Address in refutation of the Thomsonian system of medical practice : delivered in the lecture room of the Chester Co. Cabinet of Natural Science, West Chester, Pa., on December 31, 1836 / by Sumner Stebbins.

  • Stebbins, Sumner.
Date:
1837
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Address in refutation of the Thomsonian system of medical practice : delivered in the lecture room of the Chester Co. Cabinet of Natural Science, West Chester, Pa., on December 31, 1836 / by Sumner Stebbins. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    al, the follies, and humbugs, that every bamboozled the hu* man race, would not exhibit its equaL* Et has been roundly asserted in your hearing withing the past week, that the Thomsonian's consist generally of sueh persons as have remained invalids for a long time without having received any benefit from the regular practice, and who have become converts to the new system in conse- quence of having been cured by it. Now in reply to this audacious assertion, I have only to observe, that I have watched their operations with a good deal of interest for the Jast six years, and have known many individuals to die under their hands, and if they have ever effected a cure in one singleinstance, it has escaped my notice. Icould relate some anecdotes upon this subject, that would excite your special wonder. But as J do not wish to be personal, nor to harrow up the feelings of relatives and friends, I shall proceed with my disclosure of the system in order that von may form your own opinions of it. The whole concern you perceive rests upon two assump- tions. 1st. Heat is life. 2d. Cold is the cause of all disease and death. Heat is life. I will take up this hypothesis first as it is acknowledged to be the foundation of the Thomsonian faith. If this dogma be not true, if thermometrieal, or sensible heat is not life, then is the whole system as baseless as the fabric of a vision. I am aware that its absurdity is so manifest to every rational mind, that I shall hardly be excused for occupying much of your time in exposing it. Did not the assertion, heat is life, occur in almost every page of Thomson's book, and were it not that it has been reiterated by ever patent quack from New Hampshire to the far west,as an important discovery which is to revolutionize the practice of med- icine I should dismiss it as the idle freak of an ignorant mind, wholly unworthy of notice. But as it is, as I havo * Note ey the Printer. Thomson's chapter on consumption, with the remarks accom- panying it,have been excluded,as they could not have been pub- lished without swelling this pamphlet to an inordinate and un- expected size. The chapter itself may appear in the Appendix.