The great sulphur cure brought to the test : and workings of the new curative machine proposed for human lungs and windpipes / by Robert Pairman ; preface by J. Christison.

Date:
1867
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The great sulphur cure brought to the test : and workings of the new curative machine proposed for human lungs and windpipes / by Robert Pairman ; preface by J. Christison. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    of Professor ’s quackish pills.’ A. ‘ That Professor knows best himself (perhaps better than his patients) whether the astonishing virtue of his^,pills be a fact or fiction. But what one calls “ pufSng ” another may call preaching the gospel.’ Q. ‘ What do you mean?’ A. ‘ Are you a quack, my dear friend, when with a trumpet more ear- nest, though not so brazen, you proclaim aloud to all and sundry, “ Ho ! every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters.” Or is Isaiah a quack who put you up to the plan?’ My friend mused a little, and then said, ‘ Ah ! Doctor, I see you are right. Isaiah’s “waters” can stand the test. There may be puffing in appearance without reality, and if your anticipations regarding sulphur be realized as a cure, it may be found a “ great” one too.’ Another true friend, also a clergyman, said, ‘ The subject is im- portant certainly; but, dear me! your hasty rushing into print has permitted some offences against good taste, that disfigure your pamphlet very much.’ A. ‘ Another edition may yet show such stains “ rubbed out in the washing.” But your own sermons some- times tell us the folly of paying undue heed to the tithe, mint, an cumin of things. Please, reverend sir, attend you to the weightier matters of the law. Luther’s doctrine was not the less important, thbugh he might sometimes preach with a pimple on his nose, scarcely worth the criticising.’ Then there was my style—‘ pith without polish,’ or, as some editors called it, ‘inclining to the jaunty.’ A. Can the medical profession not be roused to its duty by anything short of a solemn sermon ? Would it really have been seemly for an obscure individual to have assumed the serious, and lectured as a dominie Professors at whose feet he had often sat to receive instruction ? Are our noble, disinterested, and philanthrophic High Priests like the silversmiths of Ephesus, who manufactured idols for Diana’s shrine? Surely not. Let their atten- tion be only called to the matter, let them only know of it in any nay whatever, and the work is done. Unfortunately, Dr. Dewar’s calm, chaste, and sober style has been tried already, and, to some extent, been found wanting. With less flourish of trumpets than mine, his truly valuable and interesting pamphlet has been before the world for months; but instead of convulsing Britain to its centre, not till my pamphlet cordially saluted it, like two stranger country doctors shaking