United States or Spain ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
"The most valuable medicines in the Materia Medica act on principles of which we are totally ignorant. None have ever yet been able to explain how opium produces sleep, or how bark cures intermittent fevers; and yet few, it is hoped, will be so absurd as to desist from the use of these important articles because they know nothing of the principle of their operations."
Oyster-shells he could convert into crab's eyes; common oil into oil of sweet almonds; syrup of sugar into balsamic syrup; Thames water into aqua cinnamoni; and a hundred more costly preparations were produced in an instant, from the cheapest and coarsest drugs of the materia medica: and when any common thing was ordered for a patient, he always took care to disguise it in colour or taste, or both, in such a manner that it could not possibly be known; for which purpose cochineal and oil of cloves were of great service.
Mugridge is suffering from an intermittent rash, with red, inflamed skin and large, short-lived blisters. I don't know what the deuce it is, but the nearest description to it in a 'Materia Medica, etc., is pemphigus, so pemphigus it is, and he has been 'tonic- ed' and massaged. "September 9.
What right have we to laugh? We live in an enlightened age, and yet a great proportion of the people, perhaps not a majority, still believe in incantations, have faith in ignorant practitioners who advertise a "natural gift," or a secret process or remedy, and prefer the charlatan who is exactly on the level of the Indian Medicine Man, to the regular practitioner, and to the scientific student of mind and body and of the properties of the materia medica.
Those who are acquainted with the existing systems of medical education will observe that, long as is the catalogue of studies which I have enumerated, I have omitted to mention several that enter into the usual medical curriculum of the present day. I have said not a word about zoology, comparative anatomy, botany, or materia medica.
What, then, is the result of experiments in this direction? They have been conducted through long periods and with the greatest care, by men of the highest attainments in chemistry and physiology, and the result is given in these few words, by Dr. H.R. Wood, Jr., in his Materia Medica. "No one has been able to detect in the blood any of the ordinary results of its oxidation."
On his tombstone he is described as "The Father of Chemistry and the Uncle of the Earl of Cork", and, indeed, in his Skyptical Chimist , he assailed, and for the time overthrew, the idea of the alchemists that there was a materia prima, asserting as he did that theory of chemical "elements" which held good until the discoveries in connection with radium led to a modification in chemical teaching.
It has proved itself so elegant and so convenient a vehicle for the administration of various medicinal substances, is so easily miscible with both water and alcohol, and is so pleasant to the taste, that it seems almost a wonder that it should have been so long in attaining the rank among the articles of the Materia Medica which it now occupies.
But if you are in pain, here are some cordial drops, which, taken in a glass of my own cognac, will give you rest, if I know aught of the materia medica." The Doctor, as he very well knew, had assailed Esther on her weak side; and, as he doubted not of the acceptable quality of his prescription, he sat himself at work, without unnecessary delay, to prepare it.
Medical aid was not denied, when occasion required it, from one qualified to practise among the Weld colony in the village, who of course was no heretic; but the ordinary management of the materia medica, furnished by the garden, rested with such of the fraternity as were gifted in the art of healing.
Word Of The Day