proportioned to the ignorance of the persons who take it. There are
certain charms, to some minds, in being able to "doctor" themselves,
and to do without the properly authorised medical practitioner. There
seems to be with these persons a sense that, in not having paid a fee
for advice, they have in a manner gained something. There appears to be
also a love of experiment, with a sense behind it that, if their own
experiment fails, they can at worst fall back on the skilled physician
to amend their mistakes, and to set them up again according to the
known and acknowledged rules and practices of medical science. Moreover
there is a kind of belief in empirical treatment, which is probably a
"survival" from the ancient belief in charms and witchcraft; else how
can people possibly put trust in medicines which are advertised as
being adapted to cure all manner of diseases of thoroughly differing
characters?
'But even among quack medicines there are degrees. There are some of
which ordinary medical men readily avail themselves, and which under
proper direction may be found really useful. The danger with regard to
them is that persons finding such to be useful in the doses prescribed
by their medical advisers, take doses on their own responsibility,
which prove hurtful, sometimes even fatal in their effects. On the
other hand there are a few--though we must confess very few--whose
virtues chiefly arise from the faith with which they are taken; and
these are as innocuous to the patient as they are profitable only to
the vendor. But a very large class--in fact by far the largest--are
really positively hurtful. They are described by titles which give no
real idea of their character and composition, and they are taken by
people much to their harm.
'In a recent number of the _Lancet_ the public were warned against a
seemingly harmless preparation, from the effects of which a medical
man had found some of his patients seriously suffering. He found that
lozenges called "castor-oil lozenges" were being largely used among
his patients, who were under the impression that they were taking
castor-oil in a form slightly less disagreeable than the usual one.
On examination he found that each of these lozenges contained three
grains of calomel; and it is not a matter of astonishment that he
found some persons who had taken them suffering from severe mercurial
salivation. He has found these lozenges sold by grocers, oilmen,
chandlers, and even by surgeons and chemists, and the mischief done has
been very great. The writer of the letter asks whether the Adulteration
Act cannot be brought to bear upon those who sell this "pernicious
confectionery;" but the bringing an Act to bear upon an evil is a slow
process. The true preventive of mischief from the use of quack medicine
is entire abstinence from its use.' Who can doubt the propriety of this
advice? Let quack medicines be universally abandoned.
* * * * *
Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON,
and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.
* * * * *
_All Rights Reserved._
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Transcriber's Note--the following changes have been made to this text:
Page 525: he to be--be waited upon.