CURING CANCER.
Theodore, a laborious young man, came to me one day, saying, "I am
afraid I have a cancer on one side of my nose, and I wish you would look
at it." Accordingly I made a careful examination of the sore, taking
care to give him a little pain, and, at the same time, as a most
indispensable ingredient, to look "wondrous wise;" after which the
following conversation, in its essentials, took place between us:--
"What makes you suspect this sore to be a cancer?"
"There are various reasons. Many of the neighbors think it to be so.
Then, too, it has a very strong resemblance to the cancer on Mrs.
Miller's lip. And then, again, it burns and itches and smarts, just as
people say cancers always do."
"How long have you been troubled with it?"
"It is three months or more since I first observed it; but it has given
me very little uneasiness or trouble till within a few weeks."
"What have you done for it?"
"It would take a long time to tell you of all I have done for it. Every
thing I could hear of, far or near, has been applied; from plasters of
clay and chalk, to plasters of vitriol and other poisonous things. But I
have used most a plaster made of chalk and the white of an egg. I do not
know that any thing I have done has benefited it."
"Perhaps you have not persevered in the use of any thing long enough.
How long is it, pray, since you began to use the chalk and egg plaster?"
"Oh, it is three weeks, or more."
"And how long is it usual to wear it? do you know?"
"Mrs. Lovejoy, who advised it, only said, 'Use it as long as it appears
to do good.'"
"Is it a favorite remedy with her?"
"Very much so."
"Has any one been really cured by it?"
"Oh, yes. Mr. Browning, the gardener, was entirely cured by it; so, at
least, people say."
"Any one else?"
"Yes, half a hundred or more have tried it."
"But how many have been cured by it? That is my main inquiry."
"That I cannot tell you. I have heard of no positive cure but that of
Mr. Browning."
"It is almost incredible, my dear sir, that any thing like fifty cases
can have come within such a small range of population as the village or
even the town in which Mrs. Lovejoy resides. Do you mean as you say?"
"Well, then, a great many. I know of a dozen, most certainly; and I have
heard of a great many more. I venture, at least, to say twenty."
"And you have no positive knowledge of but one permanent cure among them
all?"
"Only one, I meant to say, that I can call by name. There must be many
more, I am sure, but I have not their names."
"Have you much confidence in a method of treatment that succeeds once in
fifty times, or even once in twenty?"
"Not much, I confess; but if it now and then succeed, that is something.
You know that they who run in a race _all_ run, though but one receives
the prize."
"Are you quite sure there _is_ any gain or prize, after all?"
"Do you mean to ask if I believe Mr. Browning was really cured?"
"Yes."
"How could I doubt what I have seen and known?"
"I do not expect you will doubt the existence of what you have seen and
known. But the question before us is, what you _have_ seen and known.
Mr. Browning had something on his face, and it got well; but do we know
it was a cancer? Only a very small proportion of twenty sores suspected
to be cancers ever prove to be such, and many of them get well after a
little time, if they are let entirely alone; or, if not let entirely
alone, they would probably still get well, in spite of the treatment. It
is quite a marvel with me, not that one person, Mr. Browning, recovered
in spite of the treatment, but that more did not."
"This is to me a new way of reasoning on this subject, and yet I do not
know but you are correct. I confess, that on reflection, I do not find
positive evidence that any good has been done to Mr. Browning. It may be
so, or it may not. And yet the story of his cure is told all over the
neighborhood and for many miles around, and Mrs. Lovejoy gets great
credit by it."
"No doubt she does; and thousands obtain both credit and cash in a
similar way. Much of the reputation of our wonderful cure-alls,
advertised in the newspapers, comes in a similar way."
"Do you really think so?"
"It can be demonstrated."
"Why, then, is it not oftener done?"
"It has been done, again and again."
"Are the public, then, fully determined to act against their own
interest? Do they choose to be humbugged?"
"It seems so."
"But can you do nothing with my face?"
"I can try. I will do what I can. But I must first tell you what I
_cannot_ do. I cannot pronounce your disease to be cancer. I cannot say
positively that my method of treatment will cure it. I cannot say,
moreover, that somebody else cannot cure you, even if I cannot. If,
however, I prescribe for you, you must consent to follow me for the time
most implicitly, and let everybody else alone."
"That I shall be both willing and glad to do."
"You need not begin till you are fully satisfied in regard to the
efficacy of Mrs. Lovejoy's plaster."
"I am pretty well satisfied already. I see that science is modest but
honest, and I prefer it to humbuggery."
My prescription was an application of the common blistering ointment of
the apothecary's shop. The part to which it was to be applied was quite
denuded and tender; but I told the patient to stick a small piece of the
plaster over it and wear it, and keep it as sore as he could for a month
or more. He was, however, to call on me once a week,--or, perhaps, at
first, twice,--that I might watch the effects. There was some danger of
an absorption of the cantharides into the system, which might do more of
general harm than would justify an attempt at local good.
No man ever followed the prescription of his physician with more
pertinacity and faithfulness than young Theodore. He adhered, without
wavering, to plain and unstimulating food, and to water for drink. At
the end of twenty-one days, all the fiery redness of the ulcer had
passed away, and it had begun to wear a healthy appearance. "Now," said
I, "you may take away your plasters, and let the sore get well, if it
will."
In about ten, or at most fourteen days more, the young man's nose was as
well as any other part of his system. Whether the Spanish flies
contained in the plaster had any thing to do with it, or whether it
recovered its healthful condition in spite of them,--having just then
got ready to heal,--I cannot, of course, positively determine. In any
event, the case was a strong one, though not stronger, I confess, than
that of dosing largely with calomel, as detailed in Chapter XXXII. And
yet, as I have already told you, I should not dare to repeat that heroic
treatment. Success is not always competent proof that a given course is
correct;--at least, this is true with regard to the success of a
particular formulary of medicine. There are very many things on earth to
be known and thought of, as well as in heaven.