TRUTH, PATHOLOGY, AND PUBLIC. 151 



were so instructive in hospital no longer form the 

 staple of his experience, and the chronic cases no 

 more like meteors disappear from view. He has 

 these disadvantages to cope with namely, that in 

 his successful cases, as will always happen, he is in 

 a certain number of instances deceived by the cir- 

 cumstance that the fortunate issue has not in reality 

 been aided by his treatment, or that the treatment 

 has accidentally suited a condition other than the 

 presumed lesion against which it was directed ; in 

 fatal cases he seldom has the opportunity afforded 

 him of proving the opinions on which he has acted, 

 and when the opportunity occurs he learns to con- 

 sider it a trouble to utilize it ; while, as for the vast 

 number of cases that seem to get neither greatly 

 better nor worse, they become inevitably, as time 

 goes on, a lighter burden on his conscience, are set 

 down as among the things that " no fellow can find 

 out," and kept as quiet as may be with a variety of 

 palliatives. What wonder that such a man falls 

 into a humdrum routine ! 



Suppose, in obscure cases, you exercise your 

 reasoning powers to the best of your ability ; you 

 form the theory which seems most probable ; but 

 you have no means of testing it ; other cases occur 

 similar in much to those which have been already 

 seen, and you apply the unproven theory with all 



