Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 39.djvu/177

Rh with seeking the aid of Agnes Sampson for the relief of pain at the time of the birth of her two sons, was burned alive on the Castle Hill of Edinburgh; and this old theological view persisted even to the middle of the nineteenth century. From pulpit after pulpit Simpson's use of chloroform was denounced as impious and contrary to Holy Writ; texts were cited abundantly, the ordinary declaration being that to use chloroform was "to avoid one part of the primeval curse on woman." Simpson wrote pamphlet after pamphlet to defend the blessing which he brought into use; but the cause seemed about to be lost, when he seized a new weapon, probably the most absurd by which a great cause was ever won: "My opponents forget," he said, "the twenty-first verse of the second chapter of Genesis; it is the record of the first surgical operation ever performed, and that text proves that the Maker of the universe, before he took the rib from Adam's side for the creation of Eve, caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam." This was a stunning blow, but it did not entirely kill the opposition; they had strength left to maintain that the "deep sleep of Adam took place before the introduction of pain into the world—in a state of innocence." But now a new champion intervened—Thomas Chalmers; with a few pungent arguments from his pulpit he scattered the enemy forever, and the greatest battle of science against suffering was won. But this victory was won not less for religion: wisely did those who raised the monument at Boston to one of the discoverers of anæsthetics inscribe upon its pedestal the words from our sacred text, "This also cometh from the Lord of hosts, which is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working."

Progress in medical science within the past quarter of a century has been vast indeed; the theological view of disease has greatly faded, and the theological hold upon medical education has been almost entirely relaxed. In three great fields especially, discoveries have been made which have done much to disperse the atmosphere of miracle. First, there has come in more knowledge regarding the relation between imagination and medicine, and, though still defective, it is of great importance. This relation has been noted during the whole history of the science. When the soldiers of the Prince of Orange, at the siege of Breda in 1625, were dying of scurvy by scores, he sent to the physicians "two or three small vials filled with a decoction of camomile, wormwood, and camphor, gave out that it was a very rare and precious medicine—a medicine of such virtue that two or three drops sufficed to impregnate a gallon of water, and that it had been obtained from the East with great difficulty and danger";