An inquiry into the physiological and medicinal properties of the veratrum viride : together with some physiological and chemical observations upon the alkaloid veratria obtained from this and other species : being the prize essay to which the American Medical Association awarded the gold medal for MDCCCLXIII / by Samuel R. Percy.

  • Percy, Samuel R.
Date:
1864
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An inquiry into the physiological and medicinal properties of the veratrum viride : together with some physiological and chemical observations upon the alkaloid veratria obtained from this and other species : being the prize essay to which the American Medical Association awarded the gold medal for MDCCCLXIII / by Samuel R. Percy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    « For the proper perfection of medicine as a natural science, two things are in main needed; the first is a right understanding of the causes and symptoms of disease ; the second, a correct knowledge of the act ion of medicines. Should our acquaintance with these two subjects be complete, we should then be able to do all that man could by any possi- bility effect, in the alleviation of human sufiering. This sublime pro- blem is already being unravelled at one end. Diagnosis and Nosology are making rapid strides ; and perhaps we shall soon know what we have to cure. But at the other end our medical system is in a less satisfactory condition | and though some impatient men have essayed, as it were, to cut the Gordian knot, and have declared boldly on subjects, of which they are ignorant, yet it must be confessed, that in the understanding of the action of medicines, and of their agency in the cure of diseases, we do not so much excel our ancestors. While other sciences are moving, and other inquiries progressing fast, this subject, so momentous in its applications, has, in spite of the earnest labors of a few talented investigators, made, after all, but little progress. Let but tliosewlw feel this want bestir themselves to remove it, and it will soon be done. Those doubts and difficulties, which are now slowly clearing away before the efforts of a few, will then be finally dispelled by the united energies of all; and instead of our present indecision and uncertainty on many points, we shall find ourselves eminently qualified to wage the conflict with disease, being skilled in that science whose name bespeaks its pecu- liar importance, the science of Therapeutics.^^ Headland, Action of Medicines.