The organic laws, or, The laws which govern the human organism / by J. Bradford Sax.

  • Sax, J. Bradford.
Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The organic laws, or, The laws which govern the human organism / by J. Bradford Sax. 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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    people and ask them how they are, and how are their families, and will they tell you that they are well? Not at all. The reply will commonly he, as well as usual; and then they will proceed to edify you with a long account of pains and aches and ails,— enough to render the life of any one miserable, though he was sur- rounded by all the external blessings which the wealth of India could purchase. This is not universally true, partly because many com- plaints are concealed, and partly because many regard it as in bad taste to talk about such things.—My profession has for years called me to associate much with mankind, and to become ac- quainted with many people. If everybody had had the same oppor- tunity that I have had to become acquainted with the immense amount of disease with which the people of this country are cursed, there would be no need of these remarks; hut all would feel strongly the great magnitude of the evil. I cannot think of but one other evil in the land—sin—which is any way comparable to this in magnitude and baleful influence. With that exception, it is the master evil of the country; and no other ought so much as to be named the same day with it. Nothing else causes so much human wo, blights so many hopes, crushes so many hearts and destroys so much human happiness.—Says Dr. Cutter, in his Anatomy and Physiology, Disease is under the control of fixed laws, and rarely occurs to vegetables or animals in their native condition, while man is so subject to disease, that his average length of life is less than half its natural period. These diseases come not by chance ; they are penalties for breaking the laws of our being,—laws which we are capable of understanding and obeying. If we possess good constitutions, we are responsible for most of our sickness; and bad constitutions or hereditary diseases are but the results of the same great law,—the iniquities of the parents being visited on the children. It is a common remark, that health is necessary to happiness ;— that sickness destroys the happiness of life ;—that nothing can be enjoyed if we are sick. This is all true, even to a greater extent than is supposed. An immense amount of the very worst kind of human suffering is caused by disease, which no one.ever dreams of referring to that cause. But everybody admits disease to be the cause of misery enough, where it exists, to give them a lively