448 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



thus : " John Bull, for all his boasted common sense and hatred of 

 humbug, is still more quack-ridden than any member of the human 

 family except his cute Cousin Jonathan/' And as for ' cute Cousin 

 Jonathan's' America — Champe S. Andrews, counsel exclusively re- 

 tained by the Medical Society of the County of New York to expose 

 medical frauds, is authority for the estimate that in New York City 

 alone there are, against six thousand regular practitioners, twenty 

 thousand quacks. In view, therefore, of its ancient origin, persistence 

 and recent spread, it is not enough to account for quackery on the 

 basis of the Irishman's observation that ' there were always fools in 

 this world; in fact, there must have been some lying around, waiting 

 for the world to begin.' . . . Rather is quackery a well-defined phe- 

 nomenon, grounded on effective causes. Why it should exist at all, 

 how the worst empiric enjoys custom, often from the cultured, and 

 what measures may be aimed against this social evil are questions 

 which invite examination. 



At the very bottom lies the insufficiency of orthodox medicine. Not 

 even the long strides of the last century have brought it to the full 

 rank of an exact science. The doctor must stand by, and, only half 

 intelligently, assist vis mediatrix naturce; until quite recently at least, 

 he could in no wise control her, like the chemist and the engineer. 

 Rather has he been somewhat in the position of the philosopher, who 

 must work, more or less, in the mist, and between uncertain boundaries. 

 That explains not only the early rites of the medicine-man, but the 

 whole belief in proffered panaceas. The alchemist sought the one 

 agent which should turn all the baser metals into gold ; the philosopher 

 still seeks the one truth which shall uncover heaven's mysteries. Is 

 it not equally natural that men should lend a credulous ear to every 

 announcer of the much-sought cure-all ? 



Then, to this prospect of a universal medicine we must add the 

 call of the new — always so strong in unsettled provinces. I mean, 

 that something in a wide-awake community or a growing sphere of 

 knowledge which sees salvation in the novel. We recognize this tend- 

 ency in the fad-worship of Indian occultists, in the rapid succession 

 of new systems of philosophy, in the passing dominance of scientific 

 theories and in the brief vogue of methods in therapeutics. Out of 

 this same phenomenon grows the ready acceptance of Quack A's ' Abso- 

 lutely New Method of Treatment. No Drugs. No Knife ' or Empiric 

 B's ' Radical Invention. All Diseases banished without Fail.' 



Remember, moreover, the omnipresence of disease, its agonies and 

 the common dread of it. With this monster the doctor is asked to 

 triumphantly close, whereas he can only pelt it at a distance. When 

 the suit is lost, it is usually the law, not the lawyer, on which the vials 

 of bitterness are poured; how seldom comes a fatal sickness for whose 



