Every physician who has spent years of an active life in prescribing for
large numbers of patients, is morally bound to publish his experience to
the world, provided he is satisfied, in his interior conscience, that
such a publication might be useful to the general interests of humanity.
In offering the following essay to my readers, I simply desire to fulfil
an obligation recognised as valid by the inner sense. This essay
contains every thing that an experience of forty years in the
conscientious and philanthropic exercise of my profession has sanctioned
and confirmed as truth. Nor have I adopted a single fact, suggested by
my own observation, as correct, without contrasting it with the most
approved records of medicine. To every true friend of man, and more
particularly to every physician who considers the business of healing
disease as the highest office of medical art, I offer this essay for
further trial and examination. May the statements expressed in it either
be confirmed or else corrected and improved by those who excel in more
thorough knowledge and ability.