FALLACIES OF OBSERVATION. 349 



interference of art. The result, beyond all doubt, furnished 

 the first hint which led surgeons to the improved practice of 

 healing wounds by what is technically called the first inten- 

 tion."* " In all records," adds Dr. Paris, " of extraordinary 

 cures performed by mysterious agents, there is a great desire 

 to conceal the remedies and other curative means which were 

 simultaneously administered with them ; thus Oribasius com- 

 mends in high terms a necklace of Pseony root for the cure of 

 epilepsy ; but we learn that he always took care to accompany 

 its use with copious evacuations, although he assigns to them 

 no share of credit in the cure. In later times we have a good 

 specimen of this species of deception, presented to us in a 

 work on Scrofula by Mr. Morley, written, as we are informed, 

 for the sole purpose of restoring the much injured character 

 and use of the Vervain ; in which the author directs the root 

 of this plant to be tied with a yard of white satin riband 

 around the neck, where it is to remain until the patient is 

 cured ; but mark during this interval he calls to his aid the 

 most active medicines in the materia medica."f 



In other cases the cures really produced by rest, regimen, 

 and amusement, have been ascribed to the medicinal, or occa- 

 sionally to the supernatural, means which were put in requisi- 

 tion. " The celebrated John Wesley, while he commemorates 

 the triumph of sulphur and supplication over his bodily 

 infirmity, forgets to appreciate the resuscitating influence of 

 four months' repose from his apostolic labours ; and such is 

 the disposition of the human mind to place confidence in the 

 operation of mysterious agents, that we find him more disposed 

 to attribute his cure to a brown paper plaister of egg and 

 brimstone, than to Dr. Fothergill's salutary prescription of 

 country air, rest, asses' milk, and horse exercise."J 



In the following example, the circumstance overlooked 

 was of a somewhat different character. " When the yellow 

 fever raged in America, the practitioners trusted exclusively 

 to the copious use of mercury ; at first this plan was deemed 

 so universally efficacious, that, in the enthusiasm of the 



* Pharmacologia, pp. 23-4. t Ibid. p. 28. $ Ibid. p. 62. 



