Domestic medicine. A treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases, by regimen and simple medicines. With an appendix containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners / [William Buchan].

  • Buchan, William, 1729-1805
Date:
1821
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Domestic medicine. A treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases, by regimen and simple medicines. With an appendix containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners / [William Buchan]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    dical observations, does more real service to the art, than he who writes a volume in support of some favourite hypothesis. Very few of the valuable discoveries in medicine have been made by physicians, They have in general either been the effect of chance or of necessity, and have been usually opposed by the Faculty, till every one else was convinced of their importance. An implicit faith in the opinion of teachers, an attachment to systems and established forms, and the dread of reflections, will always operate upon those who follow medicine as a trade. Few impJ’ovements are to be ejjpected from a man who might ruin his character and family by even the smallest deviation from an es- tablished rule. If men of letters, says the author of the performance quoted above, were to claim their right of enquiry into a matter that so nearly concerns them, the good effects of medicine would soon appear. Such men would have no separate interest from that of the art. They would detect and expose assuming Ignorance under the mask of gravity and importance, and w'ould be the judges and patrons of modest merit. Not having their understandings per- verted in their youth by false theories, unawed by authority, and unbiassed by interest, they would canvass with freedom the most universally received principles in medicine, and expose the uncer- tainty of many of those doctrines, of which a physician dares not so much as seem to doubt, No argument, continues he, can be brought against laying open medicine, which does not apply with equal, if not greater force, to religion; yet experience has shewn, that since the laity have as- serted their right of enquiry into these subjects. Theology, consi- dered as a science,, has been improved, the interests of real religion have been promoted, and the clergy have become a more learned, a more useful, and a more respectable body of men than they ever were in the days of their greatest power and splendor. Had other medical writers been as honest as this gentleman, the art had been upon a very different footing at this day. Most of them extol the merit of those men who brouglit philosophy out of the schools, and subjected it to the rules of common sense. But they never consider that medicine at present, is in nearly the same situation as philosophy was at that time, and that it might be as much improved by being treated in the same manner. Indeed, no science can either be rendered rational or useful, without be- ing submitted to the common sense and reason of mankind. These alone stamp a value upon science ; and what will not bear the test of these ought to be rejected. I know it will be said, that diffusing medical knowledge among the people might induce them to tamper with medicine, and to trust to their own skill, instead of calling a physician. The reverse of this, however, is true. Persons who have most knowledge in these matters, are commonly most ready both to ask and follow ad- vice, when it is necessary. The ignorant are always most apt to tamper w ith medicine, and have the least confidence in physicians.