THE AMERICAN DOCTOR
At a dinner at Manchester in the summer I had as my _vis-a-vis_ a
delightful young American, who, among other things, said to me: "It is
astonishing to me that so many of your people live long, considering the
ignorance of your doctors." I assured her that this was merely her point
of view, and that we were well satisfied with our doctors or physicians.
I wished to retaliate by telling my fair companion a story I had heard
the day previous. An American physician operated upon a man and removed
what he called a "cyst," which he displayed with some pride to a doctor
of another school. "Why, man," said the latter, "that isn't a cyst;
it's the man's kidney!"
The Americans have made rapid advances in medicine and surgery, and they
have some extraordinary physicians. From two to four years of study
completes the education of some of the doctors, and hundreds are turned
out every year. Some are of the old and regular school of medicine, but
others are called homeopathic, which means that they give small doses of
the more powerful medicines. Then there are those who practise in both
schools. Indeed, in no other field does ignorance, superstition,
credulity, and lack of real education display itself as among the
American doctors or healers. I believe I could fill a volume by the mere
enumeration of the diabolical and absurd nostrums offered by knaves to
heal men who profess to hold in ridicule the Chinese doctors. I mention
but a few, and when I tell you, as a truth beyond cavil, that the most
extraordinary of these healers, the most impossible, have the largest
following, you can see what I mean by the credulity of the people as a
whole. Christian Science doctors have a following of tens of thousands.
They combine so-called science with religion; leave their God to cure
them at long or short range through the medium of so-called agents. The
head of this faction is an ignorant but clever woman, who has turned the
heads of perhaps thirty-three and a third per cent of the American women
whom she has come in contact with.
Then come the faith curists, who rely upon faith alone. You simply are
to _think_ you will get well. Of course, many die from neglect. As an
illustration of the credulity of the average American, a Christian
Science healer was once treating a sick woman from a distant town, and
finally the patient died. When the bill was presented the husband said,
"You have charged for treatment two weeks after my wife died." It was a
fact that the healer had been treating the woman after she was buried,
the husband having failed to give notice of the death. One would have
expected the "healer" to be thrown into confusion, but far from it; she
merely replied, "I thought I noticed a vacancy."
Next come the musical curists, who listen to thrills of sound, a big
organ being the doctor. Then there is the psychometric doctor, who cures
by spirits. The spirit doctor cures in the same way. The palmist
professes to point out how to avoid the ills of life. Magnetic healers
have hundreds of victims in every city. Their advertisements in the
journals of all sorts are of countless kinds. Some cure at short hand,
some miles distant from the patient. They are equaled in numbers by the
hypnotists, or hypnotic doctors, who profess to throw their patients
into a trance and cure them by suggestion. I heard of one cure in which
the guileless American is made to lie in an open grave; this is called
"the return to nature." Again, patients are cured by being buried in hot
mud or in hot sand. I have seen a salt-water cure, where patients were
made to remain in the ocean ten hours a day. The plain water cure has
thousands of followers, with hospitals and infirmaries, where the
patient is bathed, soaked, filled, washed, and plunged in water and
charged a high amount.
Then there is the vegetarian cure, no meat being eaten; and there are
the meat eaters, who use no vegetables. There are over fifty thousand
_masseurs_ and osteopaths in the country, who cure by baths and
rubbing. You may have a bath of milk, water, electricity, or alcohol, or
a bath of any description under the sun, which is guaranteed to cure any
and all ailments. Perhaps the most extraordinary curists are the color
doctors. They have rooms filled with blue and other colors, in whose
rays the patient victim or the victim patient sits, "like Patience on a
monument." I could not begin to give you an enumeration of the various
kinds of electric cures; they are legion. But the most amazing class
comprises the patent-medicine men, who are usually not doctors at all,
but buy from some one a "cure" and then advertise it, spending in one
instance which I investigated one million dollars a year. Every
advantageous wall, stone, or cliff in America will be posted. You see
the name at every turn, and the gullible Americans bite, chew, and
swallow.
It is not overstating facts when I say that three-fifths of the people
buy some of these patent nostrums, which the real medical men denounce,
showing that the masses of the people are densely ignorant, the victims
of any faker who may shout his wares loud enough. In China such a thing
would be impossible; the block would stop the practise; but, my dear
----, the Americans assure me China is a thousand years behind the
times, for which let us be devoutly thankful! I have not enumerated a
tenth of the kinds of doctors who prey upon these unfortunate people.
There are companies of them, who guarantee to cure anything, and
skilfully mulct the sick of their last penny. There are retreats for the
unfortunate, farms for deserted infants, and homes for unfortunate
women carried on by villains of both sexes. There are traveling doctors
who go from town to town, who cure "while you wait," and give a circus
while talking and selling their cure; and in nine cases out of ten the
nostrum is an alcoholic drink disguised.
In no land under the sun are there so many ignorant blatant fakers
preying on a people, and in no land do you find so credulous a throng as
in America, yet claiming to represent the cream of the intelligence of
the world; they are so easily led that the most impossible person, if he
be a good talker, can go abroad and by the use of money and audacity
secure a following to drink his salt water, paying a dollar a bottle for
it and sing his praises. Such a doctor can secure the names and pictures
of judges, governors of States, senators, congressmen, prominent men and
women, officers of the volunteer army, artists, actors, singers--in
fact, prominent people of all kinds will provide their pictures and give
testimonials, which are blazonly published. These same people go to
Chinese drug shops and laugh at the "heathen" drugs, and wonder why the
Chinaman is alive. America has a body of physicians and surgeons who are
a credit to the world, modest, conscientious, and with a high sense of
honor, but they are as a dragon's tooth in a multitude to the so-called
"quacks," who take the money of the masses and prey upon them, protected
in many cases by the law. No one profession so demonstrates the abject
credulity of the great mass of Americans as that of medicine.
One other incident may further illustrate the jokes these so-called
doctors play upon the common people. In a country town was a "quack"
doctor, who professed to be a "head examiner," giving people charts
according to their "bumps," a fad which has many followers. "This,
ladies and gentlemen," said the lecturer, holding out a small skull, "is
the skull of Alexander the Great at the age of six. Note the prominent
brow. This [holding up a larger skull] is the same at the age of ten.
This [holding out another] at the age of twenty-one; [then stepping out
to the front of the stage] this is the _complete_ skull of Alexander at
the time of his death." All of which appeared to be accepted in good
faith.
Of the best physicians in America one can not say enough in praise. I
was most impressed by their high sense of honor. They have an agreement
which they call their "ethics," by which they will not advertise or call
attention to their learning. Consequently, the lower and ignorant
classes are caught by the blatant chaff of the patent-medicine venders
and the quack doctors. What the word "quack" means in this sense I do
not quite know; literally, it is the cry of the goose. The "regular
doctor" will not take advantage of any medicine he may discover, or any
instrument; all belongs to humanity, and one doctor becomes famous over
another by his success in keeping people from dying. The grateful
patient saved, tells his friends, and so the doctor becomes known. In
all America I never heard of a doctor that acted on the principle which
holds among our doctors, that the best way to cure is to watch the
patient and keep him well, or prevent him from being taken sick. The
Americans, in their conceit, consider Chinese doctors ignorant fakers;
yet, so far as I can learn, the death-rate among the Chinese, city for
city, country for country, is less than among Americans. The Chinese
women are longer lived and less subject to disease. In what is known as
New England, the oldest well-populated section of the country, people
would die out were it not for the constant accession of immigrants. On
the other hand, the Chinese constantly increase, despite a policy of
non-intercourse with foreigners. The Americans have, in a civilization
dating back to 1492, already begun to show signs of decadence, and are
only saved by constant immigration. China has a civilization of
thousands of years, and is increasing in population every day, yet her
doctors and their methods are ridiculed by the Americans. The people
have many sayings here, one of which is, "The proof of the pudding lies
in the eating." It seems applicable to this case.