Observations on the Causes, Symptoms, and Nature of Scrofula or King's Evil, Scurvy, and Cancer With Cases Illustrative of a Peculiar Mode of Treatment

Excerpt

In consequence of the extreme prevalence of Scrofulous, Scorbutic, and Cancerous Diseases, and the ignorance which exists on the part of the public, as to their causes, symptoms, and nature, I have been induced to reprint my observations on those subjects, and to send forth an Eighth Edition for the information of the afflicted.

To these remarks, I have appended a relation of several cases, which have been cured by a peculiar mode of treatment which I have been in the habit of employing for twenty-six years; during which long period I have seen and treated an immense number of cases of the above description.

These cases I have rendered very concise, preferring the main points in each to a verbose and tiresome description of the minutiæ; and although the number might have been extended to many hundreds, I trust a sufficiency have been detailed to establish the success of my practice, and to show the afflicted the nature and modes of attack of the diseases above mentioned.

I have confined myself to a simple relation of the facts of each case, and on those facts such case must stand or fall. I have not resorted to those artificial props which some men are in the habit of employing because the cases themselves are too lame to stand alone; I allude to the practice of soliciting the attestations of the patients, and decoying the simple, the ignorant, well-intentioned, but deceived neighbours, to add their signatures to cases of which they know nothing, and of which the details are a series of bombast, falsehood, ignorance, and humbug. There are many of the cases which I have related to which I could have obtained the signatures of clergymen, Members of Parliament, magistrates, and other persons high in rank and station in life, without saying a word about overseers, churchwardens, and parishioners, the signatures of whom might be obtained at all times; but, established as my practice is, I would scorn to importune those gentlemen, and impertinently to place their names before the public in a position which every sensible man must declare to be that of extreme negligence, ignorance, or unbecoming officiousness.

It may be readily supposed, that from the long career of success which I have had in the treatment of scrofulous diseases, some impudent individuals should have attempted to imitate my mode of proceeding, and to foist themselves and their spurious remedies upon the public; of this I should have cared nothing had they not done it at my expense; because these inventions will find their proper level in the estimation of the public, notwithstanding their props and delusions. But these men are absolutely so ignorant, that they are compelled to copy my cases and observations verbatim; and I have little doubt that this edition will have issued from the press but a very few months, before one or other of them will be purloining such parts of it as their hired scribes may consider to answer their purpose. Not that these imposters understand the observations which I have made on scrofula or cancer, their heads are too empty—their ignorance too profound—and their pretensions consequently too barefaced. Relying upon the credulity of the public, they make no scruple in being guilty of glaring plagiarism; they thus strut about in borrowed plumes, and their presumption keeps pace with their want of information....