if i were required to guess off-hand, and without collusion with higher minds, what is the bottom cause of the amazing material and intellectual advancement of the last fifty years, i should guess that it was the modern-born and previously nonexistent disposition on the part of men to believe that a new idea can have value. with the long roll of the mighty names of history present in our minds, we are not privileged to doubt that for the past twenty or thirty centuries every conspicuous civilisation in the world has produced intellects able to invent and create the things which make our day a wonder; perhaps we may be justified in inferring, then, that the reason they did not do it was that the public reverence for old ideas and hostility to new ones always stood in their way, and was a wall they could not break down or climb over. the prevailing tone of old books regarding 288new ideas is one of suspicion and uneasiness at times, and at other times contempt. by contrast, our day is indifferent to old ideas, and even considers that their age makes their value questionable, but jumps at a new idea with enthusiasm and high hope—a hope which is high because it has not been accustomed to being disappointed. i make no guess as to just when this disposition was born to us, but it certainly is ours, was not possessed by any century before us, is our peculiar mark and badge, and is doubtless the bottom reason why we are a race of lightning-shod mercuries, and proud of it—instead of being, like our ancestors, a race of plodding crabs, and proud of that.

so recent is this change from a three or four thousand year twilight to the flash and glare of open day that i have walked in both, and yet am not old. nothing is to-day as it was when i was an urchin; but when i was an urchin, nothing was much different from what it had always been in this world. take a single detail, for example—medicine. galen could have come into my sick-room at any time during my first seven years—i mean any day when it wasn’t fishing weather, and there wasn’t any choice but school or sickness—and he could have sat down there and stood my doctor’s 289watch without asking a question. he would have smelt around among the wilderness of cups and bottles and phials on the table and the shelves, and missed not a stench that used to glad him two thousand years before, nor discovered one that was of a later date. he would have examined me, and run across only one disappointment—i was already salivated; i would have him there; for i was always salivated, calomel was so cheap. he would get out his lancet then; but i would have him again; our family doctor didn’t allow blood to accumulate in the system. however, he could take dipper and ladle, and freight me up with old familiar doses that had come down from adam to his time and mine; and he could go out with a wheelbarrow and gather weeds and offal, and build some more, while those others were getting in their work. and if our reverend doctor came and found him there, he would be dumb with awe, and would get down and worship him. whereas, if galen should appear among us to-day, he could not stand anybody’s watch; he would inspire no awe; he would be told he was a back number, and it would surprise him to see that that fact counted against him, instead of in his favour. he wouldn’t know our medicines; he wouldn’t know our practice; and the first 290time he tried to introduce his own, we would hang him.

this introduction brings me to my literary relic. it is a dictionary of medicine, by dr. james, of london, assisted by mr. boswell’s doctor samuel johnson, and is a hundred and fifty years old, it having been published at the time of the rebellion of ‘45. if it had been sent against the pretender’s troops there probably wouldn’t have been a survivor. in 1861 this deadly book was still working the cemeteries—down in virginia. for three generations and a half it had been going quietly along, enriching the earth with its slain. up to its last free day it was trusted and believed in, and its devastating advice taken, as was shown by notes inserted between its leaves. but our troops captured it and brought it home, and it has been out of business since. these remarks from its preface are in the true spirit of the olden time, sodden with worship of the old, disdain of the new:

‘if we inquire into the improvements which have been made by the moderns, we shall be forced to confess that we have so little reason to value ourselves beyond the antients, or to be tempted to contemn them, that we cannot give stronger or 291more convincing proofs of our own ignorance, as well as our pride.

‘among all the systematical writers, i think there are very few who refuse the preference to hieron, fabricius ab aquapendente, as a person of unquestion’d learning and judgment; and yet is he not asham’d to let his readers know that celsus among the latins, paulus aegineta among the greeks, and albucasis among the arabians, whom i am unwilling to place among the moderns, tho’ he liv’d but six hundred years since, are the triumvirate to whom he principally stands indebted, for the assistance he had receiv’d from them in composing his excellent book.

‘[in a previous paragraph are puffs of galen, hippocrates, and other débris of the old silurian period of medicine.] how many operations are there now in use which were unknown to the antients?’

that is true. the surest way for a nation’s scientific men to prove that they were proud and ignorant was to claim to have found out something fresh in the course of a thousand years or so. evidently the people of this book’s day regarded themselves as children, and their remote ancestors as the only grown-up people that had existed. consider 292the contrast: without offence, without over-egotism, our own scientific men may and do regard themselves as grown people and their grandfathers as children. the change here presented is probably the most sweeping that has ever come over mankind in the history of the race. it is the utter reversal, in a couple of generations, of an attitude which had been maintained without challenge or interruption from the earliest antiquity. it amounts to creating man over again on a new plan; he was a canal boat before, he is an ocean greyhound to-day. the change from reptile to bird was not more tremendous, and it took longer.

it is curious. if you read between the lines what this author says about brer albucasis, you detect that in venturing to compliment him he has to whistle a little to keep his courage up, because albucasis ‘liv’d but six hundred years since,’ and therefore came so uncomfortably near being a ‘modern’ that one couldn’t respect him without risk.

phlebotomy, venesection—terms to signify bleeding—are not often heard in our day, because we have ceased to believe that the best way to make a bank or a body healthy is to squander its capital; but in our author’s time the physician 293went around with a hatful of lancets on his person all the time, and took a hack at every patient whom he found still alive. he robbed his man of pounds and pounds of blood at a single operation. the details of this sort in this book make terrific reading. apparently even the healthy did not escape, but were bled twelve times a year, on a particular day of the month, and exhaustively purged besides. here is a specimen of the vigorous old-time practice; it occurs in our author’s adoring biography of a doctor aretæus, a licensed assassin of homer’s time, or thereabouts:

‘in a quinsey he used venesection, and allow’d the blood to flow till the patient was ready to faint away.’

there is no harm in trying to cure a headache—in our day. you can’t do it, but you get more or less entertainment out of trying, and that is something; besides, you live to tell about it, and that is more. a century or so ago you could have had the first of these features in rich variety, but you might fail of the other once—and once would do. i quote:

‘as dissections of persons who have died of severe headaches, which have been related by authors, are too numerous to be inserted in this 294place, we shall here abridge some of the most curious and important observations relating to this subject, collected by the celebrated bonetus.’

the celebrated bonetus’s ‘observation no. 1’ seems to me a sufficient sample, all by itself, of what people used to have to stand any time between the creation of the world and the birth of your father and mine when they had the disastrous luck to get a ‘head-ach’:

‘a certain merchant, about forty years of age, of a melancholic habit, and deeply involved in the cares of the world, was, during the dog-days, seiz’d with a violent pain of his head, which some time after oblig’d him to keep his bed.

‘i, being call’d, order’d venesection in the arms, the application of leeches to the vessels of his nostrils, forehead, and temples, as also to those behind his ears; i likewise prescrib’d the application of cupping-glasses, with scarification, to his back: but, notwithstanding these precautions, he dy’d. if any surgeon, skill’d in arteriotomy, had been present, i should have also order’d that operation.’

i looked for ‘arteriotomy’ in this same dictionary, and found this definition, ‘the opening of an artery with a view of taking away blood.’ 295here was a person who was being bled in the arms, forehead, nostrils, back, temples, and behind the ears, yet the celebrated bonetus was not satisfied, but wanted to open an artery, ‘with a view’ to inserting a pump, probably. ‘notwithstanding these precautions’—he dy’d. no art of speech could more quaintly convey this butcher’s innocent surprise. now that we know what the celebrated bonetus did when he wanted to relieve a head-ach, it is no trouble to infer that if he wanted to comfort a man that had a stomach-ach he disembowelled him.

i have given one ‘observation’—a single head-ach case; but the celebrated bonetus follows it with eleven more. without enlarging upon the matter, i merely note this coincidence—they all ‘dy’d.’ not one of these people got well; yet this obtuse hyena sets down every little gory detail of the several assassinations as complacently as if he imagined he was doing a useful and meritorious work in perpetuating the methods of his crimes. ‘observations,’ indeed! they are confessions.

according to this book, ‘the ashes of an ass’s hoof mix’d with woman’s milk cures chilblains.’ length of time required not stated. another item: ‘the constant use of milk is bad for the 296teeth, and causes them to rot, and loosens the gums.’ yet in our day babies use it constantly without hurtful results. this author thinks you ought to wash out your mouth with wine before venturing to drink milk. presently, when we come to notice what fiendish decoctions those people introduced into their stomachs by way of medicine, we shall wonder that they could have been afraid of milk.

it appears that they had false teeth in those days. they were made of ivory sometimes, sometimes of bone, and were thrust into the natural sockets, and lashed to each other and to the neighbouring teeth with wires or with silk threads. they were not to eat with, nor to laugh with, because they dropped out when not in repose. you could smile with them, but you had to practise first, or you would overdo it. they were not for business, but just decoration. they filled the bill according to their lights.

this author says ‘the flesh of swine nourishes above all other eatables.’ in another place he mentions a number of things, and says ‘these are very easy to be digested; so is pork.’ this is probably a lie. but he is pretty handy in that line; and when he hasn’t anything of the sort in 297stock himself he gives some other expert an opening. for instance, under the head of ‘attractives’ he introduces paracelsus, who tells of a nameless ‘specific’—quantity of it not set down—which is able to draw a hundred pounds of flesh to itself—distance not stated—and then proceeds, ‘it happened in our own days that an attractive of this kind drew a certain man’s lungs up into his mouth, by which he had the misfortune to be suffocated.’ this is more than doubtful. in the first place, his mouth couldn’t accommodate his lungs—in fact, his hat couldn’t; secondly, his heart being more eligibly situated, it would have got the start of his lungs, and being a lighter body, it would have sail’d in ahead and occupied the premises; thirdly, you will take notice, a man with his heart in his mouth hasn’t any room left for his lungs—he has got all he can attend to; and, finally, the man must have had the attractive in his hat, and when he saw what was going to happen he would have remov’d it and sat down on it. indeed he would; and then how could it choke him to death? i don’t believe the thing ever happened at all.

paracelsus adds this effort: ‘i myself saw a plaister which attracted as much water as was sufficient to fill a cistern; and by these very 298attractives branches may be torn from trees; and, which is still more surprising, a cow may be carried up into the air.’ paracelsus is dead now; he was always straining himself that way.

they liked a touch of mystery along with their medicine in the olden time; and the medicine-man of that day, like the medicine-man of our indian tribes, did what he could to meet the requirement:

‘arcanum. a kind of remedy whose manner of preparation, or singular efficacy, is industriously concealed, in order to enhance its value. by the chymists it is generally defined a thing secret, incorporeal, and immortal, which cannot be known by man, unless by experience; for it is the virtue of every thing, which operates a thousand times more than the thing itself.’

to me the butt end of this explanation is not altogether clear. a little of what they knew about natural history in the early times is exposed here and there in the dictionary.

‘the spider. it is more common than welcome in houses. both the spider and its web are used in medicine: the spider is said to avert the paroxysms of fevers, if it be apply’d to the pulse of the wrist, or the temples; but it is peculiarly recommended 299against a quartan, being enclosed in the shell of a hazlenut.

‘among approved remedies, i find that the distill’d water of black spiders is an excellent cure for wounds, and that this was one of the choice secrets of sir walter raleigh.

‘the spider which some call the catcher, or wolf, being beaten into a plaister, then sew’d up in linen, and apply’d to the forehead or temples, prevents the returns of a tertian.

‘there is another kind of spider, which spins a white, fine, and thick web. one of this sort, wrapp’d in leather, and hung about the arm, will avert the fit of a quartan. boil’d in oil of roses, and instilled into the ears, it eases pains in those parts. dioscorides, lib. 2, cap. 68.

‘thus we find that spiders have in all ages been celebrated for their febrifuge virtues; and it is worthy of remark, that a spider is usually given to monkeys, and is esteem’d a sovereign remedy for the disorders those animals are principally subject to.’

then follows a long account of how a dying woman, who had suffered nine hours a day with an ague during eight weeks, and who had been bled dry some dozens of times meantime without 300apparent benefit, was at last forced to swallow several wads of ‘spiders-web,’ whereupon she straightway mended, and promptly got well. so the sage is full of enthusiasm over the spider-webs, and mentions only in the most casual way the discontinuance of the daily bleedings, plainly never suspecting that this had anything to do with the cure.

‘as concerning the venomous nature of spiders, scaliger takes notice of a certain species of them (which he had forgotten), whose poison was of so great force as to affect one vincentinus thro’ the sole of his shoe, by only treading on it.’

the sage takes that in without a strain, but the following case was a trifle too bulky for him, as his comment reveals:

‘in gascony, observes scaliger, there is a very small spider, which, running over a looking-glass, will crack the same by the force of her poison. (a mere fable.)’

but he finds no fault with the following facts:

‘remarkable is the enmity recorded between this creature and the serpent, as also the toad: of the former it is reported, that, lying (as he thinks securely) under the shadow of some tree, the spider lets herself down by her thread, and, 301striking her proboscis or sting into the head, with that force and efficacy, injecting likewise her venomous juice, that, wringing himself about, he immediately grows giddy, and quickly after dies.

‘when the toad is bit or stung in fight with this creature, the lizard, adder, or other that is poisonous, she finds relief from plantain, to which she resorts. in her combat with the toad, the spider useth the same stratagem, as with the serpent, hanging by her own thread from the bough of some tree, and striking her sting into her enemy’s head, upon which the other, enraged, swells up, and sometimes bursts.

‘to this effect is the relation of erasmus, which he saith he had from one of the spectators, of a person lying along upon the floor of his chamber, in the summer-time, to sleep in a supine posture, when a toad, creeping out of some green rushes, brought just before in, to adorn the chimney, gets upon his face, and with his feet sits across his lips. to force off the toad, says the historian, would have been accounted sudden death to the sleeper; and to leave her there, very cruel and dangerous; so that upon consultation it was concluded to find out a spider, which, together with her web, and the window she was fasten’d 302to, was brought carefully, and so contrived as to be held perpendicularly to the man’s face; which was no sooner done, but the spider, discovering his enemy, let himself down, and struck in his dart, afterwards betaking himself up again to his web; the toad swell’d, but as yet kept his station: the second wound is given quickly after by the spider, upon which he swells yet more, but remain’d alive still.—the spider, coming down again by his thread, gives the third blow; and the toad, taking off his feet from over the man’s mouth, fell off dead.’

to which the sage appends this grave remark, ‘and so much for the historical part.’ then he passes on to a consideration of ‘the effects and cure of the poison.’

one of the most interesting things about this tragedy is the double sex of the toad, and also of the spider.

now the sage quotes from one turner:

‘i remember, when a very young practitioner, being sent for to a certain woman, whose custom was usually, when she went to the cellar by candlelight, to go also a spider-hunting, setting fire to their webs, and burning them with the flame of the candle still as she pursued them. it happen’d 303at length, after this whimsy had been follow’d a long time, one of them sold his life much dearer than those hundreds she had destroy’d; for, lighting upon the melting tallow of her candle, near the flame, and his legs being entangled therein, so that he could not extricate himself, the flame or heat coming on, he was made a sacrifice to his cruel persecutor, who, delighting her eyes with the spectacle, still waiting for the flame to take hold of him, he presently burst with a great crack, and threw his liquor, some into her eyes, but mostly upon her lips; by means of which, flinging away her candle, she cry’d out for help, as fansying herself kill’d already with the poison. however, in the night, her lips swell’d up excessively, and one of her eyes was much inflam’d; also her tongue and gums were somewhat affected; and, whether from the nausea excited by the thoughts of the liquor getting into her mouth, or from the poisonous impressions communicated by the nervous fibrillæ of those parts to those of the ventricle, a continual vomiting attended: to take off which, when i was call’d, i order’d a glass of mull’d sack, with a scruple of salt of wormwood, and some hours after a theriacal bolus, which she flung up again. i embrocated the lips with the oil of 304scorpions mix’d with the oil of roses; and, in consideration of the ophthalmy, tho’ i was not certain but the heat of the liquor, rais’d by the flame of the candle before the body of the creature burst, might, as well as the venom, excite the disturbance, (altho’ mr. boyle’s case of a person blinded by this liquor dropping from the living spider, makes the latter sufficient;) yet observing the great tumefaction of the lips, together with the other symptoms not likely to arise from simple heat, i was inclin’d to believe a real poison in the case; and therefore not daring to let her blood in the arm [if a man’s throat were cut in those old days, the doctor would come and bleed the other end of him]. i did, however, with good success, set leeches to her temples, which took off much of the inflammation; and her pain was likewise abated, by instilling into her eyes a thin mucilage of the seeds of quinces and white poppies extracted with rose-water; yet the swelling on the lips increased; upon which, in the night, she wore a cataplasm prepared by boiling the leaves of scordium, rue, and elderflowers, and afterwards thicken’d with the meal of vetches. in the mean time, her vomiting having left her, she had given her, between whiles, a little draught of distill’d 305water of carduus benedictus and scordium, with some of the theriaca dissolved; and upon going off of the symptoms, an old woman came luckily in, who, with assurance suitable to those people (whose ignorance and poverty is their safety and protection), took off the dressings, promising to cure her in two days’ time, altho’ she made it as many weeks, yet had the reputation of the cure; applying only plantain leaves bruis’d and mixed with cobwebs, dropping the juice into her eye, and giving some spoonfuls of the same inwardly, two or three times a day.’

so ends the wonderful affair. whereupon the sage gives mr. turner the following shot—strengthening it with italics—and passes calmly on:

‘i must remark upon this history, that the plantain, as a cooler, was much more likely to cure this disorder than warmer applications and medicines.’

how strange that narrative sounds to-day, and how grotesque, when one reflects that it was a grave contribution to medical ‘science’ by an old and reputable physician! here was all this to-do—two weeks of it—over a woman who had scorched her eye and her lips with candle grease. the poor wench is as elaborately dosed, bled, embrocated, 306and otherwise harried and bedevilled, as if there had been really something the matter with her; and when a sensible old woman comes along at last, and treats the trivial case in a sensible way, the educated ignoramus rails at her ignorance, serenely unconscious of his own. it is pretty suggestive of the former snail pace of medical progress that the spider retained his terrors during three thousand years, and only lost them within the last thirty or forty.

observe what imagination can do. ‘this same young woman’ used to be so affected by the strong (imaginary) smell which emanated from the burning spiders that ‘the objects about her seem’d to turn round; she grew faint also with cold sweats, and sometimes a light vomiting.’ there could have been beer in that cellar as well as spiders.

here are some more of the effects of imagination: ‘sennertus takes notice of the signs of the bite or sting of this insect to be a stupor or numbness upon the part, with a sense of cold, horror, or swelling of the abdomen, paleness of the face, involuntary tears, trembling, contractions, a (****), convulsions, cold sweats; but these latter chiefly when the poison has been received inwardly;’ whereas the modern physician holds that a few 307spiders taken inwardly, by a bird or a man, will do neither party any harm.

the above ‘signs’ are not restricted to spider bites—often they merely indicate fright. i have seen a person with a hornet in his pantaloons exhibit them all.

‘as to the cure, not slighting the usual alexipharmics taken internally, the place bitten must be immediately washed with salt water, or a sponge dipped in hot vinegar, or fomented with a decoction of mallows, origanum, and mother of thyme; after which a cataplasm must be laid on of the leaves of bay, rue, leeks, and the meal of barley, boiled with vinegar, or of garlick and onions, contused with goat’s dung and fat figs. mean time the patient should eat garlick and drink wine freely.’

as for me, i should prefer the spider bite. let us close this review with a sample or two of the earthquakes which the old-time doctor used to introduce into his patient when he could find room. under this head we have ‘alexander’s golden antidote,’ which is good for—well, pretty much everything. it is probably the old original first patent-medicine. it is built as follows:

‘take of afarabocca, henbane, carpobalsamum, 308each two drams and a half; of cloves, opium, myrrh, cyperus, each two drams; of opobalsamum, indian leaf, cinnamon, zedoary, ginger, coftus, coral, cassia, euphorbium, gum tragacanth, frankincense, styrax calamita, celtic, nard, spignel, hartwort, mustard, saxifrage, dill, anise, each one dram; of xylaloes, rheum, ponticum, alipta moschata, castor, spikenard, galangals, opoponax, anacardium, mastich, brimstone, peony, eringo, pulp of dates, red and white hermodactyls, roses, thyme, acorns, pennyroyal, gentian, the bark of the root of mandrake, germander, valerian, bishops weed, bay-berries, long and white pepper, xylobalsamum, carnabadium, macodonian, parsley-seeds, lovage, the seeds of rue, and sinon, of each a dram and a half; of pure gold, pure silver, pearls not perforated, the blatta byzantina, the bone of the stag’s heart, of each the quantity of fourteen grains of wheat; of sapphire, emerald, and jasper stones, each one dram; of hasle-nut, two drams; of pellitory of spain, shavings of ivory, calamus odoratus, each the quantity of twenty-nine grains of wheat; of honey or sugar a sufficient quantity.’

serve with a shovel. no; one might expect 309such an injunction after such formidable preparation; but it is not so. the dose recommended is ‘the quantity of an hasle-nut.’ only that; it is because there is so much jewellery in it, no doubt.

‘aqua limacum. take a great peck of garden-snails, and wash them in a great deal of beer, and make your chimney very clean, and set a bushel of charcoal on fire; and when they are thoroughly kindled, make a hole in the middle of the fire, and put the snails in, and scatter more fire amongst them, and let them roast till they make a noise; then take them out, and, with a knife and coarse cloth, pick and wipe away all the green froth: then break them, shells and all, in a stone mortar. take also a quart of earth-worms, and scour them with salt, divers times over. then take two handfuls of angelica and lay them in the bottom of the still; next lay two handfuls of celandine; next a quart of rosemary-flowers; then two handfuls of bears-foot and agrimony; then fenugreek; then turmerick; of each one ounce: red dock-root, bark of barberry-trees, wood-sorrel, betony, of each two handfuls.—then lay the snails and worms on the top of the herbs; and then two handfuls of goose-dung, and two handfuls of sheep-dung. then put in three 310gallons of strong ale, and place the pot where you mean to set fire under it: let it stand all night, or longer; in the morning put in three ounces of cloves well beaten, and a small quantity of saffron, dry’d to powder; then six ounces of shavings of hartshorn, which must be uppermost. fix on the head and refrigeratory, and distil according to art.’

there! the book does not say whether this is all one dose, or whether you have a right to split it and take a second chance at it, in case you live. also, the book does not seem to specify what ailment it was for; but it is of no consequence, for of course that would come out on the inquest.

upon looking further, i find that this formidable nostrum is ‘good for raising flatulencies in the stomach’—meaning from the stomach, no doubt. so it would appear that when our progenitors chanced to swallow a sigh, they emptied a sewer down their throats to expel it. it is like dislodging skippers from cheese with artillery.

when you reflect that your own father had to take such medicines as the above, and that you would be taking them to-day yourself but for the introduction of homœopathy, which forced the old-school 311doctor to stir around and learn something of a rational nature about his business, you may honestly feel grateful that homœopathy survived the attempts of the allopathists to destroy it, even though you may never employ any physician but an allopathist while you live.