Persecution of Homeopathic and Botanic Practitioners. During the time bleeding was popular the doctors believed that the patient must be bled in all cases; an instance is mentioned by Dr. Guy of London, in his book on Public Health, where he says one hundred and forty patients were all bled for one disease, and they all died. Dr. Samuel Hahnemann of Germany, old Samuel Thompson of this country, and their followers, suffered martyrdom, nearly one hundred years ago, for opposing these destructive methods in the treatment of diseases.

There were a number of volumes published by Prof. Simpson, of Edinburg, Scotland, Dr. Woods, Dr. Hooker, and others at that time, opposing homeopathy and botanic practice of medicine, which volumes endeavored to prove that the botanic and homeopathic physicians did no good to their patients, but that the disease was constantly increasing until it was too late for the patient to be cured by their own destructive and poisonous medicines, and all kinds of persecutions were resorted to, tr break up or put a stop to these two innocent and harmless systems of the practice of medicine.

At the time of the illness and death of Gen. Washington, a doctor who attempted to treat fever or any disease, without bleeding the patient several times, and not using calomel and jalap, emetic tartar, etc., and the patient died, he would be arrested at once and tried for manslaughter. We have an instance in the trial of Samuel Thompson, who was opposed to bleeding, and taking such large doses of poisonous medicine, which he termed rats bane."

66

For years and years the allopathic doctors have been combining and raising money to influence the legislature and have laws enacted to prevent any person from taking care of or prescribing for sick persons, without being a regular graduate, and of their school, and have been doing everything possible to prevent druggists from selling what is called proprietary or patent medicines, which are in almost all cases composed of ingredients that are harmless and not destructive to life or health.

On Feb. 17th, 1898, a member of the Assembly of New York State introduced a bill requiring all patent medicines to have the names and quantities of the ingredients printed in plain English on a label pasted on the bottle, so that every person taking the medicine should know just what they are taking, and which would enable the persons to make up the medicine for themselves. How much better it would be to have a law enacted compelling every physician to have printed or written in plain English the names and quantities of each ingredient in the prescription, on a label and pasted on each bottle or package, so that the patient would know what he is taking, or his friends would know what they are giving him.

Another member introduced a bill which provides, that if a proprietary medicine, which contains certain named poisons in any quantity whatever, no matter how small a quantity, the retailer or wholesaler should affix to the bottle or package, a poison label in red ink, specially naming the poison and prominently displaying a picture of a skull, and cross bones, together with the antidote for the particular poison so advertised.

Such a bill can only have one of two objects. First, to drive the manufacturers of such proprietary medicines out of the State, which medicines are never known to injure any person to any great extent,* or, Secondly, to blackmail the proprietors of patent medicines, in order to raise money to have the bill killed, either in the Assembly or committee rooms.

The allopathic physicians are trying to have the manufacture of patent medicines stopped, and no druggist permitted to sell anything without a prescription from a physician; they are also trying to have laws enacted to close up all dispensaries or at least to make them so uncomfortable for people who visit them, that they will deem themselves more disgraced than if they were paupers.

Such bills as the above are introduced in State Assemblies, year after year, at the instigation of the allopathic physicians.

How much more sensible it would be to have a law enacted that all

prescriptions sent out of drug stores should be labeled "poison " in red ink, and also that there should be displayed on the label a skull and cross bones, so that people would become more cautious when taking such prescriptions.

A great many sensible people think that physicians have no right to doctor unless they use very dangerous and destructive medicines similar to the prescription of Dr. Cleveland, and that in using them he must be equally as skillful as expert performers in theatres who place a man standing with his arms extended and the expert using long knives and so throwing them that they pin him to the board so he cannot move; or like a man who is a good marksman, shooting a lighted cigar from a man's mouth, or a small ball from his head, and in such actions if the ball or knife went an inch crooked it would be almost instant death.

But after all, times are changing, and it is a good indication that the District Attorney is wakening up, and paying some attention to such cases as the death of Mrs. Carhart's child, even if it is a year after the death occured, If in the future the attention of the District Attorney should be called to all such cases as these, which occur almost daily, he will be kept so busy attending to cases of persons who die of violent deaths after taking prescriptions, that he will not have time for arresting and trying people who treat patients who afterwards die a natutal death.

I have given Dr. Draper a number of cases that would make splendid subjects for a farce or comic opera, and could give thousands of other

*The manufacturers or proprietors of medicines have to be doubly careful in regard to the ingredients, as they are awlays aware that the person taking such medicines are very careless as regards the quantity to be taken. If any person dies after taking even a large dose of those medinines, no matter of what disease, the proprietor of such medicine would be liable to be instantly arrested and when all the doctors in the state would combine to have him severely punished, both by fine and imprisonment.

To give an instance of how careless some people are in taking medicines, I will mention a case which came under my observation in England.

A cousin of mine who kept a drug store in Leeds, sold a man a box of pills to act on the bowels, with directions to only take one pill each night, but that same night he took the whole box at one time. The effect was fearful, but not fatal.

Had the man been taken seriously ill, or had he died it would have caused my cousin serious trouble and expense, if not imprisonment. So in regard to any person getting up a patent medicine, if any one is injured by it, even by taking a whole bottle at a time (when directions are a teaspoonful a day,) and the patient dies, the manufacturer of such medicine wonld get into serious trouble, and it would completely destroy the sale of his medicines afterwards.

cases that have come under my notice, if he could dispel from the minds of his audience that they were real tragedies.

I had intended devoting some part of this book to "Medical Astrology," but I find I have not space, but anyone wishing to know something of this science can read the last 12 pages of this book.

THE OBJECTIONS TO THE SCIENCE OF ASTROLOGY ANSWERED.

1. The Folly and Knavery of its Professors.

2. The Uncertainty of the Science itself as manifested by the frequent failure of Predictions.

3. The certainty that Astrology must be false, because it cannot be true, and therefore no man of learning and sense would believe in it.

The first objection contains more truth than real weight or value. Formerly when the science was but little known or understood there were great numbers of impostors, pretending to practice it, but since the people have commenced to investigate Astrology for themselves, these pretenders are gradually going out of that kind of business. Therefore that objection is gradually disappearing, and after a time it will be entirely gone. The faculty of possessing foreknowledge is so predominant in our nature, that the desire to gratify it, when not properly trained or developed, causes it, to become really a temptation, and impostors are always ready to profit by it where they can. Wise men who studied the science, although convinced of its truth, were fully aware of its difficulties, and careful how they committed themselves. Fools were not so scrupulous, and impostors thought of nothing but how they could make the most of it. At length things came to such a pass that, as Gasendus remarked, some would "scarcely cut their hair or pare their nails without consulting the Almanac to see what sign the Moon was in." It may not be improper to give a hint relative to impostors of the present day in this city, who charge money for telling that to others, which they do not believe themselves, whose principle aim is to make money out of a science they do not understand, and to laugh at the public while they are robbing them. Wretches like these are infinitely more despicable than the greatest blockhead on earth, who is sincere. Astrology, however, must stand or fall by its own merits or demerits and not by those of its professors. Had the study of Chemistry been abandoned because a set of fools, urged on by knaves, ruined themselves in the pursuit of the universal Menstruum or Potable Gold, the world would have been deprived of a most useful Science.

The second objection, that is, "The Uncertainty of the Science itself as manifested by the frequent failure of Predictions," seems more plausible, but it is equally applicable to other branches of knowledge, of which the truth is not even disputed. We are, for instance, as little acquainted with the true operations of Celestial Affinities, and the Electric Phenomena of the Planetary Orbs as with the Pathology of the human body, and probably much less, as we have fewer opportunities of investigating them; and I would ask not only the medical man, but any man who

has studied nature, whether in the event of a person receiving a wound in the hand or foot, he would require the physician to decide as to it being succeeded by Tetanus. A question like this could only proceed from extreme ignorance, and would be treated as such. Not one in ten wounds, nor do I believe one in a hundred, occasions lock-jaw, and yet the identity of Traumatic Tetanus is as perfect as any other disease in Nosology.

The partial failures of Astrologers necessarily presuppose partial successes. If Astrologers always failed in their predictions, the evidence against Astrology would be strongly presumptive, though not absolutely conclusive, in as much as the properties of matter do not result from man's knowledge of them, but pervades all matter, inherently, prior to man's existence, and are only yet ascertained to a very limited extent. When attempts are made to parallel Astrology with many other sciences, its magnitude and complexity appear so immensely overwhelming, that the wonder turns not upon the failure of its professors, but rather upon their frequent successes.

To those who make the third objection, that is, "The certainty that Astrology must be false, because it cannot be true, and therefore no man of learning and sense would believe in it," I would recommend patience, with the assurance that should they by any accident become men of LEARNING AND SENSE themselves, they will probably change their opinions. Besides, it is but right to inform them, that men of sense often conceal their knowledge and belief from a conviction that FOOLS

ARE TOO NUMEROUS AND TOO FORMIDABLE A BODY TO BE TAMPERED WITH,

A little investigation, however, will enable them to discover that a number of years back, before the spirit of research had been almost subdued by prejudice, most men of acknowledged ability did BELIEVE IN IT. SIR ISAAC NEWTON, and also the great and ingenious KEPLER,* whose astronomical discoveries and mental acuteness have never yet been surpassed; and the profound and intelligent LOCKE, whose indefatigable spirit of research, may justly shame the brightest genius of the present age, were all well convinced of the truth of Astrology, and not ashamed to acknowledge it. Other names such as Dryden, Richelieu, etc., of equal celebrity, might be quoted, but no such authority is required to sanction truth, and the expedient is seldom resorted to except with a view to blind the ignorant and give currency to prejudice.

As every age brings improvement, "the Society for the Diffusion or Useful Knowledge" seem to have hit upon a plan of improving this expedient, by circulating their OWN names to serve for authorities, instead of the names of their PREDECESSORS. I forget who it was that prescribed a list of great men with little minds, as a cure for Hypochondriasis, supposing it must operate upon the Nerves through the medium of the visible muscles. The idea was ingenious, and really when I peruse the "Diffusion," and compare the names on its covers with the nonsense in its pages, I am tempted to believe we are in possession of the very desideratum alluded to. Such a stale, commonplace farrago

*See page 21.

† See page 22.

of physical absurdities was never before let loose upon the uninformed mass of mankind.

I wish they had given their recipe for making a Universe. That for putting the Planets in motion when they are made is truly admirable. The feat, it appears, is performed by a "PUSH given to them at first, and forcing them onward at the same time that they are drawn toward a certain point," and again we find that this attractive force which draws them toward a certain point, is "the same influence or power that makes a stone fall to the ground." Now of all the PUSHES I have ever observed, the original impulse was but momentary, and although the effect must have remained through all eternity, had there been no obstruction, yet where it is, it must be gradually annihilated. A stone thrown forward, even were there no atmospherical resistance, must proceed in a parabolic curve, the effect of two conflicting forces, viz:—that of the first impulse, and the impeding power of gravitation; but the former being but temporary, and the latter perpetual, the former would be gradually exausted by the latter, and the stone would in a given time remain relatively motionless upon the earth's surface. All that now remains to be ascertained, is the nature of the Society's "Push.” Is it like other PUSHES likely to be overcome by a contrary impulse and if it be, by what means does it still retain its power unimpaired by resistance, undiminished by gravitation? not to mention the variations at the apsides which can neither be caused by primitive impulse, or uniform gravitation. This to ME would be "Useful Knowledge," and I should be happy at seeing it “diffused” as soon as possible. I must however, caution them that I am not one of those "bipeds" that says "pretty poll, or polly wants a cracker," simply because I hear some one else say so, nor am I to be amused by a NAME or an AUTHORITY, whether of Newton or any one else. I may be wrong in applying to the Society for a reason of their own, which they have not to give, but I mean to have a reason, or the fact itself, if it is one, or nothing. Did it ever occur to those wiseacres, that every distinct body in nature, has like themselves, a will of its own, differing only from theirs, in being directed to much wiser purposes! Could they never find out that the LAWS of nature are the WILLS of nature, exercised for the mutual benefit and preservation of all its component parts, collectively and individually? could they once be made to comprehend this obvious truth it would assist them through many of their difficulties, and among other things, teach them to account for the "falling of a Stone, a phenomena which seems to puzzle them extremely; and but for the experience they have to the contrary, "It is," they say, "quite conceivable that a stone might STAND still in the air or fly upwards, or in any other direction; and there would be nothing at all absurd, contradictory, inconceivable or impossible in either of these suppositions, as there would be in supposing the stone equal to half itself, or falling and rising at once," etc. Now, really, how one positive absurdity can be more CONCEIVABLE" than another, is to ME INCONCEIVABLE," but this is the inevitable consequence when lawyers and statesmen set themselves up for astronomers, astrologers or philosophers.

Art is their proper study. They are ignorant of nature, and