The Views of a Physician

Archibald McLellan

The following excerpts from an article which recently appeared in The Independent, were not written by an opponent of materia medica, but by a distinguished member of the medical profession, A. E. Wright, M.D., of whom The Independent says,—

"Dr. Wright is one of the highest recognized medical authorities in England. He is the Pathologist and Bacteriologist of St. Mary's Hospital, London, and was lately Professor of Pathology in the Army Medical School at Netley, and was a member of the India Plague Commission."

The article is a plea for more extensive medical research, and it contains a frank admission that physicians "are not, in fact, making any effort worthy of the name to solve the problems of disease." Dr. Wright says,—

"One only of the problems that confronted man at the outset of his race still stands and confronts us practically unabated—the problem of disease. Over the processes of disease we have as yet achieved almost no directive control.

"Of all the evils which befall man in his civilized state, the evil of disease is thus incomparably the greatest. It ought, accordingly, to loom largest in his mind. In comparison with the chance of winning directive control over this evil, every other thing ought to be counted as loss. The cutting off of a day from the Atlantic passage, the supersession of submarine cables by wireless telegraphy, the acceleration of trains and motor-cars, and objects of this order of importance occupy the attention of man. All these ought to be to civilized man, in comparison with any advance in the exploration of disease, as the small dust of the balances—as altogether vanity.

"If the belief is nurtured that the medical art of to-day can effectually intervene in the course of disease, this ought to be dismissed as illusion. ... It may be affirmed with confidence of the medical art, as at present practised, that it can do practically nothing to avert death from a virulent bacterial invasion or to bring about a cure. The thoughtful and conscientious physician has absolutely no illusions on this subject. Confronted with an acute bacterial invasion, he does not conceal from himself, or from others, that he is quite in the dark and that he cannot foresee or determine the issue of the conflict which is in progress in the organism.

"That scientific knowledge which alone can avail in the conflict with disease is—practically all of it—still to seek."

The Chicago Tribune, commenting upon this article, says, "Dr. Wright's view may be somewhat pessimistic. Few physicians will admit that medical science has made or is making as little progress as he asserts. But, on the other hand, every physician knows that for the most part what he says is strictly true. Disease constantly rages over the earth, spreading suffering, death, and desolation in much the same manner that it did in the time of Hippocrates."

In the face of such testimony as that of Dr. Wright and other eminent men who have expressed similar views regarding the inadequacy of medical practice, it seems almost incredible that our legislatures can seriously consider the enactment of laws intended to compel all sick people to employ physicians or suffer without help of any kind, and this is especially so in view of the fact that through the beneficent ministrations of Christian Science thousands of persons have been healed after their physicians had given them up to die. It is recorded of Jesus that he "went about all Galilee, ... healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people," and the results which have been obtained through Christian Science are proof that his method is still effective.

Pertinent to this discussion is the following editorial item from the Nashua (N. H.) Telegraph:

"It is evident that medical science has not reached high water-mark when the hospitals of London openly admit there were over two thousand cases of mistaken diagnosis during the past year."

Archibald McLellan.

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Editorial

Peace and Progress

September 9, 1905

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