Analysis and refutation of the Statements of facts in relation to the expulsion of James C. Cross from Transylvania University --recently published by Dudley, Mitchell & Peter / by James Conquest Cross.

  • Cross, James Conquest.
Date:
1846
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Analysis and refutation of the Statements of facts in relation to the expulsion of James C. Cross from Transylvania University --recently published by Dudley, Mitchell & Peter / by James Conquest Cross. 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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    have no doubt anthorized, his son publicly to prefer against me, and which he fully endor- sed when he caused the Card embodying them, to be printed on Idler-sheets and circulated through the Post-Office. No one believed that he or his subordinates would think of entering upon so hopeless an enterprise, and the opin- ion spread abroad that the controversy had clo- sed. In this view of the matter I had no confi- dence. Silence on his part I had rendered utter- ly impossible. He must either speak or be for- ever disgraced in public estimation, as a ma- lignant calumniator and slanderer, as one who ferociously started his son upon a most ruf- fianly enterprise, and when called to account, instead of adducing proof, like the divers in the gulf of Ormus, who when they see fish ap- proaching to devour them, destroy the transpa- rency of the water by raising the mud with their feet, he endeavors to humbug the public with vague and unintelligible generalities. He knew he must speak or be lost, and the agonizing thought goaded him in every fibre of his heart. His position, even m his Paradise, so rich in all the enjoyments in which he so much delights, began to be precarious.— When he saw that his sycophancy and his sup- pers ceased to be invested with their usual attractions, he was convinced that, without a struggle, he must sink at once and forever, to the very bottom of the great ocean of public contempt; and Contempt, says Dr. John- son is a kind of gangrene which when it seizes, one part of a character corrupts all the rest by degrees. My last Card, together with such notices of my appeal, as the following, which appeared in the Knoxville Standard, produced this conviction and forced him to break a si- lence which he had obstinately persisted in, amidst the fiercest and most deadly assaults upon his conduct and character, for more than thirty years* -Happy would it have been for Dr. Dudley had he con- tinued to pursue his usual and heretofore successful poli- cy. His obliging me to respond to the frantic calumnies of a venal confederacy, he shall repent to the last hour of his existence, for had f been sitting at the elbows of and dicta- ting to the Trio, the Statements of Facts would not have been made more vulnerable nor would they have answered my purpose better. So low-bred is the idle gossip ami so frivolous and absurd are the calumnies which the Trio have uttered and published, that the reflecting part of the public can scarcely fail to ask the question, are these men responsible agents? So closely is what they have said akin to the unquestionable offspring of insanity, that it will hardly be permitted to claim any other paternity, and if the Board of Trustees would act sensibly, in future, they will take the advice Hamlet gave Orphelia, which was to lock her father up, that he might play the fool no where but in his own house. I would therefore, and it cannot, at least, by those who have read the Statements, bp looked upon as a gratuitous recommendation counsel, tlieui to close the doors of the College upon the Trio, that ihej may be allowed to render themselves ridiculous no where but upon the rostrum, and for the amusement of the students exclusively. Indeed, nearly the whole of what th«y have asserted is as false as dicer's oaths, as I shall exclusively prove, for they have done little more than te The history of talent and genius in all time ie more or less marked by the malevolence of inferior beings whom circumstances, aided by the trickery of bad hearts, have elevated to an undue and dan- gerous position among men. The conciousness of inferiority, together with that rancorous envy which holds the place in cor- rupt minds of generosity and admiration, impels them to detract and defame those whom the God of Nature has placed higher in the intellectual and moral scale than themselves, and whom they can- not rival they attempt to destroy. There is nothing so dangerous to the purity and health of the moral and social constitution as the elevation to places of trust and honor of beings without ability, integrity and firmness. Not capable of brilliantly acquitting themselves in their foreign position, and unable to reach the proud summit of superiority, they use all the means within their control to drag down its natural occupants to their own unenviable level. The history of the period of the Professorship of Dr. Cross in Transylvauia, shows an unbroken series of duplicity and wrong, directed against himself, scarcely parallelled in the records of chi- canery. Placed as he was in juxtaposition with those who lack the moral firmness to dare be hon- est men, and under the despotic sway of one who, if judged by his conduct as detailed in the appeal of Dr. Cross, views subserviency and pliancy as essential attributes in his colleagues, determined ' in their sapient conclave not only upon the remo- val of Dr. Cross out of their iniquitous road, but his utter demolition. Their vile machinations re- sulted in the withdrawal of a man who was an ornament to old Transylvania. Upon the arrival of the proper time, Dr. Cross published an Appeal to the Medical Profession of the United States. in which he gives a full and candid narrative of all the circumstances and events that led to his resignation. Written in a clear, bold and manly style, it carries the conviction to every candid mind that it is the truth, and while it stamps its author as a man of unusual ability, it shows him to be magnanimous to even his dead- liest foe, for while he pours a burning torrent of invective on the devoted heads of his writhing vic- tims, he waives all the doubtful advantages which the usage and custom of written warfare would tolerate, and confines himself to plain, honest con- clusions drawn from fairly stated facts. He meas- ures the foils, gives the longest to his foe, and then vanquishes him in a manner that does credit to his head and heart. Every lover of truth should read this work, as it discloses a system of villainy and duplicity in high places which would shame depravity itself, and visits on the heads of the guilty an awful but just retribution. Though not a member of the medical profession and feeling no bias on the subject, yet I rejoice in the triumph of right over wrong, and believe that every true-hearted man will arise from the peru- sal of the Appeal with the conviction that mor- al obliquity never received a more just or lminly exposure. (i. j umble together an undigested heap of contrarieties, dis- graceful both to their heads and hearts, which will oblige me to commit moral when in fact it should be physical murder, for they deserve the fate of poor Cinna the poet, who_was killed by Mark Antony's mob for making bad verses.