Remarks of S.H. Tewksbury, M.D. on the bill for the promotion of medical science : also, an appeal to the members of the legislature in behalf of the Maine Medical Association, in the Senate chamber, Feb. 27, 1855.

  • Tewksbury, S. H. (Samuel Henry), 1819-1880.
Date:
1855
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Remarks of S.H. Tewksbury, M.D. on the bill for the promotion of medical science : also, an appeal to the members of the legislature in behalf of the Maine Medical Association, in the Senate chamber, Feb. 27, 1855. 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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    REMARKS. Mr. Chairman,— From the position which I hold as Chairman of the Committee of the Maine Medical Association, it ni*y per- haps be expected that I should make some remarks on this bill before you. 1 shall content myself with offering you a few desultory thoughts for your consideration on this subject, which is one of the most important and mo- mentous questions which concerns our profession. I am aware, Sir, in the outset, that the success of an argument which is to reach the understanding and reason of men, in opposition to their sympathies and natural instincts, — is desperate and almost without a hope ; and I can assure those that may be opposed to this bill, that I am by no means insensible to the force of what will be their main objection—founded in the repugnance of many of the peo- ple of this State to the dissection and mutilation of the human body after death. I presume we all in some degree participate in this feeling. I am of an opinion, however, that it is greatly overrated, and do know that it is found to exist in widely different degrees in different individuals. I have observed that it is found generally among those that have very little feeling for the living, that so tenderly respect the dead bodies of their fellows! It is a lamentable fact, at the present time in certain communities, where post mortem examinations even arc conceded to be useful and necessary, and there are good reasons for believing that they would result in discoveries useful to the living, — this private feeling rises up in op- position, and the most important secrets of disease are*