登陆注册
15444900000044

第44章 II(28)

Coincidences, meaning nothing, though a man have a monopoly of the disease for weeks or months; or cause and effect, the cause being in some way connected with the person; this is the question. If I am wrong, let me be put down by such a rebuke as no rash declaimer has received since there has been a public opinion in the medical profession of America; if I am right, let doctrines which lead to professional homicide be no longer taught from the chairs of those two great Institutions. Indifference will not do here; our Journalists and Committees have no right to take up their pages with minute anatomy and tediously detailed cases, while it is a question whether or not the "blackdeath" of child-bed is to be scattered broadcast by the agency of the mother's friend and adviser. Let the men who mould opinions look to it; if there is any voluntary blindness, any interested oversight, any culpable negligence, even, in such a matter, and the facts shall reach the public ear; the pestilence-carrier of the lying-in chamber must look to God for pardon, for man will never forgive him.

THE CONTAGIOUSNESS OF PUERPERAL FEVER.

In collecting, enforcing, and adding to the evidence accumulated upon this most serious subject, I would not be understood to imply that there exists a doubt in the mind of any well-informed member of the medical profession as to the fact that puerperal fever is sometimes communicated from one person to another, both directly and indirectly. In the present state of our knowledge upon this point I should consider such doubts merely as a proof that the sceptic had either not examined the evidence, or, having examined it, refused to accept its plain and unavoidable consequences. I should be sorry to think, with Dr. Rigby, that it was a case of "oblique vision;" I should be unwilling to force home the argumentum ad hominem of Dr.

Blundell, but I would not consent to make a question of a momentous fact which is no longer to be considered as a subject for trivial discussions, but to be acted upon with silent promptitude. It signifies nothing that wise and experienced practitioners have sometimes doubted the reality of the danger in question; no man has the right to doubt it any longer. No negative facts, no opposing opinions, be they what they may, or whose they may, can form any answer to the series of cases now within the reach of all who choose to explore the records of medical science.

If there are some who conceive that any important end would be answered by recording such opinions, or by collecting the history of all the cases they could find in which no evidence of the influence of contagion existed, I believe they are in error. Suppose a few writers of authority can be found to profess a disbelief in contagion,--and they are very few compared with those who think differently,--is it quite clear that they formed their opinions on a view of all the facts, or is it not apparent that they relied mostly on their own solitary experience? Still further, of those whose names are quoted, is it not true that scarcely a single one could by any possibility have known the half or the tenth of the facts bearing on the subject which have reached such a frightful amount within the last few years? Again, as to the utility of negative facts, as we may briefly call them,--instances, namely, in which exposure has not been followed by disease,--although, like other truths, they may be worth knowing, I do not see that they are like to shed any important light upon the subject before us. Every such instance requires a good deal of circumstantial explanation before it can be accepted.

It is not enough that a practitioner should have had a single case of puerperal fever not followed by others. It must be known whether he attended others while this case was in progress, whether he went directly from one chamber to others, whether he took any, and what precautions. It is important to know that several women were exposed to infection derived from the patient, so that allowance may be made for want of predisposition. Now if of negative facts so sifted there could be accumulated a hundred for every one plain instance of communication here recorded, I trust it need not be said that we are bound to guard and watch over the hundredth tenant of our fold, though the ninety and nine may be sure of escaping the wolf at its entrance. If any one is disposed, then, to take a hundred instances of lives endangered or sacrificed out of those I have mentioned, and make it reasonably clear that within a similar time and compass ten thousand escaped the same exposure, I shall thank him for his industry, but I must be permitted to hold to my own practical conclusions, and beg him to adopt or at least to examine them also.

Children that walk in calico before open fires are not always burned to death; the instances to the contrary may be worth recording; but by no means if they are to be used as arguments against woollen frocks and high fenders.

同类推荐
  • 石门集

    石门集

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 阿弥陀经疏

    阿弥陀经疏

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 缁门崇行录

    缁门崇行录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 洞玄灵宝自然斋仪

    洞玄灵宝自然斋仪

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 壶史

    壶史

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 傲世修真行

    傲世修真行

    源,万物之源,天地之本。。。傲天,手掌源之剑,感悟万物之源,掌生死,破轮回。身世迷途,寻仇路上。有仇,有怨,还有恨。。。有柔情,有友情,还有激情。萝莉投怀送抱,妖媚手到擒来。。。仇人终手刃,人散曲未完。何去何从?故事才开始。。。修仙?不!我不修仙,我会弑仙。。。修神?不!我不修神,我只杀神。。。我就是傲天,我修道,我更修真。。。何为道?何为真?我命便是道,随我心意即天意,心之所向便是真。。。且看我如何踏天而行,驭天正道,演绎一个不同的修真传奇。。。
  • 如风似东流

    如风似东流

    正义本为惩治邪恶,奈何有时却要用邪恶来维护?不免令人怀疑,什么是正?什么又是邪?便数风流人物,何人可称侠?何人又可为雄·····
  • 原始时代的帝国

    原始时代的帝国

    廖德远离开了自己家乡去从军,半年后一次从林训练,被送到伊拉克单独训练,在一次大山作战任务中,意外发现一搜飞船,好奇心驱使他去探险,来到飞船下面,突然一到强光把他劈到了原始时代,只有一身现代装备的他该何去和从呢?欢迎阅读我的处女之作,您的支持和鼓励就是我的灵感。
  • 帝王传承

    帝王传承

    混沌初开后天地灵气淤积不散,浓郁的灵气孕育了各种各样的生物导致世界上的灵气变得日渐稀薄起来,为了夺得灵气充裕的福地,各种生物连年大战。人类是其中分得灵气最少的,所以没有双翼、没有锋利的爪牙,但是人类中有人找到了后天吸收灵气最快的功法。一直以来,鸟兽成精的妖族都把人类当成奴仆,直到人族勇士高把自己知道的功法传授给越来越多能感受到灵气的人,终于人族有了自卫能力可以跟妖族分庭抗礼。为了让自己变得更强大,人类也加入了抢夺灵脉的行列并最终脱颖而出成为了赢家。妖王凤凰为了保护妖族的,拼死一击在高身上种下了血脉传承。失去首领的妖族四散躲藏分布在人迹罕至的地方静待时机。
  • 浮世瞳

    浮世瞳

    为了隐埋在双瞳深处的真正秘密,他毅然走进都市……国术与异能的碰撞,异术与超术的对决,谁主沉浮!阴谋阳谋,诡计百出。前世今生,轮回不止。以强者的决心笑傲花都,以帝皇的姿态俯瞰世界!浮华乱世,浮沉俗世,浮萍若世,浮生随世,它名——浮世瞳。
  • 长宁天下

    长宁天下

    作品取材于小时候读武侠小说的幻想。武后临朝,四方多事,边关战事不断,江湖纷争不断,乱世时期,方显英雄本色。
  • 苍天之主

    苍天之主

    “天若亡我,我便逆天”“世不容我,我便灭世”这是一个乱世欺天,血肉横飞的时代,这是一个企图用力量去追赶命运的世界。没有白头偕老的爱情传说,没有悲天悯人的可笑情怀;有的只是历经千劫的不屈铁骨,有的只是行尸走肉般的奋力向前。当生存成了唯一希望,梦想,底线又该如何存在!当发现世界与你背道而驰,你是否还会一如当年!
  • 长泪邪

    长泪邪

    世间万物情感所化为的生灵,却只有雪白的记忆,她忘了太多的事。她的眼泪,可以起死回生。可是所谓的重生,不过一命换一命罢。“只要能救阿灵,我什么都愿意给你”她亲眼看见蜀国君主为了自己所爱之人亡了整个国家,她不甚唏嘘。在佛罗,她曾听一女子所言,那女子问她:“青邪,你生命可曾有过这样一个人,你明明恨他,却又不可抑制的爱上他”她无言以对,她的生命如白纸,早已遗忘了从前,又哪里会有这样的人。她经历了很多人的故事,却始终记不起自己的过往,那些相似之处却让她的心中隐隐作痛。她闭着眼,朦胧间,回忆着脑海中不太清晰的画面。那个身着白衫的男子,俊美的面容上淡淡的笑意,他衣衫的胸口上是像用墨画上去的山水画,他的眼神如月光般明亮,双手却如寒霜般冰冷。“长寻,若我死了,你会想我吗?”“我会陪你一起”
  • 止水轶事录

    止水轶事录

    这是一部借着武侠的幌子讲述人性本恶的小说,所以死人很多。阴谋、悬疑比比皆是,主角仿佛在做力挽狂澜的事,其实被无数的因果牵着往前。何去何从,如何选择,不到最后不会揭晓
  • 弑神焚天怒

    弑神焚天怒

    他,一个人人皆知的一个没有丝毫修炼天赋的废物。被人嘲笑被人排挤,天道命运让他天生不能修炼。但他并不向天道屈服,他要逆天而行。神要阻挡我?那便屠神吧!天要压我?那便灭了天吧!看他如何逆天而行在他神级灵脉面前谁敢称天才?天灭天道杀众神。站在万神殿上俯视苍生,各色美女揽入怀里。天道是什么?我便是天道。