EMILIA AND THE LOVE CURE.
One young family on whom I was accustomed to call from time to time, was
not only accustomed to send for me in the night, as did many others,
but, what made it much worse for me, they resided some four or five
miles distant, among the mountains. They were of that class of people
who look every man on his own things, and never, as the apostle would
enjoin, on the things of others. They knew very well that a physician,
though he might be half a conjuror, required sleep; still, they were
willing to finish their day's work, eat their supper, perform a large
number of _et ceteras_, even if they did not call for the doctor till he
had fairly taken off his boots to retire for the night. But there was
one consolation in all this, that they paid me promptly; and medical
men, as you know, like other men, work for pay. They cannot live wholly
on air.
In the same house with the family alluded to, was a young woman, about
twenty-five years of age, who had been confined to her bed ten or twelve
years. She was the only daughter of very indulgent parents, who had
never, from her earliest years, thought they could do too much for her.
In truth, this was the source of her feebleness. Some little ailment,
indeed, there might have been at the outset, induced by pie, cake,
preserves, pickles, or something which no truly kind parents should
permit a child to take; though nothing more than might have been got rid
of in its effects, by a little patient waiting. But instead of waiting a
little, the anxious mother had dosed and drugged her. And these ill
turns had been more and more frequent, just in proportion to the
frequency with which she had been drugged for them; till, at twelve
years of age, she was almost all the while complaining. And at
fourteen, she was completely bedridden--a burden to herself and to
others.
"I wonder," said my principal employer, at about twelve o'clock, when I
had attended to his own little family, and was about to leave, "whether
you could do any thing for our Millie. She has tried almost all the
doctors, to no purpose; but we have so much confidence here in your
skill, that she sometimes speaks of trying you. She is hardly willing to
'give up the ship' without another trial."
This, as you must be aware, was a stirring appeal to my love of
approbation; but it was too late at night to make a call on her at that
moment. So, promising to come and see her shortly, I took my leave, and
rode home, as usual, meditating.
Now I had never seen Emilia, but from the account which I had received
from the neighbors, as well as from the nature of the case, I knew very
nearly how she was; and that the great difficulty in the way of recovery
was the constant habit of watching herself and attending to every
internal sensation. In other words, she was so completely wrapped up in
self, that I could see no reasonable prospect of getting her mind out of
the maze in which it had been so long involved.
But I found time, a few days afterward, as I was employed again in the
same neighborhood, to call and see her; and I ventured accordingly. She
was sitting up in the bed, well bolstered, with a huge mass of clothing
both on herself and on the bed. Then, at her right hand, was a stand
half covered with bowls, saucers and tumblers; and near it a little
closet or recess, in which were nearly an equal number of parcels of
medicine, wrapped in papers ready to be used, when they were supposed to
be necessary.
I had no sooner entered the room, than she began to give me an account
of her medicine, rather than of herself. So rapid was her enunciation,
and so eager was she to tell me what she knew--not about the symptoms of
her disease, but about the treatment--that it was a full quarter of an
hour before I could reach the inmost recesses of her condition. "That,"
said she, "is for canker in the mouth; that for sore throat; that is an
eye wash I sometimes use, and that is a kind of bitters Dr. R. left for
me, but which I have now nearly done taking--and they never did me any
good," etc.
When I found an opportunity, I endeavored to investigate, very fully and
freely, what had hitherto been supposed to be a very remarkable case. I
found, indeed, that the patient had a great many little troubles,
dependent mainly on the state of a mind greatly harassed by constant
reflex tendencies, not easily eradicable. But I did not find it easy to
prescribe for her. She was one of those very inquisitive people who wish
to know what every thing you give them is, and who have a very
conscientious objection to every thing. However, I at last settled down
on a course of treatment, and wrote it out in a fair hand, and left it
at the bedside. Not, however, I repeat, till I had foolishly fallen into
my former error, and told her all the whys and wherefores.
This familarity into which she had drawn me, had already extracted
one-half the virtue of my medicine; for that is no longer mysterious
which the medical man openly and freely discusses. The freedom of
thinking she had indulged in while I was present, had been extended to
freedom of action; and the very medicine, whose virtues she had dared to
discourse upon, she ventured to set aside, when her experience assured
her it was not producing the effect she desired, and for which she
supposed it was intended. So that what, from the first, I had feared,
and more than I had feared, at length happened. She took my medicine,
professedly,--that is, just when she pleased,--for about four weeks, to
no manner of purpose whatever, except to deceive herself; for during the
first and second weeks of its use, she imagined herself all the while
getting better; while during the third week she began to doubt, and
about the fourth week she came to the sage conclusion that she was just
where she had been a month or two before.
The great, abiding difficulties of her case--her want of simple,
confiding trust in her physician, and her constant, anxious attention to
her own internal sensations, were far enough from being overcome. She
was, in short, very nearly where she was ten years before, except that
she was in circumstances rather more difficult to be reached, and had
become rather more sceptical about medicine.
What should now be done? Must the case be abandoned? Or was there some
other way, some _new_ way, by means, of which it could be reached? I was
not quite willing to give her up as irrecoverable, and yet I saw nothing
remaining which I could do. I revolved the thing in my mind, by night
and by day. At last a plan struck me which I verily believed would
succeed.
A few miles distant was a young physician, just from the schools, who
vainly, though naturally, supposed he knew almost every thing which was
known, and who wanted business. As he had nothing to lose, even if he
were to fail in a hundred trials, but every thing to gain could he
effect one very remarkable cure, I proposed to the family to employ him.
I knew well he would have one or two advantages over his older and more
experienced brethren. He would not at once place himself on the same
platform with his patient and the friends, by answering their numerous
questions; and for this plain and simple reason: In the first place,
that he _could_ not, and very probably knew his own weakness; secondly,
he would have more of that blind faith in medicine which inspires the
ignorant with confidence.
But there was another thought beyond all this, a wheel within a wheel.
The young physician might succeed better than I, in drawing her
thoughts, and even her affections, away from herself; for he was a
single man, and the patient, though sick, not destitute of charms,
especially of that more tangible charm which, to _indigent_ young men,
and especially young _medical_ men, so often eclipses all others. She,
on her part, as I well knew, was not wholly resigned to the world of
single blessedness, though her long-continued ill health had almost
unfitted her for any thing else.
It only required a little _management_ to bring about the desired
result. Dr. Juvenis was soon employed; and, though he did not always
reply to her questions, which were numerous, and often wholly
irrelevant, yet according to my own secret anticipations, he gradually
raised her hopes in another direction, and hence drew her attention in
no small degree from herself. His reserve, too, served but to inspire
her with confidence in his great wisdom. There was something deep beyond
the exterior, she always thought, which did not come out to the full,
vulgar gaze.
The final result was a strong attachment on her part, which, though not
reciprocated by him in a direct manner, was not by any means repelled.
The virtues of the medicines were no longer discussed or doubted; and it
was obvious to all that she was beginning to mend.
It was now high time for me to abandon a field which was not only fully
occupied, but _well_ occupied. The visits of the young physician were
continued, at longer or shorter intervals, for years, till the young
woman's health was nearly restored; and, as I subsequently learned, they
were married. The more recent history of her life, I have not been able
to ascertain, except that neither party gained as much by the new
connection as had been expected,--a result which, alas! is by no means
any thing new, and that there was, after some time, a relapse of
disease.
This artifice for restoring health to a bedridden patient, is not
mentioned in a way of approbation, but of regret, or at least of
confession. Yet, while it declares my weakness, it develops or at least
confirms a well-known principle, which it concerns mankind, patients as
well as physicians, most fully and clearly to understand. The medical
efficiency of an agent is greatly enhanced when the mind can be made to
go along with it.
I have wished a thousand times, both by night and by day, that I had
never commended Dr. Juvenis to the favorable notice and regard of this
illiterate but confiding family. True, I had the good fortune thus to
get rid of a most troublesome, standing _patient_. Had I a moral right
thus to do? Did the end either sanction or sanctify the means? Grant
that I saved, or seemed to save, the patient;--was she really saved?
Was there any absolute gain in the end? These are questions which I
cannot, as yet, fully settle. Most certainly she was not quite cured.
What a mighty work for this fallen world education has yet to achieve;
especially Physical Education! This, reader, let me say once for all,
this physical education, under the guidance of Christianity, whose
handmaid all true science should be, and to whose development and
application all true religion should be directed, is our chief
dependence. It is the lever by which we are to raise the world.