Earlier text: HOW TO LIVE.Unless the original cause of any given disease be removed, there is no successful way of obtaining a permanent cure; and by the removal of the original cause, perhaps in more than nine cases out of ten,19 Nature will remove the difficulty without the aid of any kind of medicine. It is the most consummate quackery to prescribe medicine to cure disease, while the cause that produced it is not abandoned. If a liver complaint, or kidney complaint, or any other glandular derangement shall occur, which has been produced by tobacco, coffee, tea, or any other narcotic or stimulant, it is an outrage on all common sense, as well as science, to prescribe remedies while indulgence in these false luxuries is continued. They must be abandoned, or health given up; and it is folly to inquire which should be relinquished, for they are all hurtful, and should be rejected. Here comes a lady with prostrated nervous system; and from this arises a diversity of complaints,—dyspepsia in its various forms and its hundreds of attendant sufferings, sick headaches, and nervous headaches, with their periodical visits, goneness at the stomach and palpitation of the heart;—any, and all of these, and many more, have grown out of the long-continued use of stimulating drinks. Her dear wicked luxuries of coffee and teas,—especially the green teas,—by their intoxicating power on the nerves, have gradually and imperceptibly worn out their healthy tone; they are now in a morbid and irritable state, laying a broad foundation for ill health in a variety of forms. If the liver is the point to which her illegal living has directed its force, and her immediate sufferings arise from a torpid condition of that gland, accompanied with its usual attendant, a sluggish condition of bowels, she runs after some nostrum in the form of anti-bilious pills, or other quackery. She takes her pills, which force a temporary action that is generally followed by greater prostration of nervous force, giving the liver greater torpidity, and still continues her luxuries of coffee and tea. This is like a man’s holding his hand in the fire till the skin is removed, calling on the doctor for a salve, while he is still holding his hand in the flame. If he wants the burned skin to be removed and a new one to take its place, he must take the hand out of the fire; he must put away the original cause. When he will20 do this, Nature will want little help to bring things again to their right bearings. But if he continues the cause, he may tax the skill of the whole medical world, and find no relief. If he will continue to violate law, he must meet the damages. But if he will cease rebelling against Nature, put away his weapons of warfare, desist from destroying her vital forces, and let her have her own way, she will put forth her very best efforts to set everything right. Nature always goes for health; and so zealous is she in her undertakings, and so certain of the best possible issue, that we may rest assured that on her part no pains will be spared, and on our part no risk is run. As before remarked, probably in nine cases out of ten of all the diseases in the world, especially those of chronic form, when the primary cause is removed, Nature requires no help from medical agents, and will perform her work of cure better without than with them. Where medicines are not really needed, they do harm instead of good; for all medical agents are unnatural to the laws of healthy life. The philosophy of allopathic cure consists in creating an unnatural condition of the animal economy, in opposition to the existing one. A morbid condition now exists; another morbid condition is instituted in order to overcome and expel it. And if the medicine succeed in removing it, still Nature must remove the unnatural condition produced by the medicine; and if Nature alone can remove any existing disease by having its cause put away, she will come out better in the end, than she will if two morbid conditions, instead of one, are thrown in her way. My own department of the medical profession has been, in many instances, deficient in attention to the laws which belong to health. The study of Pathology, or the laws which govern diseased life, do not, as a general rule, direct sufficient attention to laws which govern healthy life. The Homœopathists, and Hydropathists give much attention to this subject. If a man comes to them for medical aid, they look into the history of the case. They inquire into his habits of eating and drinking; carefully note all his physical21 errors, and proscribe everything which is in conflict with the laws of health. In this way they put their patients upon the resources of Nature. While their medicines, to say the least of them, are not drugging the patients to death, they are giving the powers of Nature an opportunity to exert their healing forces; and this fact probably forms the principal basis of their success. Nature gets a chance to put forth healing energies, which drugging has sometimes, nay, often, prevented. Cases have often come under observation where persons affected with chronic diseases have been taking drugs prescribed by their physician, while at the same time they were indulging unnatural appetites in sufficient degree to account for all the attendant morbid symptoms. Several cases of prostrated health, from the use of tobacco, have fallen under notice, where several members of the faculty have been consulted, each recommending his remedies but not one of them so much as intimating that tobacco possessed deadly properties. Even those who have noticed its deadly effects at all, have generally only half condemned the practice, and merely recommended the lessening of the quantity, instead of entire and eternal abstinence from it. The prescribing of medicine to cure a disease which is the product of an unnatural habit unrelinquished, is of all kinds of quackery in the world the most enormous and inexcusable. More than nineteen-twentieths, probably, of all the diseases of which complaint is made, are created, directly or indirectly, by the people who suffer from them; and, as a general rule, if they will cease creating the disturbance, Nature will recover herself better without medicines than with them. A portion of their diseases they create directly, by interference with natural law, without any other agency. Another portion of diseases are created indirectly. There are morbid conditions of the atmosphere, and also contagions, which cannot always be wholly avoided; but, as a very general rule, these would touch us lightly, if at all, if we would not, by impairing the tone of natural vitality, open the door of the “house we live in,” and22 invite them in. As fearful as are the ravages of the cholera, it is comparatively little to be feared, if we will continually pay obedience to all the laws of organic life. But if we will abuse the powers of our own vitality, we may expect cholera, or any other epidemic or contagious disease, to walk in and take such a possession as may prove fatal. The great majority of fatal cases of cholera, were made so by the intemperance of its victims. Many who used no spirituous liquors, used tobacco. Many who used no tobacco, had destroyed the equilibrium of their electric forces, circulating in the nervous system, by strong teas and coffees. Perhaps they had eaten luncheons and late suppers, or had taken largely of meats and condiments. If we take such a natural course of habitual living as to secure a healthy and even-balanced circulation of the blood, and especially of the electric currents of the body, we shall be in comparatively little danger from hurtful atmospheric influences. Neither cholera or any other morbid agency can find much chance to prey upon us. But if we derange the functions of our organism, though we may seem to do so with impunity to-day, yet to-morrow other destructive causes may enter, with deadly weapons. Hence we can see, if those who are suffering ill health will read and inform themselves on the natural laws of healthy life, and cease violating them altogether, Nature will generally perform a cure. If we create a majority of all our diseases by intemperate habits, we certainly can quit those habits and let the system recover itself. Seeking for remedies short of this, is the very worst of folly. It is spending time and money to no purpose, and wasting the vital energies by medicines, which, when they cannot effect good, are only increasing disease and hastening premature death. If, instead of resorting to drug-shops and quack-doctor books, men would see that all violations of natural law were put away, so that no embarrassment should oppress Nature, they would not only save themselves from a vast waste of money, but from23 many a ruined constitution and loss of life, which silver and gold cannot replace. Oh, what consummate fools some people are! If we recommend them a book on the laws of health, they will call it quackery, a catchpenny, or a humbug. Or, if we tell them at the bedside, that all they really need is abstinence from disobedience to some law of health—that they do not need drugs—they will think us ignoramuses, and probably send for some doctor, so destitute of skill or honesty, that he will abundantly gratify them with medicines. The efforts of an honest man they cannot appreciate; but the man who will furnish them with a doctor book, promising to show them how to cure themselves with medicines—the man who will really humbug for money—they will regard as a benefactor to the race. The man who will make a display of powders and drops which are only preparing them to drop into the grave, is at once reckoned one of the most skillful doctors of the age. The man who has not moral courage enough to repel the temptations which such ignorance furnishes, is not fit for the profession. The man who will seek a reputation at the peril of community, has not that degree of honesty which could prepare him for a station of such responsibility. He is obtaining money under false pretences, and even bartering the life that has been intrusted to his hands, for paltry gain. Nay; he is worse than a highway robber and murderer. He meets you, not in bold frank attitude of his real character, as does the highwayman, letting you understand at once your danger and need of preparation for defence, but comes to you in the meanest hypocrisy, pretending to be devoted to the cause of humanity and the relief of human suffering, while he is willing to let you go on in your course of self-destruction; and then, instead of seeking to show you wherein you have departed from Nature’s path, and turn you back into it again, will deal out needless drugs for money and a reputation, which push you into the grave. Considering the ignorance of the people and their fondness for drugs—the abundance of quackery and24 the contingencies attending the administration of all medical agents—the increased indifference of the people toward the laws of health because there are plenty of doctors and medicine on hand—it is pretty safe to conclude, setting aside the benefits of skillful surgery, that the standard of health and longevity would be far above its present position, if no medicines had ever been known in the land, and not a physician had ever set foot upon its soil. The existence of medicines and physicians will probably continue to do more harm than good, until the friends of humanity will take more interest in diffusing among the people a knowledge of the laws of the human system which relate to practical life, and the people themselves shall wake up to their own highest earthly interests in this matter, and those of their rising posterity. Then, and not till then, probably, will doctors and medicines become, on the whole, blessings to community. The second step toward the cure of disease is effected As a general rule, keep the stomach in right action, and the whole system will be right. This organ is very much exposed to hurtful influences, some of which cannot always be avoided. Although, as a very general rule,—a rule with few exceptions,—its maladies can be avoided by a knowledge of its peculiar functions and laws, yet it may possibly, by the strictest care, become deranged, and the whole system be put into liability to suffering. Its lining membrane may become coated with a viscid mucous secretion, or its nervous tone may be temporarily prostrated, so that a healthy appetite may be gone, and the whole system brought under some form of fever. If, on the approach of the disturbance, abstinence from ordinary food be rigidly adhered to for a day or two, the stomach may free itself from its causes of oppression. If, instead of resorting to emetics and cathartics, as is frequently done, the person affected would cease all ordinary eating, and live on mere Indian gruel, till the stomach could have time to clear itself from its mucous25 coating, or gather up its electric vigor, the whole difficulty might come to an end; a protracted sickness, severe drugging, a large bill, and perhaps a premature grave, might be avoided. A popular idea exists, that when the stomach gets deranged, the bile has entered it, and must be dislodged. Hence, they will take emetics, throw up bile in the course of vomiting, and thus seem to prove their notions correct. Whereas, the bile rarely comes up hill into the stomach except by the effort of vomiting. The bile they see is brought up from below, from the second stomach, or duodenum, by the severe reverted action of the stomach, calling into its sympathy its associated organs. The stomach would not much better bear bile introduced into it, without vomiting, than it would bear a decoction of tobacco on its first introduction. It would set up rebellion against it, and throw it off with almost as much earnestness, as it would against a solution of tartar emetic. Whenever the stomach has lost its tone, or become oppressed by wrong eating, the only cure that can suffice, consists in temporary abstinence from food. Hundreds and thousands have sick headache, nervous headache, heartburn, sour stomach, and other ailments which are, if not caused, greatly enhanced by bolting down the food without stopping to masticate it; and the poor foolish sufferers will swallow quarts of pills, neutralizing salts, emetics, syrups, and a host of other things, in hope of cure;—and they make about the same progress that a man would to drink himself drunk every day, and sleep himself sober every night. As long as they will swallow their food whole, they may expect to suffer. When they will cease insulting their stomachs by their swinish eating, they will find by short fasting, that organ to regain its strength. But fast eating is not the only promoter of gastric disturbance. The taking of condiments with meats is a crime against the stomach. Instead of leaving that organ free to carry on its own vital functions, they throw in pepper, and ginger, and spice, and mustard. All these are as truly destructive to its tone and healthy action, as is alcohol. They produce unnatural26 excitement, and weaken natural strength. The taking of mustard with meats is a very popular habit, and one that is directly against health. If any one would inquire which he had better take, mustard or pulverized Spanish blistering flies, let him test their strength. Put a poultice of mustard on one arm, and a plaster of flies on the other, and see which can be borne the longest. This test will prove that the use of flies on meats would be less hurtful than the mustard. If these stomach complaints are produced by these unnatural and unnecessary agents, and a cure is desired, let them dismiss these things at once, and fast until Nature can perform a cure. Vast disturbance is the direct effect of various stimulants. There are ladies suffering from various forms of dyspepsia and its often accompaniment, consumptive cough, which has been, to say the least, greatly increased by stimulating drinks. They have created great fondness for their favorites, coffee and tea. They love their intoxicating power, as truly as the drunkard loves his liquors, and for precisely the same reason; because they spur up Nature—quicken a mind that is drooping under the reaction of a former excitement—produce a cheering sensation on the jaded nervous system. Tell them about abandoning such a habit, and, as in the case of the rum and tobacco drunkard, you might sooner succeed in persuading them to abandon the Christian faith. They will be found more firmly wedded to this worldly lust, than they are to a healthy body, a sound mind, or a sanctified heart. An unnatural animal passion rules the day, over better judgment, reason, conscience, and all the higher powers of nature. Health, with all its attendant blessings on the soul, is worth something, but their gratified passion is valued more. But they cannot have this and health too, after symptoms of suffering show themselves. They must be content to suffer on, or put away their idol appetites. The best cure for periodical or protracted headache, is ceasing to create or foster the complaint. The best drops for consumptive cough consists in dropping the foolish habits which produce it, or keep it in existence.27 Let them cease destroying the tone of the nervous system, from which arise a host of complaints, and these complaints will soon disappear. While this portion of our being is kept in tune, there is but little danger of much derangement. But get this out of tune, and there is scarcely any trouble that may not arise.
—Philosophy of Health, pp. 169–182. Hygienic medication—commonly called Water-Cure, Hydropathy, Hygeopathy, or more properly Hygeio-Therapy—is based on the fundamental principle that all curative virtue is inherent in the living organism; and that all that remedial agents can or should do, is to supply favorable conditions for the successful exertion of that power. Those conditions can never be supplied by the administration of drug-poisons, which are themselves incompatible with living structures, and which only cure (or rather change) one disease by producing another. They are only found in such materials and influences as the organism uses in its normal state; not in such things as it rejects. Food, water, air, light, temperature, exercise and rest, sleep, clothing, electricity, passional influences, etc., are necessary and useful to, and usable by, the living system, in its state of health; and they constitute, also, its proper materia medica in all its conditions of disease. So far from being a “one-ideaism”—as many charge, who regard the system as literally a Water-cure, and cold water at that—Hygienic medication embraces all the useful things in the world—every curative agent in the universe. It adopts whatever nature appropriates, and discards only what nature rejects. The “one-ideaism” is all on the other side. The term may well be retorted upon those whose remedial agents are, whatever nature abhors and rebels against, and whose only idea of a medicine is an animal, vegetable, or mineral poison. The system of the healing art which I advocate and28 practice, not only repudiates all the remedies of the drug schools, but denies the philosophy on which their employment is predicated. It charges their practice with being destructive, and their theory with being false. It ignores all the fundamental premises of all drug-medical systems, and declares the truth to be the exact contrary of what they teach. To illustrate: it is taught in all their books and schools, that nature has provided remedies for diseases in the things outside of the domain of organic life. The truth is exactly the contrary. Nature has provided penalties—and among them sickness—as the consequences of disobedience to organic law; but she has not provided remedies to do away the penalties! It is also taught, in all their books and schools, that disease is an entity, a thing foreign to the living organism, and an enemy to the life-principle. The truth is exactly the contrary. Disease is the life-principle itself at war with an enemy. It is the defender and protector of the living organism. It is a process of purification. It is an effort to remove foreign and offensive materials from the system, and to repair the damages the vital machinery has sustained. It is remedial effort. Disease, therefore, is not a foe to be subdued, or “cured,” or killed; but a friendly office, to be directed and regulated. And every attempt to cure or subdue disease with drug-poisons, is nothing more nor less than a war on the human constitution. It is further taught, in all the books and schools of the drug-systems, that medicines have specific relations to the various parts, organs, or structures of the living system; that they possess an inherent power to “elect” or “select” the part or organ on which to make an impression; and that, in virtue of this “special” “elective” or “selective” affinity, certain medicines act on the stomach, others on the bowels, others on the liver, others on the brain, others on the skin, others on the kidneys, etc. This absurd notion is the groundwork of the classification of the materia medica into emetics, cathartics, colagogues, narcotics and nervines, diaphoretics, diuretics, etc. Now the truth is exactly the contrary. So far from there being29 any such ability on the part of the dead, inert drug—any “special affinity” between a poison and living tissue—the relation between them is one of absolute and eternal antagonism. The drugs do not act at all. All the action is on the part of the living organism. And it ejects, rejects, casts out, expels, as best it can, by vomiting, purging, sweating, diuresis, etc., these drug-poisons; and the doctors have mistaken this warfare against their medicines for their action on the living system. The treatment of diseases with drugs ever was, now is, and always must be, uncertain and dangerous experimentation. It never was and never can be reduced to reliable practical rules. An art is the application of the principles of a science to specific results. And a science is an arrangement of ascertained principles in their normal order and relations. These principles constitute the premises of the system which is made up of the science and the art. But in medicine according to the philosophy of all the drug schools, every one of its fundamental premises is false; hence its science is false, and its practice must be false also. On the contrary, the treatment of diseases with normal or Hygienic agencies and materials is founded on the demonstrable laws of physiology, and reducible to fixed and invariable rules of practice, and it affords the data for a true Medical Science and a successful Healing Art. Wherever and by whomsoever this system is understood, it is adopted. Just so fast as people become thoroughly acquainted with it, they abandon all the systems of drug-medication. Thenceforth they have very little need of the physician, and never patronize the quack. They will not be killed by regular, nor imposed upon by irregular, physicians. But an imperfect and superficial acquaintance with its fundamental principles causes many persons to err in the management of its agents and processes. The scarcity of properly educated Hygeio-Therapeutic physicians, and the incompetency and charlatanism of some who assume the title of Water-Cure doctors, have rendered it necessary, for the great majority30 who approve our system, to be their own physicians. Very few of them, however, have time, opportunity, and inclination to study our larger works; and for the benefit of such I have arranged this little tract. Attention to the rules and principles herein stated and briefly illustrated will, I am confident, enable any person of ordinary tact and judgment to manage all ordinary maladies successfully, and to avoid doing any very serious injury in any case. HYGIENIC AND DRUG MEDICATION CONTRASTED.
All that I have said, shall say, or can say against drug-medication, and in favor of the Hygienic system, is more than confirmed by the standard authors and living teachers of the drug system. I will give a few specimens of their testimonies on these points. And first, let me introduce to the reader some of the most eminent of the living professors of our Medical Colleges: Said the venerable Professor Alex. H. Stephens, M. D., of the New York College of Physicians and Surgeons, in a recent lecture to the medical class: “The older physicians grow, the more skeptical they become of the virtues of medicine, and the more they are disposed to trust to the powers of nature.” Again: “Notwithstanding all of our boasted improvements, patients suffer as much as they did forty years ago.” And again: “The reason medicine has advanced so slowly, is because physicians have studied the writings of their predecessors, instead of nature.” The venerable Professor Jos. M. Smith, M. D., of the same school, testifies: “All medicines which enter the circulation, poison the blood in the same manner as do the poisons that produce disease.” Again: “drugs do not cure disease; disease is always cured by the vis medicatrix naturæ.” And again: “Digitalis has hurried thousands to the grave.” Dr. Hosack, formerly a Professor in this College, used to say that it31 derived its name from the fact that it pointed the way to the grave.” And yet again: “Prussic acid was once extensively used in the treatment of consumption, both in Europe and America; but its reputation is now lost. Thousands of patients were treated with it, but not a case was benefited. On the contrary, hundreds were hurried to the grave.” Says Professor C. A. Gilman, M. D., of the same school: “Many of the chronic diseases of adults are caused by the maltreatment of infantile diseases.” Again: “Blisters nearly always produce death when applied to children.” Again: “I give mercury to children when I wish to depress the powers of life.” And again: “The application of opium to the true skin of an infant is very likely to produce death.” And yet again: “A single drop of laudanum will often destroy the life of an infant.” And once more: “Four grains of calomel will often kill an adult.” And, finally: “A mild mercurial course, and mildly cutting a man’s throat, are synonymous terms.” Says Professor Alonzo Clark, M. D., of the same school: “From thirty to sixty grains of calomel have been given very young children for croup.” Again: “Apoplectic patients, who are not bled, have double the chance to recover than those have who are bled.” And again: “Physicians have learned that more harm than good has been done by the use of drugs in the treatment of measles, scarlatina, and other self-limited diseases.” And yet again: “My experience is, that croup can’t well be cured; at least, the success of treatment is very doubtful. A different mode of treatment is introduced yearly, to be succeeded by another the next year.” Once more: “Ten thousand times ten thousand methods have been tried, in vain, to cure diabetes.” Still another: “In their zeal to do good, physicians have done much harm. They have hurried many to the grave who would have recovered if left to nature.” And, finally: “All of our curative agents are poisons; and, as a consequence, every dose diminishes the patient’s vitality.” Says Professor W. Parker, M. D., of the same school: “I have no confidence in gonorrheal specifics.”32 Again: “Nearly all cases of urethral stricture are caused by strong injections.” And again: “The usual treatment of syphilis, by mercury, causes atheromatous deposits in the coats of the arteries, predisposing to apoplexy.” And yet again: “It must be confessed that the administration of remedies is conducted more in an empirical than in a rational manner.” Once more: “The pains of which patients with secondary and tertiary syphilis complain are not referable to the syphilitic poison, but to the mercury with which they have been drugged.” And, finally: “Of all sciences, medicine is the most uncertain.” Says Professor E. H. Davis, M. D., of the New York Medical College: “Tablespoonful doses—480 grains—of calomel have been given in cholera.” Again: “The modus operandi of medicines is still a very obscure subject. We know they operate, but exactly how they operate is entirely unknown.” And again: “The vital effects of medicines are very little understood; it is a term used to cover our ignorance.” Says Professor E. R. Peaslee, M. D., of the same school: “The administration of powerful medicines is the most fruitful cause of derangements of the digestion.” Again: “The giving of morphine, or other sedatives, to check the cough in consumption, is a pernicious practice.” Says Professor Horace Green, M. D., of the same school: “The confidence you have in medicine will be dissipated by experience in treating diseases.” Again: “Cod-liver oil has no curative power in tuberculosis.” Says Professor H. G. Cox, M. D., of the same school: “There is much truth in the statement of Dr. Hughes Bennett, that blood-letting is always injurious, and never necessary, and I am inclined to think it entirely correct.” Again: “Bleeding in pneumonia doubles the mortality.” And again: “Calomel does no good in pneumonia.” And yet again: “The fewer remedies you employ in any disease, the better for your patient.” And once more: “Mercury is a sheet-anchor in fevers; but it is an anchor that moors your patient to the grave.” Says Professor B. F. Barker, M. D., of the same school: “The drugs which are administered for the cure of scarlet fever and measles, kill far more than those diseases do. I have recently given no medicine in their treatment, and have had excellent success.” Again: “I have known several ladies become habitual drunkards, the primary cause being a taste for stimulants, which was acquired in consequence of alcoholic drink being administered to them as medicine.” And again: “I am inclined to think that mercury, given as an aplastic agent, does far more harm than good.” And yet again: “I incline to the belief that bleeding is injurious and unnecessary.” Once more: “There is, I am sorry to say, as much empiricism in the medical profession as out of it.” And finally: “Instead of investigating for themselves, medical authors have copied the errors of their predecessors, and have thus retarded the progress of medical science, and perpetuated error.” Says Professor J. W. Carson, M. D., of the same school: “It is easy to destroy the life of an infant. This you will find when you enter practice. You will find that a slight scratch of the pen, which dictates a little too much of a remedy, will snuff out the infant’s life; and when you next visit your patient, you will find that the child which you left cheerful a few hours previously, is stiff and cold. Beware, then, how you use your remedies!” Again: “We do not know whether our patients recover because we give medicine, or because nature cures them. Perhaps bread-pills would cure as many as medicine.” Says Professor E. S. Carr, M. D., of the New York University Medical School: “All drugs are more or less adulterated; and as not more than one physician in a hundred has sufficient knowledge in chemistry to detect impurities, the physician seldom knows just how much of a remedy he is prescribing.” Again: “Mercury, when administered in any form, is taken into the circulation, and carried to every tissue of the body. The effects of mercury are not for a day, but for all time. It often lodges in the bones, occasionally causing pain years after it is administered. I have often34 detected metallic mercury in the bones of patients who had been treated with this subtle poisonous agent.” Says Professor S. St. John, M. D., of the same school: “All medicines are poisonous.” Says Professor A. Dean, LL. D., of the same school: “Mercury when introduced into the system, always acts as a poison.” Says Professor Martin Paine, M. D., of the same school: “Our remedial agents are themselves morbific.” Again: “Our medicines act upon the system in the same manner as do the remote causes of disease.” And again: “Drug medicines do but cure one disease by producing another.” Says Professor S. D. Gross, M. D., late of the New York University Medical School, now of Louisville (Ky.) Medical College: “Of the essence of disease very little is known; indeed, nothing at all.” Such being the deliberate assertions, declarations, and confessions of those who advocate, teach, and practice the drug system, let us see next what they say of the system which we advocate, and which they oppose. Says Professor Parker: “As we place more confidence in nature, and less in preparations of the apothecary, mortality diminishes.” Again: “Hygiene is of far more value in the treatment of disease than drugs.” And again: “I wish the materia medica was in Guinea, and that you would study materia alimentaria.” And yet again: “You are taught learnedly about materia medica, and but little about diet.” Once more: “We will have less mortality when people eat to live.” And finally: “I have cured granulations of the eyes, in chronic conjunctivitis, by Hygienic treatment, after all kinds of drug-applications had failed.” Says Professor Carson: “Water is the best diaphoretic we have.” Again: “My preceptor used to give colored water to his patients; and it was noticed that those who took the water recovered more rapidly than35 those of another physician, who bled his patients.” Says Professor Clark: “Pure cold air is the best tonic the patient can take.” Again: “Many different plans have been tried for the cure of consumption, but the result of all have been unsatisfactory. We are not acquainted with any agents that will cure consumption. We must rely on Hygiene.” And again: “Cream is far better for tubercular patients than cod-liver oil, or any other kind of oil.” And yet again: “In scarlet fever you have nothing to rely on but the vis medicatrix naturæ.” Once more: “A hundred different and unsuccessful plans have been tried for the cure of cholera. I think I shall leave my patients, hereafter, nearly entirely to nature; as I have seen patients abandoned to die and left to nature, recover, while patients who were treated died.” And, finally: “A sponge-bath will often do more to quiet restless, feverish patients than an anodyne.” Says Professor Barker: “The more simple the treatment in infantile diseases, the better the result.” Says Professor Peaslee: “Water constitutes about eight-tenths of the weight of the human body, and is its most indispensable constituent.” Again: “Water is the only necessary—the only natural—drink.” Says Professor Gilman: “Every season has its fashionable remedy for consumption; but Hygienic treatment is of far more value than all drugs combined.” Again: “Cold affusion is the best antidote for narcotic poisoning. If the medical profession were to learn and appreciate this fact [Why don’t they learn it?—R. T. T.], the number of deaths from narcotism would be diminished one-half.” And again: “The continued application of cold water has more power to prevent inflammation than any other remedy.” And yet again: “The application of water to the external surface of the abdomen, is of great importance and value in the treatment of dysentery. I have also cured adults by this means alone.” Once more: “Water is equal in efficacy, as a diuretic, to all other diuretics combined. Water is the thing that produces diuresis; all other means are subordinate.” And finally: “Water is the best febrifuge we have.” Says Professor Smith: “The vapor of warm water is the most efficacious expectorant we have.” Again: “Abstinence from food is one of the most powerful antiphlogistic means.” To the above testimonials against the drug system, and in favor of the Hygienic, I will add the opinions of a few of the standard authors of the Allopathic school: