Athothis : a satire on modern medicine / by Thomas C. Minor.

tude and seclusion for the invalid of which you spoke but a few moments since. Yet, I suppose, this rolling of a patient's couch through long halls, and up and down ele- vators, and the excitement and fear thus engendered in the sick, is part of the treatment. This is your boasted humanity, and recalls a caustic epigram of old; " I 'm ill, I send for Symmachus: he's here, A hundred students following in the rear. All feel my pulse, with hands as cold as snow; I had no fever then, / have it now." " This is a base slander ! " cried Paulus Androcydes, angrily. " Has not the father of our art, Hippocrates, whom you profess to admire, claimed that clinical obser- vation was the corner-stone in the Temple of Medical Wisdom ? How can one acquire an understanding of disease without using his senses—the eye, the ear, the touch, the taste?" " True ! " retorted Athothis. " But men must learn to reason before they can observe correctly, and, as Hip- pocrates says,' Even experience is deceptive and judg- ment difficult!' And permit me to remark that the poor woman just before the class has neither heart disease nor caseous pneumonia, but a malady peculiar to her sex, which is perfectly amenable to treatment if the wise Pro- fessor Borborygmus did but understand his trade. Yet, like most of your modern experts, this clinician has ar- rived at his opinion by what he considers intuition. He made no thorough examination, and, although using his sense of hearing, was unable to reason between cause and effect, and so fell into error. Of what use are these lec- tures, that only serve to mislead and perpetuate ignorance ? What benefits do students derive when the learned pro-