A probationary surgical essay on some diseases reputed venereal : submitted ... to the examination of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh ... / by Robert Hamilton ... October 1820.

  • Hamilton, Robert, 1794-1868.
Date:
1820
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A probationary surgical essay on some diseases reputed venereal : submitted ... to the examination of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh ... / by Robert Hamilton ... October 1820. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    7/40 (page 3)
    interesting examples, which he conceives establish the cor¬ rectness of his views *; and Mr Carmichael adds his valuable testimony in support of the same opinion. Mr Pearson, as I have just observed, barely states his own conviction; and leaves us to regret, in a measure pro¬ portioned to the high value we attach to all his conclusions, the want of the evidence upon .which his conviction is founded. Mr Abernethy, among many observations of a simi¬ lar import, presents us with the following: ‘‘It deserves “ to be observed, that diseases resembling syphilis do oc- “ cur, without any reason to suppose that any morbific “ poison has been admitted into the system fAnd again, “ All surgeons of experience will, I believe, admit, that “ diseases resembling syphilis occur from disorder of the “ health in general fHe then goes on to furnish us with some of the facts upon which he grounds this opinion; but it may be questioned whether they satisfactorily esta¬ blish the point. There are but few who have at all attend¬ ed to this subject, that would find any difficulty in allow¬ ing that this disease occasionally occurs in a couple who were healthy before their union, and after it, have been guil^ ty of no breach of chastity. Now, in all Mr Abernethy’s cases, the patients were married men, and were certainly lia¬ ble to affections of this kind. And again, in the conclusion of the very chapter in which these cases are recorded, their respected author has the following remark : “ The poison “ which produces pseudo-syphilitic symptoms is sometimes “ absorbed without any evident breach of surface in the “ skin §J* How did Mr Abernethy, in his previous rear * On Diseases resembling Syphilis, pp. 54, 89, &c. f Op. cit. p, 90, ^ Op. cit. p. 69. § Op. cit,