Introductory for 1844-5 : on the present position of some of the most important of the modern operations of surgery / by Thomas D. Mütter.

  • Mütter, Thomas D. (Thomas Dent), 1811-1859.
Date:
1844
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Introductory for 1844-5 : on the present position of some of the most important of the modern operations of surgery / by Thomas D. Mütter. 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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    investigated orthopedic surgery, will ever think for an instant of separating the two plans ; they are so closely con- nected indeed, that they must ever he considered, bone of one bone and flesh of one flesh, and in the present state of our knowledge to discard either, to confine ourselves exclu- sively to one mode of treatment alone, would be in truth a casting away of the gem because we are ignorant of its value. Much attention has recently been directed to a department of surgery which for many years languished in the hands o' the empiric, and nostrum-monger, and even yet may be con- sidered as scarcely freed from their trammels. The depart- ment to which 1 allude is Jiural Surgery. As this is really one of the most interesting subjects of modern times, a brief sketch of its history will prove, I trust, both apposite and interesting. Looking back to the period at which aural sur- gery was first brought regularly before the notice of the pro- fession, we find that Celsus, that wonderous luminary of a dark and benighted age, is entitled to the credit of having originated specific or independent forms of aural diseases, for up to his time all the affections of the ears were confound- ed together, and spoken of solely as symptomatic maladies, their idiopathic nature never for an instant being suspected. But although Celsus benefitted science by the steps which he took in reference to the establishment of a more correct clas- sification, he can scarcely be thanked for the crude, harsh, and even dangerous remedies he proposed for the relief of these diseases ; and unfortunately, such was his authority that his successors, even such men as Galen, Paul of iEgina, and Rhazes, adopted his treatment and handed it down even to our own time, for it is well known that the popular reme- dies for all cases of deafness, it matters not from what cause proceeding, are yet of the most stimulating and fiery charac- ter. It is really surprising that the brilliant discoveries of iEustachius, Fallopius, Cotunnius, and Casserius, who flour- ished about the conclusion of the fifteenth century, the great interest first excited on the subject of deafness by the labours