Art. XVI. A treatise on the lues bovilla, or cow-pox, by Benjamin Moseley ... 2d edition ... 1805.

Date:
[1805]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Art. XVI. A treatise on the lues bovilla, or cow-pox, by Benjamin Moseley ... 2d edition ... 1805. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    ^^RT. XVI. A. Treatise on the Lues Bovilla, or Cotv-Pox. By Benjamin Moseley, M.D., Physician to the Royal MiHcary Hos- pital of Chelsea^ &c. sd Edition, ,with considerable Additions. 8vo. pp. 142. 5s. sewed. Longman and Co. 1805. 'T^HE respectable rank in the profession which Dr. Moseley holds, as Phybici-an to a great national establishment, might justify much higher pretensions than such as are supported by the merits of the treatise before us. We have seldom seen a work which bore, more distinctly than the present, the stamp of an intemperate endeavour to carry beyond the reach of ra- tional investigation, a subject of the highest importance to mankind ; and we cannot sufficiently reprehend the disposition, which so universally appears through the whole of this per- formance, to impose on the jwdgment of the public, by the substitution of bold assertion and illiberal invective, for a can- did and philosophical inquiry after truth. With those who have time and disposition to examine, this publication bears too many internal evidences of error to mislead: but where it is merely known that a Physician of standing and respectability comes.forwards, with an appear.^nce of candour, of zeal for the honour of his profession, and regard to the interests of the public, to stem the torrent of popular prepossession, by what 3re represented to be unquestionable facts and incontrovertible reasoning, it becomes the more necessary to put in a caveat, i£ there be any circumstances connected with his work which diminish our confidence in its accuracy. In the very first page of the preface, we find an observation which gives no flattering idea of the author's judgment. He there tells us that it is his firm opinion ' that experience is not necessary to know, the cow-pox cannot be a preventive to the small-pox —For on the principles of pathology, and analogy r Irom the laws of the animal occonomy, and the want of reci- procity between the two diseases, it is impossible to believe, without an entire subversion of our reason, that either should render the human frame unsusceptible of the other ' It re quires but little philosophy to know that we are not'intitled to infer any thing but from experience. Analogy is frequently delusive; It may be employed with caution in the absence of direct evidence: but it would be the height of extravagance to conceive that it can supersede fact, or render inquiry unne! cessary. We presume that Dr. Moseley is not app ized of the nature of that constitutional change, which pro. uces unsus- ceptibil.ty to small-pox in those who have goSe throLh h t disease ; and we take it for granted that he would hardly ven tare a conjecture on tho«e minute differences in organiLtioa which