Electro-physiology and electro-therapeutics : showing the best methods for the medical uses of electricity / By Alfred C. Garratt.
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point in all medical science, important yet delicate, elaborate and yet intricate as it is, Electricity comes to our aid and elicits, — has elicited, certain uniform phenomena, — already a " law and testimony," so far as ascertained, that can be derived from no other source. Significant facts like these do certainly de- mand of medical men a careful attention. Because we do not know more, or all, is certainly no good reason why we should not avail ourselves of what is already positively discovered. Much in this department of medical research will yet, ay, will soon, be accomplished ; and brilliant will be the achieve- ments. The very abridged manner and immethodical style of the few works that have appeared in this country, or even in the English language, on the medical em- ployment of Electricity, have never yet enabled the medical profession generally, particularly that of this country, to seize upon these telling facts understand- ing^, so as to bring them to bear upon clinical practice. On the other hand, the more complete treatises on physics enter too much into detail on Electricity, in its own wide realm, as a force of nature, or as a physical force, or in specu- lations upon these, for persons who do not desire to make this their particular object of labor and pursuit. A systematic work on the medical and surgical uses of Electricity, containing clear and practical directions as to where, token, and " how" to employ Elec- tricity as a remedy, (embracing at the same time the condensed scope of those natural, accidental, as well as artificial electric influences that affect life and health,) has long been greatly needed; and of late urgently requested of the author, by many distinguished members of the most venerable medical associa- tion in America, to fill, in some degree, this deficiency in our medical literature. True, we have had published in this country some small, yet valued treatises on this subject—one by Dr. Golding Bird; another by Dr. W. F. Channing. But these pioneer works were rather " evidence and argument," to exhibit and convince of what has, might, and would be accomplished by the medical uses of Electricity, rather than giving any philosophic and rational expose' of the methods of doing it. Therefore what has been done by the agency of Elec- tricity, in the way of remarkable cures, empirically or otherwise, if the modus operandi is not also clearly given, is purposely excluded from this work. The author has aimed to confine himself to gleaning from the highest practical au- thorities, and the comparing of these with his own clinical experiences, then classifying and arranging the subject matter, so as to present the whole range of electro-therapeutics on a more systematic and scientific basis. Perhaps it is scarcely necessary to add here, (except to forestall unnecessary and detracting criticism,) that the author has unavoidably employed the ideas often, as also the language, of others.' In a work like this, based as it is in natural science, with a limited special literature, every one must know is but the embodying of the best of all high authority, while but a portion of the whole is truly original. Our freshest knowledge has its origin in the teachings and well-known writings of the world's best philosophers ; which, after being