Forty Years in the Wilderness of Pills and Powders Cogitations and Confessions of an Aged Physician

When I was a lad, a man was employed by my father on his farm, who used occasionally to fall down in convulsions, lie for some time, not entirely still, but foaming at the mouth...

There have been giants in the earth, in nearly every age, if not in every clime--giants mentally, and giants physically. Of course they may have been rare exhibitions, and may t...

If any individual in the wide world needs to breathe the pure atmospheric mixture of the Most High,--I mean a compound of gases, consisting, essentially, of about twenty parts o...

I have already mentioned more than once,--or at least done so by implication,--that I hold my existence, on this earth by a very feeble tenure. Consumption, by right of inherita...

In the autumn of 1824, while a severe sickness was sweeping over one or two towns adjacent to that in which I resided, and considerable apprehension was felt lest the disease sh...

Dr. Johnson, one of the best British writers on dyspepsia, advises his medical brethren to starve out the disease, as the surest way of getting rid of it. He says he has by far...

The thought that a minister of the gospel can be gluttonous is so painful that, after selecting as the caption to the present chapter, "A gluttonous minister," I concluded to mo...

Not many years since, I received a letter from a family in a retired village of the Green Mountains, begging me to visit one of their number, a young woman about twenty-seven ye...

Nearly at the beginning of my practice in medicine, I was called to see a fine and hitherto healthy youth, twelve years old, but who had for several weeks before application was...

So many people regarded it, and therefore I use the phrase as a title for my chapter. I have heard of families of children so large that it was not easy to find names for them a...

For several months of the first year of my medical life, I was a boarder in a family, all of whom were sickly. Some of the number were even continually or almost continually und...

One young family on whom I was accustomed to call from time to time, was not only accustomed to send for me in the night, as did many others, but, what made it much worse for me...

Within the usual limits assigned me in the daily routine of my profession, but on its very verge, there resided an individual of much general reputation for worth of character,...

A female, in Worcester County, Massachusetts, nearly sixty years of age, having for many years been a sufferer from domestic afflictions, till, along with certain abuses of the...

One of the most amusing incidents of my "Forty Years among Pills and Powders," is found at full length of detail in the following chapter. The amusement it affords has, however,...

An aged man not far from where I was studying, had an attack of dysentery which was long and severe. Whether the fault of its long continuance lay in his own bad habits, or the...

Having occasion to go to the metropolis, one day, I took the most expeditious public conveyance which the times and the season afforded. It was January, 1832. Railroad cars were...

A female, about thirty-five years of age, and naturally of a melancholic temperament, was very frequently at my room for the purpose of conversing with me in regard to her healt...

About the year 1833, I became somewhat intimately acquainted with the dietetic and general physical habits of a young woman in a family where I was a boarder, whose case will be...

I was born in a retired but pleasant part of New England, as New England was half a century ago, and as, in many places, despite of its canals, steamboats, railroads, and electr...

Mr. W. was a distinguished minister of the gospel, and teacher of females. He could not at this time have been much less than seventy years of age. He was originally a man of ir...

The family of a wealthy farmer came under my hands, as physician, one autumn, in circumstances peculiarly painful and trying. Several of them had been taken suddenly and severel...

Should you ever go to Boston, and pass along a certain street called Court Street, almost to its western extremity, you may probably see at your left hand, in large letters of v...

Should any medical man look through these pages, he may perchance amuse himself by asking where the writer obtained his system of classification of disease. It will not, certain...

Throughout the region where I was brought up, and perhaps throughout the civilized world, the notion has long prevailed that in some of the last moments of a person's life, he i...

President Lindsley, late of one of our south western colleges,--a very shrewd and observing, as well as learned and excellent individual--has been often heard to say that no hal...

It is morally impossible for any medical man who has kept his eyes open for forty years, not to have been struck with certain obvious and incontrovertible facts, of which I pres...

William A. Alcott was born in Wolcott, Conn., August 6th, 1798. His father, a farmer in the rough mountain town, employed his son, as soon as he was old enough to be useful, in...

A certain young woman who had great general confidence in my skill, after I had stood by her many long hours in one of Nature's sorest trials, was left at length in a fair way t...

Theodore, a laborious young man, came to me one day, saying, "I am afraid I have a cancer on one side of my nose, and I wish you would look at it." Accordingly I made a careful...

Journeymen in medicine, though without the full responsibilities of the profession, have yet their difficulties. I had mine; and I had not only the ordinary complement of ordina...

Wrestling for amusement, in the region where I practised medicine, was a very common occurrence, and certainly had its advantages. But there was one drawback upon its excellence...

A young man, fifteen or sixteen years of age, who was in the habit of suffering from protracted colds, nearly the whole winter, till they seemed to terminate almost in consumpti...

growth, so as to be almost a dwarf, she seemed, at first, to be tolerably healthy. But in the course of a year she suffered from various complaints, to which scrofulous and othe...

My periodical tendency to a species of eruptive disease closely resembling measles, was mentioned in Chapter IV. During the summer of 1823 this affection became unusually severe...

Mr. S., a very aged neighbor of mine, fell into habits of such extreme inactivity of the alimentary canal, that instead of invoking the aid of Cloacina, as Mr. Locke would say,...

A telegraphic communication was made to me one day, nearly as follows: "B. J. W. is very sick, and is not expected to live through the day. Please come on immediately."

Early in my practice as a physician I had a patient, a little girl, who, after having been sick for many weeks with a fever, seemed at length to become stationary. She was not w...

A recent letter from a patient of mine, contains the following statement: "I met, yesterday, with a poor dyspeptic. He said he felt very bad indeed, and that he had been _dietin...

So, when I entered upon the medical profession, which I regarded as next of kin to sacred, I deemed honesty quite a high recommendation; and whatever in the abstract appeared to...

Some of these blessings have been alluded to in Chapter XXXVI. But the subject is one of too much importance to be left in an unfinished state, and I have concluded to make it t...

It is said of Job, and his friends who visited him to condole with him in his sufferings, that they sat down together and said nothing, for seven days and seven nights.

Almost at the next door from me was an opium eater. He, like the female whose case was described in the preceding chapter, was not far from three score and ten, and was of indus...

One morning, about two o'clock, in the depth of winter, I was roused from my slumbers by a stranger's voice, requesting me to get up and go immediately along the sides of the mo...

In Chapter XXIII., I have given a full account of my partial recovery from consumption. I have even spoken of the postponement as if it were complete and final. More than twenty...

There are, of course, many ways of destroying or killing people. To kill, with malice aforethought, though sometimes done, is a much less frequent occurrence than killing in the...

A very large amount of testimony, going to show the inefficiency and inutility of medicine, might be presented; but I have limited myself to a selection of some of the more stri...

I was, at length, twenty-two years of age. I had about fifty dollars in my pocket, besides a few books. But what would this do towards giving me a liberal education? And yet, to...

My own child, a boy nine or ten years of age, and somewhat inclined to croup, was one evening wheezing considerably, and, as his mother thought, was threatened with an immediate...

Mrs. N. was about seventy years of age. In her early years she had possessed a sort of masculine constitution; and though embarrassed by poverty, had reared a large family of ch...

A little child about two years of age, severely afflicted with bowel complaint, came under my care during the first year of my medical practice, and proved the source of much di...

"About three months ago, I took a long journey by stage-coach, which brought on, as I think, an internal inflammation. Since that time I have taken very little medicine. Please...

Medical men well know--should any such condescend to look over this volume--what is meant when I affirm that I was not long in securing to myself a good share of _standing patie...

Some fifty years ago, I saw in a Connecticut paper, a brief notice of the death of an individual in Wellingworth, in that State, from a disease which, as the paper proceeded to...

Not far from this period I was called to visit Mr. O. B., sixty-one years of age, a farmer by occupation. He had been for twenty or thirty years addicted to cider drinking very...

In the early part of the year 1854, measles prevailed considerably, and was rather severe even under the most favorable circumstances. In our cities, such as New York and Boston...

Without examining the term suicide, in regard to its various shades of meaning, I have placed it at the head of this chapter; for I think it properly belongs there. Of this, how...

My first surgical case of any magnitude, was that of a wounded foot. For, though I had been required to bleed patients many times,--and bleeding is properly a surgical operation...

Physicians are sometimes compelled by the force of circumstances, to visit the poor as well as the rich; albeit, they expect, so far as mere pecuniary compensation is concerned,...

I was, early in life, greatly perplexed in mind by the oft-recurring question, why it was that in the hands of common sense men, every known system of medicine--even one which w...

Five or six miles from the place of my nativity a family resided whom I shall call by the name of Port. Among the ancestry of this family, time out of mind, there had been more,...

A large family, not much more careful of their habits or cleanly about their premises than the family alluded to in the foregoing chapter, had sickened one autumn, and one of th...

My thoughts were now directed with considerable earnestness and seriousness, to the study of medicine. It is true that I was already in the twenty-fourth year of my age, and tha...

The oddity of some of my captions may seem to require an apology; but I beg the doubtful reader to suspend any unfavorable decisions, till he has read the chapter which follows....

At the period of my life to which we have at length arrived, I was for four or five months of every year a school teacher. This was, in no trifling degree, an educational proces...

I was called one morning very early, to see a little girl, five or six years of age, who, it was said, was extremely sick, and without immediate aid could not probably long surv...

In consequence either of the disease or its mismanagement, I was left, on recovering from the measles, with a general dropsy. I might also say here, that at the recurrence of th...

Cases of poisoning by lead are occurring in our country almost daily; and it becomes a matter of much importance to know how to treat them. Indeed, there are many who are so sus...

One of them was a swaggering man of wealth, about sixty-three years of age. He had long lived very highly, had eaten a good deal of roast beef, and drunk a good deal of wine, an...

Straws, it is said, show which way the wind blows; and words, and things very small in themselves, sometimes show, much better than "two crowns," or the "stars," what is to be t...

My aged father sickened about this time, and remained in a low condition many months. I was at a distance so great, and in circumstances so peculiar, that I could not see him of...

Pope says of the freethinker, that he may be "all things in an hour." So may some people in their medical creed, at least, practically. They change their opinions with almost ev...

The Massachusetts Medical Society, in the year 1856, were authorized by an unknown individual to offer a premium of one hundred dollars for the best dissertation which should be...

The eyes of my mind having just begun to be opened to the impotence of a mere routine of medication as a _substitute for nature_, rather than _as an aid to her enfeebled efforts...

The individual alluded to in the preceding chapter, once sent for me to come and aid him for a time. He was the proprietor of a somewhat dilapidated water-cure establishment, wh...

My long experience of ill health, and of dosing and drugging, had led me to reflect not a little on the causes of disease, as well as on the nature of medicinal agents; and I ha...

Although I was opposed to the frequent and free use of medicine, I early fell into one habit which was as diametrically opposed to my general theory as could possibly have been....

One of my patients was subject to repeated attacks of rheumatism. He was by no means a man of good and temperate habits, and never had been so. And even his rheumatic attacks, t...

When I was about fourteen years of age, an event occurred which left a stronger impression on my mind than any of the foregoing; and hence in all probability did more to give my...

The father of a large family came to me one day, and, with unwonted politeness, inquired after my health. Of course, I did not at first understand him, but time and patience soo...

The subject of Temperance, in its present associated forms, had, at this time, just began to be agitated. At least, it had just begun to receive attention in the newspapers whic...

An Ohio clergyman, just setting out in his ministerial career, consulted me, one day, about his health and future physical prospects. His nervous system and cerebral centre had...

It was by no means an uncommon thing with me, while studying medicine, to take long walks. One day, in the progress of one of these rambles, I came so near the family mansion of...

When I began the study of medicine, my eyes were so exceedingly weak, and had been for about ten years, or indeed always after the attack of measles, that I was in the habit of...

I have said that my fellow traveller was less cautious than myself, and have intimated much more. He was in some respects cautious, and yet in others absolutely reckless. When h...

While cholera was prevailing in our large towns and cities, and a few cases were occurring and proving fatal in my own neighborhood, a friend of mine, who had till recently been...

At a certain season when scarlet fever was very prevalent among us, a member of my family was attacked with it slightly, and, as it was believed by almost everybody to be contag...

When I was about half-way through my nineteenth year, a desire to see the world became so strong that I made up my mind to a little travelling. Accordingly, having provided myse...

On examination, I found a strong tendency to the head. The eye was heavy, the head hot and painful, and the tongue thickly coated. The digestive system was disordered, and the s...

A particular friend of mine purchased one day, at a stand in the city, two small cakes of maple sugar. It was early in the spring, and very little of the article had as yet been...

and so it proved. All I did for some time, whenever I had been peculiarly exposed and feared I had taken cold, was to go and swallow a small pill--say about a grain--of opium.

I am well acquainted with one man of Yankee origin, who formerly made it a practice to freeze out his colds, as he called it. It is certainly better to prevent them, as I have a...

Not far from the end of July, 1857, I received the following, in a letter through the post office, as usual, and dated at Boston, but signed by a name probably fictitious.

Two years after this, an aged man, a distant relation, came to reside in my father's family for a short time, and brought with him a small electrical machine. He was a person of...

In the autumn of 1856, a fine young man, a clerk in a large mercantile house in Boston, came to me with complaints not unlike those of thousands of his own age and sex, and begg...

A child about a week old, but naturally very sensitive and irritable, became, one night, unusually restless and rather feverish, with derangement of the bowels. The condition of...

It is a notorious fact, that while the number of physicians and the expenditure for drugs and medicines is constantly increasing, in every civilized country where they have been...

Much is said in these days about scrofula, and much indeed should be said about it; for it has become a most frequent, not to say fatal, disease. For, if few die of it, immediat...

A babe, not yet a day old, came under my care for treatment. What the symptoms were, except those of nervous irritation, I have now forgotten; but there was ample evidence of mu...

Some of my friends, fully aware of my strong reliance on the recuperative powers of nature, and of my growing scepticism in regard to medicine, entered into combination and prop...

It is easy in imagination, to be wise, especially at a distance. How many a surgical operation have I performed _on paper_; or still oftener, and with more assurance, in my own...

One of my neighbors had fallen down-stairs, and injured himself internally, in the right side of the chest; and a degree, greater or less, of inflammation had followed. The pain...

A young man, recently married, called on me one day, and requested me to visit his family as soon as I could conveniently, for the purpose of having what he was pleased to call...

The statements of the following chapter will include a confession of one of the principal faults of my life,--a fault, moreover, which, as a physician, I ought to have guarded a...