SCIENCE 



NEW YORK, JANUARY 22, 1893. 



"DIVINE HEALING."^ 



About twenty years ago a half-educated trifler from Ger- 

 many, babbling-, as they all do now, a travesty of undigested 

 "metaphysical philosophy" displayed in a nimbus of re- 

 ligious cant, concerning whom the most injurious reports 

 were circulated and have never been contradicted — this 

 man became the apostle of a large followiog, and the worthy 

 founder of the most notorious of the "schools" spawning 

 ever since in the shallow waters of " Christian science," and 

 there is of late a pitiful increase of faith, particularly on the 

 part of religious people, in the prayers, promises and neglect 

 of these healers, until cancer, diphtheria, and typhoid are 

 left without challenge or remorse in the control of " Divine 

 Healers," "Christian Scientists," "Faith" and "Mind 

 Curers," and " inspired" persons in all garbs, who advertise 

 variously, while each calls all others "quack." 



Here is a "philosophy" which literally insists that there 

 is neither pain nor disease; ^ cancer is an imagination. How 

 patient, after all, are our legislators ! 



Serious argument against the hypocritical nonsense of 

 these parasites in the medical profession would hardly have 

 seemed called for, — so silly is the silliness, so crazy the 

 craze, — were it not true that their influence is widely and 

 perniciously felt. As keen an observer as Mr. Edward Eggle- 

 ston has thought the status of "Christian Science" so seri- 

 ous an evil that his last work, " The Faith Doctor," is a strong 

 indictment of its murderous counsels. 



Popularity is easily gained, for the dead tell no tales. 

 Christian Science murmurs its experimental prayer over the 

 sick as material, while its triumphal march gathers a noisy 

 ovation from the imaginative, the neurotic, the convalescing, 

 and from certain surgical cases, stiff-jointed, rheumatic, or 

 weak, and simply needing reassurance to take up beds and 

 walk. From New England to the extreme West, towns and 

 communities swarm with the new "practitioners." "The 

 number of these regularly graduated cannot be accurately 

 estimated, but they are numbered by the thousand. Within 

 the limits of one school there are about thirty organized 

 churches, and also one hundred and twenty societies which 

 maintain regular services." ^ 



Numerous periodicals make their appeal in such priestly 

 vestments as have never been assumed by Ayer's Almanac 

 or the most plausible of the Guides to Health. Twenty- 

 three institutes, scientific and metaphysical, are advertised 

 in one periodical.^ 



Here whoever listens becomes a titled practitioner (C.S.) 

 and is "inspired," however brief the course of instruction. 

 "There are about fifty dispensaries and reading-rooms, and 



' A portion of tills paper was published In Boston Transcript, Dec. SI, 1891, 

 In reply to a communication, Boston Transcript, Nov. 7, favoring Divine Heal- 

 ing as " the more excellent way."' 



2 " Science and Health," pp. 183, 190, 231, etc. " You say a boll Is Inflamed 

 and painful, but that Is Impossible " (331). " Inflammation, tubercles, hemor- 

 rhage and decomposition are but thoughts, beliefs " (188). 



3 American Spectator, Dec, 1891. 



* Christian Science Journal, Jan., 189i 



a rapidly increasing literature for Christian Science; one of 

 the other schools. Mind Cure, has also a large number of 

 organizations similar in character." ° 



Reputable physicians occasionally yield to the importuni- 

 ties of patients, or the specious argument from the assumed 

 standpoint of religion, and endorse the practice of Faith 

 Cure, wholly or in part. Given an inch, an ell is taken, 

 and the fanatical statement has already been made that there 

 exists no opposition to Divine Healing on the part of medi- 

 cal men." 



Yet every veracious medical article and authentic report 

 written during the past decade to show the service of air, 

 diet, exercise, baths, or medication, is the enlightened protes 

 of science, i.e., of confirmed and verified experience, in op- 

 position to sensational, hysterical, superstitious pseudo-sci- 

 ence. 



Concession on the part of any physician to the childish 

 credulity of a bygone age is simply high treason to his noble 

 profession. A medical man who is still conducting cases of 

 successful treatment should reflect upon his ingratitude to 

 Alma Mater, and upon the comment which must greet a step 

 which seems to stultify his own professional life and give 

 support to a dangerous class in the community. His col- 

 leagues will, inevitably, question his sincerity and ask for a 

 logical defense. 



Religious observances have their time and place, but the 

 Almighty evidently always employs means; the preachers are 

 accepted agents in matters spiritual, perhaps the doctors are 

 the convenient instruments to cure disease. 



A disorder so serious, visible, established, and contagious 

 as diphtheria, is not to be left to faith and prayer alone. 

 The writer has never seen a cure wrought by such agency; 

 but he has met with several instances where, in this disease, 

 faith without works has brought adout a most disastrous re- 

 sult. Prayer accompanying unskilled attendance in child- 

 bed has proved to be infanticide. 



The fact remains (statistics arestubborn) that " The Prayer 

 Test " submitted some years ago was unsuccessful in applica- 

 tion, both here and in England, and it is not now referred 

 to by those who so conSdently offered it. 



Consumption is unwisely chosen as a chief example of the 

 hopelessly incurable, therefore to be abandoned to prayer.' 

 Dr. CuUis has here failed to help;" the bacteria still defy 

 his methods. But medical science accomplishes very much 

 in this disease, more and more from year to year. Even the 

 removal of patients to antiseptic air and a warmer climate 

 completely cures in many instances. Dr. Burnett recently re- 

 ported fifty cases of advanced consumption of the lungs cured 

 in England in spite of the climate, and medical authorities 

 are nearly unanimous in promising aid at early stages of 

 phthisis. Why should we, so equipped with books, profes- 

 sional training, experience, and a sense of responsibility 

 toward our fellows, abandon the care of consumption to the 

 pseudo-scientists? 



' Am. Spectator, Dec, 1891. 



« Journal of the Evangelical Alliance, Nov. 14, 1891. 



' Boston Transcript, Nov. 7; Chr. Science Journal, Jan., 1892; Science and 

 Health, p. 188. 



8 In the Consumptives' Home, a large faith Institute, located in Boston. 



