S. Weir Mitchell, physician, man of science, man of letters, man of affairs / by Charles W. Burr, delivered before the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, November 19, 1919.

  • Burr, Charles W. (Charles Walts), 1861-1944.
Date:
1920
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: S. Weir Mitchell, physician, man of science, man of letters, man of affairs / by Charles W. Burr, delivered before the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, November 19, 1919. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    was not far enough advanced, that milk does good in these patients not only because it is easily digested, but because it in some way alters the chemistry of the body. The future chemistry will prob¬ ably prove the correctness of his guess. There was at first much opposition among physicians to the rest cure, especially from those whose temperament compels them always to- be in opposition. We all know such people, by sad personal acquaintance; they are the type whose mental reflex is always “No,” and who having once said the word, stubbornly persist in their opposition. They are the men who, when St. Peter meets them at the gates of Heaven on resurrection day, will hesitate, so fixed is their habit of opposition, to accept his kindly invitation to enter. Happily, no injury will be done, rather poetic justice, for they deserve to go to the other place. Some physicians, I fear envy influenced their subconscious minds, said it was unpro¬ fessional for a physician to write in language the common people could understand, because it was advertising himself, and he might thereby obtain a patient, and to have patients is wicked, because it means success. Others, horribly suspicious of the morality of their fellows, claimed that massage was immoral. The treatment finally, however, became too popular, and incompetent physicians used it on pati ents who needed a work cure, not a rest cure. Never¬ theless, it still has, and will continue to have, a very important and useful place in therapeutics. It has brought back to healthy life many a nerve-wracked, brain-weary invalid. A literary friend, one whose business is book-writing, said, in speaking to me about this address, “ Of course you will only talk about the medical side of Dr. Mitchell’s life,” his tone implying that a mere medico was incompetent to speak on such a great matter as literature. In a sense, my friend was right. It would