V 
The medical profession may be said to be made up of the exclu¬ 
sive scientist, who studies the diseases, as the chemist the elements, by 
analysis and synthesis, and prepares the way for the true executor- 
artist, the scientific practitioner. Here the classification should end. 
Unfortunately, we must continue and sub-classify. We find the em¬ 
piric from the schools, and the empiric educated by long continued 
practicing and, in individual cases, study and observation. This latter 
individual takes, in my mind, a place superior to the empiric from the 
schools. Here, at all costs, the classification should end. But we must 
go further. These two latter classes again subdivide, and we have 
school empirics, a part of whom are veritable quacks ; and self-edu¬ 
cated empirics, a greater part of whom are veritable quacks. 
Quacks are not alone of abiogenic origin. They do not all spring 
up fungus like. We too frequently develop and nourish them. Not 
every man who is entitled, from having scraped through a medical 
school, to write M. D., V. S., M. R. C. V. S. to his name, is a veritable 
educated and competent practitioner. Such examinations are neces¬ 
sary. They do not always, as they should, guarantee competency. 
They can .never guarantee character. The M. D. who advertises himself 
as capable of curing a cancer , not only uses the method of veritable quackery , 
but is out and out a quack. Who will remove a cancer from the 
stomach ? A quack is a person in any profession, or out of it, who re¬ 
presents himself as capable of doing things he is incapable of doing. 
Removal is one thing, to cure is another. To cure means it shall not 
again return. A superficially situated cancer may in its early stages be 
removed, and not return either in its original or other locality. But 
who will dare to guarantee to me that metastasis has not already taken 
place, and the foul destroyer not again at work in another place ? The 
dentist may guarantee to cure a toothache, because he can remove the 
cause. Dare the dental surgeon guarantee to cure other pain depend¬ 
ent on carious or osteomalacic processes in the jawbones ? Can he 
tell me all that is going on within ? The surgeon may guarantee (in 
most cases: to cure a superficially seated lipoma, for he can remove it, 
and with it the 'irritant which caused it. Who will guarantee to cure 
me of consumption, diabetes, or many another fell disease ? The vital 
or physiological processes may, with proper and scientifically applied 
support, be able to overcome the disturbances within me ; but the dia¬ 
thesis remains, and the original processes may break forth again on 
very insignificant causes. Am I cured ? No ! but temporarily, in for- 
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