Ether and chloroform : a compendium of their history, surgical use, dangers, and discovery / By Henry J. Bigelow.

  • Bigelow, Henry Jacob, 1818-1890.
Date:
1848
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Ether and chloroform : a compendium of their history, surgical use, dangers, and discovery / By Henry J. Bigelow. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    give me of it. Of Listen's case of amputation, which is usually sup- posed to have carried with it extraordinar}' conviction, Sir James Clarke says, The man said that he felt something was doing with his leg, but it was not pain. Yet he does not hesitate to avow, that it is really a marvellous thing. December 17, Richard Bright, in spite of infor- mation from Guy's Hospital that they had completely failed to produce the desired state of intoxication, apologetically writes, However, there must have been some want of skill in this first attempt, and I can scarcely doubt that future experience will lead to better success. Lastly, Dr. Forbes adds to the American communications Listen's case, and writes, I have sent copies of the enclosed to all the newspapers, so that I hope all the world will soon have the great news. Here was the effect of evidence upon the scientific mind of Europe. Now it is unquestionably very respectable to doubt. The world may not question the judgment of those who suspend their judgment. Yet there are times when doubt is sophistry, and indecision culpable. Rich- ard Bright did not delay to forward the news to Guy's Hospital, that no time might be lost in affording so great a relief to any who might be in the unfortunate condition of being obliged to undergo a serious operation. Ought not the motive of relieving human pain to induce the appointed officers of public charities to ask what is the nature of this anodyne, in whose behalf united nations rise to testify ? Is it supposed that one of these gentlemen would lose his own arm without invoking ether ? Shall none remonstrate, when those who arc appointed to alleviate human suffering in administering the accumulated charities of years, virtually avow, that, having tried no experiments, and comparatively ignorant of the subject, they consider that the decision of mankind is wrong ; and, acting upon this avowal, they condemn, not tlieraselves, nor yet the reasoning community who resist their influence, but their helpless hospital patients, to the horrors of the knife ! If these consequences wei'e limited to the sphere of a few institutions, the public would have a proportionally limited interest in the subject ; but the wide-spread influence which such institutions exercise upon their own section of the country, and upon the large community of which they are the scientific centre, as well as the indirect influence they may have ex- ercised upon governments, render it imperative at least to exhibit the ac- tual value of the influence they choose to exert.