stituted. The analogical evidence of all the physical sciences and the direct evidence of pathology and chemistry at once disproved the principle of this dogma by the same kind of testimony which showed that water would not run up hill, nor moisture arrest the processes of decay. Thus its principle of operation was early defeated, while its practical application was defeated at a later day by showing that Psora could only be cured by destroying the insect that was the sole cause of it. All the natural laws are known to govern matter by counteraction and opposition, and not by similarity of action; yet here is a dogma which has withstood all this, without destroying the order of nature, and which, according to the "Post," is increasing in power and influence for good to mankind, and, therefore, deserving of professional recognition because it has public recognition. That is, anything that receives a small share of public and newspaper recognition and endorsement should be accepted and acknowledged as being possibly useful to the public, no matter how absurd the doctrines may be shown to be when tried by all the natural laws governing matter, as well as by accurate observation and practical experience.

The third proposition of Hahnemann is, in effect, that the potency of medicines for the cure of disease is increased by dilution-that quantities infinitesimally small have correspondingly greater power than larger doses. In regard to this smallness of dose, it is probably Jahr, in his hand-book of homeopathy, who says that one drop of any elementary medicine, well mixed with the waters of Lake Maggiore, would not approach the dilution of the higher potencies, and this is strictly true, for it has been mathematically proved that one grain of any medicine carried to the thirtieth potency of homœopathic dilution, and made up into doses, would require a vessel of the size of the solar system to hold them.

But the mathematicians were the first to show the fallacy of this dogma by proving that a part cannot be greater in power than the whole. Then the physicists showed that, while light and heat and all other potencies were rapidly diminished by dilution, it was impossible that this asserted exception could be true in any sense. But all such arguments were met by that tremendous weapon of the ignorant and the fanatical, namely, individual experience, which must be the ultimate truth. The volumes of "provings " published from time to time, with detailed accounts of the symptoms produced. by these infinitesimal doses upon individuals, were held to set at naught all knowledge not only of disease and its management by

rational medicine, but all knowledge of the physical laws of the universe, and so the dogma continued to gain ground not only with the ignorant, but also with many educated people, who proved not less credulous, nor able to avail themselves of education. But byand-by came the spectroscope, and its revelations are no less fatal to this proposition than was the discovery of the itch insect to the first proposition, for it has shown conclusively that all matter is very universally disseminated in infinitesimal quantities. This means that all living beings are taking homoeopathic doses of immense power of everything, every moment of their lives without the symptoms detailed in the volumes of provings. No attempt has ever been made by any homeopathic writer to meet the spectroscope on this impregnable ground, and probably no attempt ever will be made, and yet the dogma stands as an integral part of homœopathy. It is true that many who call themselves. homœopathists have rejected both the first and the third of these propositions, and adhere only to the second, but such are not true homœopathists, and are unworthy of the name, though the adherence to one of three irrational dogmas, which constituted a so-called system, after it has been disproved with the others, does not give them any better claim to recognition on the part of any rational system of medicine.

If an honest believer in only the second proposition of homœopathy uses opium to relieve pain, or chloral to procure sleep, or quinia to arrest fever, and all in large effective doses, he must do so upon a line of reasoning with himself that is not homœopathic but is the reverse of it. If he does not so use them and many other similar agents, he must deliberately deny to his patients the advantages which a medical profession has to offer to suffering humanity; and then, whether he does or does not so use them, his name as a homœopathist becomes a mere trade-mark and advertisement by which he makes a living through some unknown means,-occult and secret because not in accordance with natural laws nor explainable through their operation.

It will, therefore, be seen that homeopathy as a system of medicine has, at this time, no more standing as a rational or successful system of procedure than has clairvoyance, eclecticism, hydropathy, and all that genus. Legal recognition gives none of them a rational standing, because in conferring it the legislators do not enter into the question of their soundness nor of their rationality, but only upon the question of their popularity, or the proportion of the lay

public which supports them, or demands them. If this popularity be, as it is, the basis of legal recognition, then all the trade-mark patent medicines which are advertised into popularity and flood the country are better entitled to legal recognition, because they are more popular, for, whilst there are perhaps not more than 25,000 men and women who practice medicine on all the exclusive and irrational dogmas together, and whilst their patients are confined, perhaps, to 4,000,000 or 5,000,000 of the population of the country, quack medicines in one form or other are said to reach the sick or ailing portion of over 30,000,000 of the population.

This enormous proportion of the population seem to choose their physicians very much as they choose their quack nostrums, namely, upon that most dangerous form of ignorance, a self-assumed knowledge of themselves and their disorders; and this liberty of choice can be in no way abridged so long as it is supported by the newspapers in such articles as that above quoted from the "Post," instead of being corrected. The masses of the population read little else than the newspapers and the one thing upon which all newspapers are in accord is in the publication of the advertisements of quack nostrums and of editorial articles, whose tone, temper and teachings are fairly represented in the above-quoted article which, though not so intended, really supports this freedom of choice from the pernicious nostrums of its own columns, and which makes this country, through pure mercantile enterprise for getting money without earning it, the most medicine ridden, or rather nostrum ridden country on the face of the earth.

While such failure to recognize any fundamental principles in the art of rational medicine, and of teaching the public so, must needs be accorded to the newspapers, because it cannot be prevented, such teaching need not be accepted by the profession of rational medicine when the newspapers attempt to reason it into heterogeneous consultations on the doctrine of there being no fundamental principle of action anywhere, or at least no more in one sect than in another, when such sects are in direct opposition.

It would appear by the following extract from the "Proceedings of Congress" on the 14th of July, that the newspaper discussion of the new code of ethics is already producing its legitimate effects. upon the politicians.

In the Senate:

Mr. Cameron (Rep., Pa.) introduced a joint resolution making it

a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of $500 and dismissal from office, for any officer of the United States Government, civil, military, or naval, to make any discrimination in favor of or against any school of medical practice, or its legal diplomas, or its duly graduated members, in the examination and appointment of candidates for medical service in any department of the Government. Referred.

This extension of the idea of civil and religious liberty to the poor and down-trodden irregulars of all "schools" is certainly going farther than the framers of the new code intended; but it is really only what might have been expected as an outcome of their liberality and tolerance of error, for if there be no principle at stake but only mere intolerance of school, then there should be no discrimination permitted. Free trade and unrestricted liberty means just that, whether it be in matter of life and death, in morals or in trade. Mr. Cameron might with equal wisdom and justice to the true interests involved have abolished the Medical Departments of the Army and Navy and substituted for them five patent medicines whose joint advertisements should cover all the possible diseases, because this is really the most popular "school" of all. Suppose

Mr. Cameron's resolution sends on board a national vessel a medical man of the "school" of homœopathy for example, to practice his "school" among officers trained at Annapolis in accordance with established physical laws. They would not want to trust their lives to the practice of an irrational" school." Then what becomes of their civil liberties? They must simply submit and be doctored by joint resolution of Congress, or leave the government service to such as are not troubled by any principles, and who might in common with a considerable portion of the unthinking community prefer to be doctored by that "school" whose medicines were pleasantest to the taste or most easily taken. But in the Army and Navy unless there be an assortment of "schools " supplied to each camp or ship some people will run the risk of not having their choice of "schools," and of not being able to turn from one school to another. That "school" which owes so much of its popularity and success to the very superficial and irrational claim that it gives no nauseous medicines, might not satisfy soldiers and sailors as well as it does some of the more imaginative people in civil life, and then the soldiers and sailors would be down-trodden and abridged of their liberties.

In the Senate of the United States there can certainly be no danger that Mr. Cameron's chaotic resolution will ever be seriously considered, but that it was offered at all shows that even in some high places there is nothing like principle or law recognized as underlying or supporting the medical profession which should keep it from affiliation and admixture with mercantile empiricism.

ASSAYS OF CINCHONA.

Since the process at page 76 was published, it has been found that some of the quantities and many of the details were adjusted to barks which were rather exceptionally soft and spongy, and therefore easy to exhaust, and the very next bark tried after the process was published happened to be hard and compact, and therefore so difficult to exhaust as to require somewhat more menstruum and longer digestions. It is therefore thought better to publish a corrected process, with the improvements which have been suggested by a few months' further experience with a greater variety of barks. In these assays it must never be forgotten that the point of greatest importance as well as of greatest difficulty is the complete exhaustion of the bark, and knowing when the exhaustion is complete. Next, it must be always borne in mind that different samples of bark differ very much indeed in structure and therefore, in accessibility to the exhausting menstruum. Some are soft and spongy and easily exhausted with a small quantity of liquid in a short time. Others, which do not sensibly differ in appearance of either the bark or its powder, are hard and compact, requiring more liquid and longer digestions. Hence, while the process given at page 76 is very nicely applicable to some barks, and is entirely sufficient for those upon which its details were adjusted, it does not do equally well for other barks, but may be so modified as to apply equally well to all. This great difference in the facility with which different cinchona barks are exhausted has been too much overlooked, and it may be the principal cause of the disagreement between Drs. Biel and De Vrij, who, working by the same process, find a different length of time necessary for the digestion,-the former advising a digestion of four hours, while the latter finds one hour sufficient.