaining subjects but that of exhumation: aversion to this employment
may be pardoned: dislike to the persons who engage in it is natural, but
to regard them with detestation, to exult in their punishment, to
determine for themselves its nature and measure, and to endeavour to
assume the power of inflicting it with their own hands, is absurd.
Magistrates have too often fostered the prejudices of the people, and
afforded them the means of executing their vengeance on the objects of
their aversion. The press, with a few honourable exceptions, has
uniformly allied itself with the ignorance and violence of the vulgar,
and has done every thing in its power to inflame the passions which it
was its duty to endeavour to soothe. It is notorious that the winter
before last there was scarcely a week in which many of the papers did
not contain the most exaggerated and disgusting statements: the appetite
which could be gratified with such representations was sufficiently
degraded: but still more base was the servility which could pander to
it.
As one among many of the cases which illustrate this bad feeling, we may
refer to that of Samuel Clark who was indicted at the Essex Quarter
Sessions, in January, 1824, for feloniously stealing at Little Leighs,
on the 26th of December, a woman’s shift, a bed-gown, a night-cap, and a
pair of cotton stockings, the property of James Chinnery. It appeared in
evidence, that a young woman the wife of a labouring man named James
Chinnery, had been buried in Little Leighs Church-yard, on Sunday the
21st of December. Previous to her death she expressed a wish to be
interred in a night-cap, shift, bed-gown and cotton stockings, and her
request had been complied with. The body was discovered on the morning
of the 26th, in a ditch near the church-yard. A few rods from this spot
was found a horse yoked to a chaise cart and tied to a tree. It appeared
that “the box under the chaise cart was calculated to hold a couple of
human bodies, when rolled up; and on examining it, a most offensive
odour proceeded from it, as if it had been recently used in the
prisoner’s _unhallowed_ occupation.” The prisoner owned this horse and
cart, and this is the whole of the evidence, at least, as stated in the
report of the trial, which implicated him in the robbery of the grave.
Under these circumstances, the counsel for the prisoner submitted to the
Court that there was no case to go to the jury on three grounds:--first,
that there was no proof of any asportation of the articles alleged to
have been stolen: secondly, that supposing the asportavit made out, the
prisoner could not be convicted of this offence, unless it was manifest
that he had a felonious intention of taking the clothes and converting
them to his own use; and thirdly, that, at all events, there was no
evidence upon which the jury could safely be called upon to act, so as
to implicate him in the alleged offence. The counsel for the prosecution
in answer urged, first, that the finding of the body naked, after proof
that it had been interred in the clothes mentioned in the evidence, was
sufficient proof of asportation: and that even stripping the body
without removing the clothes out of the grave, was, in law, enough to
support the indictment: secondly, that although the primary intention of
the prisoner might be, to steal the body only, yet, if the clothes were
taken, the law would construe them to have been feloniously taken: that
it might as well be said that although a man’s intention might be to
steal a valuable jewel, yet it was no offence to take the casket in
which it was contained: and thirdly, that whether the defendant was the
party to whom guilt was imputed, was a question solely for the
consideration of the jury. On the prisoner’s counsel insisting that his
objections had not been answered, the Chairman overruled the two first
objections, and then summed up the evidence, on which the jury, after
deliberating a few minutes, found the prisoner _Guilty_. The verdict, it
is recorded, _was received by the auditory with a general expression of
pleasure_. The Court after animadverting in strong terms on the
_abominable_ offence of which the prisoner had been found guilty, said
they were determined that he should not have an opportunity of pursuing
his _odious_ trade in this country, at least for some years, and
_therefore_ sentenced him to be transported for seven years. The account
of this case is taken from the report of the trial contained in the
Globe and Traveller newspaper of Jan. 20, 1824; a paper honorably
distinguished for its endeavours to enlighten the public mind on this
subject, not to foster its prejudices.
In this case there was no sufficient evidence to convict the prisoner of
the alleged offence: even if that evidence had been perfectly
satisfactory, the punishment inflicted was unjust: the circumstance
essential to constitute the felony did not exist: the Chairman, with an
ignorant and vulgar mind, stretched the law to gratify ignorant and
vulgar prejudice: he relied upon the public feeling for protection in
the illegal exertion of his power: he administered the law badly: he
endeavoured to justify his conduct by loading the prisoner with odious
epithets, and he did not miscalculate the feeling of his auditory: they
witnessed the transaction “with a general feeling of pleasure.” This
case exhibits but too faithfully, the spirit often displayed both by the
magistracy and the people.