Veratrum viride,
which was little heard of when I was still practising medicine. I am
only appealing to that higher court of experience which sits in judgment
on all decisions of the lower medical tribunals, and which requires more
than one generation for its final verdict.

Once change the habit of mind so long prevalent among practitioners of
medicine; once let it be everywhere understood that the presumption is in
favor of food, and not of alien substances, of innocuous, and not of
unwholesome food, for the sick; that this presumption requires very
strong evidence in each particular case to overcome it; but that, when
such evidence is afforded, the alien substance or the unwholesome food
should be given boldly, in sufficient quantities, in the same spirit as
that with which the surgeon lifts his knife against a patient,--that is,
with the same reluctance and the same determination,--and I think we
shall have and hear much less of charlatanism in and out of the
profession. The disgrace of medicine has been that colossal system of
self-deception, in obedience to which mines have been emptied of their
cankering minerals, the vegetable kingdom robbed of all its noxious
growths, the entrails of animals taxed for their impurities, the
poison-bags of reptiles drained of their venom, and all the inconceivable
abominations thus obtained thrust down the throats of human beings
suffering from some fault of organization, nourishment, or vital
stimulation.

Much as we have gained, we have not yet thoroughly shaken off the notion
that poison is the natural food of disease, as wholesome aliment is the
support of health. Cowper's lines, in "The Task," show the
matter-of-course practice of his time:

"He does not scorn it, who has long endured
A fever's agonies, and fed on drugs."

Dr. Kimball of Lowell, who has been in the habit of seeing a great deal
more of typhoid fever than most practitioners, and whose surgical
exploits show him not to be wanting in boldness or enterprise, can tell
you whether he finds it necessary to feed his patients on drugs or not.
His experience is, I believe, that of the most enlightened and advanced
portion of the profession; yet I think that even in typhoid fever, and
certainly in many other complaints, the effects of ancient habits and
prejudices may still be seen in the practice of some educated physicians.

To you, young men, it belongs to judge all that has gone before you. You
come neare