Strictly speaking, there are scarcely any intelligent physicians who can properly be called Thomsonians or steamers. Amateur doctors, men of very limited education, may be found to whom such terms apply; but those who commence a botanic practice, if they obtain any proper medical education, enlarge their resources far beyond the limited circle of Thomsonism, and soon become essentially Eclectic in their general course.

The peculiarities of the Eclectic practice are too numerous to be learned, except by a thorough course of study. These peculiarities have arisen from the gradual adoption of one improvement after another, until the whole system of practice has been essentially changed, and all those measures which are calculated to impair the vital powers, have been substituted by more successful methods. It is a cardinal principal of the Eclectic system, that no medical treatment should be allowed which perinanently impairs or injures the vital powers, that no such treatment is, in any case, necessary or proper, and that in the choice of remedies, we should prefer those which are safest, and calculated to act most nearly in accordance with the laws of health.

Hence, we reject, in toto, the most pernicious features of old school practice. Not that we consider them entirely useless; but because they are so far inferior in their results to the measures upon which we rely. The habitual, internal use of certain intensely poisonous metals, as mercury, antimony, arsenic, lead, copper, &c., we consider a gross violation of the dictates of medical philosophy and experience-an egregious delusion which has brought millions to a premature grave, and which, at the present time, maintains an immense amount of human suffering among the living. This delusion has arisen from a profound ignorance of the true characters of a number of important medicines, and an indifference to the enormous evils now arising from the mercurial practice. It is not known in the Colleges that our vegetable materia medica furnishes far better agents for all the purposes of the healing art, than these destructive metals, and that every purpose for which it is supposed that mercury is necessary, can be accomplished better without than with its agency. The fancied necessity of mercury, for the sake of its power over the liver, is well known, by all Eclectic practi tioners to be a gross delusion; without the use of a particle of mercury and without its dangerous morbid consequences, they produce much more efficient cholagogue and alterative action than mercurial remedies can maintain. The medical profession are aware of the dreadful evils of a mercurial practice, and would gladly get rid of the two-edged weapon which cuts alternately the disease and the patient, if they were informed by the colleges and authors, upon whom they rely, of the powers of other and better cholagogues.

So far from this being done, the colleges profess (no doubt sincerely) to be ignorant of any substitutes for mercury, and insist upon its use with so mach earnestness, that the administration of mercury has become a criterion of medical respectability-the very shibboleth of medical societies, and with the herd of quacks, who practice by routine, without either mental ability, or professional knowledge, almost all their medical skill concentres into the mere art of giving calomel. Even with the most enlightened and distinguished members of the medical profession, the best efforts of the physician are often attended by sad mortality. Under

the treatment of the Allopathic physicians of Europe, as recorded in hospitals, on an average, more than one-tenth of all the patients die. Under the treatment of the Faculty of the Ohio Medical College, in the Commercial Hospital of Cincinnati, during the year 1848, more than one sixth of all the patients died, according to their own report.

In the Eclectic practice, so far as statistics have yet been obtained, it is believed that the average mortality of all classes of cases does not exceed two per cent.

In the treatment of cholera, we have the comparative statistics, afforded by the reports of cholera practice, in New York and in Cincinnati. In the latter city, we observe that nine Eclectic physicians, during the month of May, treated 330 cases of cholera, and upwards of 200 of choleroid disease of a milder form, with the loss of but five patients, while the cholera reports of other physicians to the Board of Health, exhibit, during the same month, 432 cases of cholera and 116 deaths!

In the month of June, the disease having reached its maximum intensity, and many of the cases being reached by the physicians only in the collapsed stage, the mortality was necessarily greater. Hence the reports of Eclectic physicians in Cincinnati, present an aggregate for the two months, of 1094 cases of cholera, and a large number of choleroid diseases not fully reported, which were treated with entire success in all but 36 cases, which proved fatal. In making up this aggregate of deaths, we have included a number of cases in which the physicians' directions were disregarded, or in which he was called in too late to have any reasonable hope. Even thus, the aggregate mortality appears to have been less than four per cent. (being 3.28.) while the mortality of cholera patients under Old School treatment, has been from 40 to 60 per cent. throughout Europe.*

Notwithstanding this striking and almost incredible contrast, (a ratio of more than 10 to 1.) a proscriptive and illiberal course was pursued by the opponents of Eclecticism. This, however, entirely failed to accomplish its object, as the City Cholera Hospital, originally under the care of Old School practitioners, was placed in the hands of Eclectic physicians, by the Board of Health; and the wisdom of the change was shown by the fact that, since this change, although the disease has greatly increased in severity and fatality, the ratio of mortality, in the Cholera Hospital, has been but about one-half as great as previously. While the discase was in a milder form, but the mercurial treatment was in vogue-while calomel, opium, and the acetate of lead were regarded as the prominent medicines, the mortality was in the ratio of seven out of twelve; but since that period, under the Eclectic or non mercurial treatment, the mortality has been less than three in twelve of the cholera patients who underwent the Eclectic treatment. This, too, during a period when the pestilence raged highest, and the average number of deaths in Cincinnati was over 1000 a week. That the average mortality from all diseases, under the orthodox mercurial treatment, is twice as great as under the Eclectic treatment, is the opinion of all who have made a comparative trial, or carefully observed their results; and it has been the earnest desire of Eclectic practitioners to subject the two systems of practice to a rigid comparative trial, under similar circumstances, in some public Institution.

*As the mortality of the Old school cholera practice in Cincinnati, was 26 per cent. in May, it must have been at least 50 per cent. in June, when the ratio of mortality was more than doubled with all physicians.

Under these circumstances, we are justified in making a solemn appeal to all young men aspiring to the medical profession, and asking whether they are willing to sanction the proscriptive bigotry and Hunkerism,— which exist in a portion of the profession,-whether they are willing to join in the conspiracy against free investigation-whether they are willing to be established in that narrow and imperfect system of practice which has everywhere been proved vastly inferior, in its results, to the modern improvements of Eclecticism and Homœopathy-in short, whether they can conscientiously go forth to practice medicine in accordance with the dicta of teachers who, in a Cincinnati Hospital, lose more than onesixth of all their patients-who, in European Hospitals, lose from a tenth to a ninth; and who, all over the world, lose from one-third to two-thirds of their patients in cholera? Can you sanction this disastrous system of medical error and bigotry, or will you take the stand of an American freeman in behalf of Eclectic liberality, and connect yourself with that system of practice which constitutes one of the greatest benefactions America has yet conferred upon the world-a system of practice which saves ninety-six or ninety-seven cholera patients out of a hundred, and which looks upon that practitioner as utterly unworthy of his high vocation and a position in the Eclectic ranks, whose practice is attended by as great a mortality as is common in Allopathic practice.

This high stand can be maintained only by valuable professional knowledge. That knowledge enables Eclectic practitioners not only to dispense with mercurial medicines, but to lay aside the pernicious practice of blood-letting, as a clumsy, barbarous, and destructive method of effecting objects which may be better accomplished without the lancet. That very efficient substitutes for mercury and the lancet exist, or that they have been used with triumphant success throughout this country, in all it various climates and classes of diseases for many years, is not known or taught in our old medical colleges, nor will this fact be recognized, until a more liberal spirit shall be introduced than prevails at present.

In the practice of Surgery, as well as in other departments, the remarkable improvements and superior results of Eclectic medicine, in comparison with all that has been accomplished by the highest skill of Europe, challenges professional scrutiny. It is not in the use of the knife, nor in mechanical dexterity, that any peculiar merit is claimed; but in the preservation of life and limb-in the substitution of scientific constitutional treatment for the reckless use of the knife, lies the principal glory of Eclectic Surgery. For further illustration we can only refer to the many thousand, who have been benefited by Eclectic Surgical practice. In the obstetrical department-especially in the treatment of the diseases of females, the reform has been no less decisive and important than in general practice. But as the limits of this address do not admit of specifications, we can only invite a candid scrutiny, and refer to the decisive opinions entertained by all who have made themselves fully acquainted with Eclectic medicine, after studying the resources of old school practice.

In physiology and medical philosophy, the instructions of the Institute are essentially different from those of any other school in Europe or America. This is the only school in which the facts of Phrenology and Animal Magnetism have been properly recognized and explained as a por

tion of medical science. It is the only school in which the functions of the brain, as a physiological organ, have been taught.

To a member of this Faculty belongs the honor of discovering the proper method of exploring the functions of the brain, determining its mental and physiological powers, and the relations which it bears to all parts of the human body. By this discovery the highest problems of psychology and physiology which have ever engaged the attention of man, are made accessible to rigid experimental enquiry and scientific demonstration. This discovery (the essential truth of which has been recognized in Europe as well as America,) not only lays the foundation for a grand system of philosophy in which all sciences relating to man find their appropriate place, but explains the philosopical laws of his constitution in reference to its internal sympathies,-the influence of medicines and food, the causes and nature of diseases and contagion, the principles of therapeutics and the entire philosophy of medicine.

The medical philosophy of the Institute being thus based upon a knowledge of the mainsprings of the human constitution, (the much neglected nervous system) is essentially different from that taught in other schools. It recognizes fully the relations which all methods of treatment bear to the laws of life and health, and hence appreciates liberally the merits alike of Homœopathy, Allopathy, Hydropathy, and all peculiar medical theories. In short our medical philosophy is not a system of sectarian dogmatism, but a guiding, inspiring and progressive influence. Incessant progress, is our rule of life, and he who does not continually make such progress by independent observation is unworthy of the name of an Eclectic.

Nor would that Institution be worthy of the name of Eclectic, which would hesitate to avail itself of knowledge derived from any source which may be useful to man. Conscious of the importance and value of the researches and experience of Homeopathic physicians, who have pursued the great labor of medical reform by another mode distinct from our own, we have recognized the claims and recommended the study of Homœopathy as a valuable portion of professional knowledge. Having deter mined to establish at a suitable opportunity a course of Homeopathic instruction for the benefit of our students, we have been gratified to observe at the same time among the Homœopathic medical profession a concerted movement for the purpose of securing a suitable opportunity of instruction for Homeopathic medical students, in which they might at least be safe from the insults of Allopathic bigotry, by attending a Homœopathic college or a college of liberal principles.

ence.

Having resolved to establish a Homeopathic chair in the Institute, it was deemed desirable to select for that chair some one whose learning, experience and general reputation as a Homœopathie physician would give the best assurance of a satisfactory development of Homeopathic sciFor this purpose it was deemed best to tender the privilege of nominating a suitable professor, to the convention of Homeopathic physicians which was about to meet in the city of Cleveland. The convention appreciating highly the liberal spirit which prompted the offer, deliberated upon the subject and unanimously recommended Dr. STORM ROSA of Painesville, Ohio, for the Homœopathic Professorship of the Institute. This nomination, highly acceptable to all parties, was confirmed by the

Trustees of the Institute, who have elected Dr. Rosa to the professorship, for which he was recommended.

Thus are we enabled to present for the first time in the history of medicine, a school truly liberal, independent, and free from sectarian influence; and overlooking not the narrow boundaries of some dogmatic and ephemeral theory, but the whole horizon of medical science-including alike the researches of the standard authorities from Hippocrates to Velpeau; the ingenious and wonderful discoveries of Hahnemann and his followers, and the extensive knowledge of botanic medicines, of safe and successful methods of practice, and of the true principles of physiology, which belong to Eclectic Medical Reformers of America.

Graduates of this Institution, whether designing to occupy the range of Eclecticism, or to give their attention exclusively to Homeopathic prac tice will enjoy an unusually extensive familiarity with all the recources of the healing art, and hence, will occupy now that advanced position to which the whole profession will in time attain, when paltry jealousies shall have perished, and when the varied contributions of the 19th century to practice medicine and medical philosophy are all received and arranged in their proper place, and taught in all respectable medical schools.

As the pioneer teacher of the American or liberal system of medicine, the Institute is appropriately located in the most central portion of our Republic. Cincinnati is evidently destined to be either the largest city or one of the few largest cities on the continent-from the rate of its growth we may calculate that ere the close of the present century, Cincinnati will be to America, as London and Paris are to Europe, and the medical authority of Cincinnati will be proportionally influential throughout the world. With an eye to such a future-to the ascendancy of the American republic-the American spirit, and the American system of medicine, the Institute has been established, and we invite all who cherish the glory of our country-all whose sympathies are with the FUTURE in its progress, rather than the PAST in its DARKNESS, to participate in our enterprise, and share the glory of American Medical Reform.

ΝΟΤΕ.

STATISTICS OF THE CINCINNATI CHOLERA HOSPITAL.-(established by the Board of Health, under authority of the city council.) Dr. J. H. JORDAN, Resident Physician. From the 6th of June up to the 27th of July, total number of admissions 225-total number of deaths 83, of these, twenty were in articulo mortis when brought in, and died generally in less than an hour; five died of narcotism from opiates taken previous to admission; three died of delirium tremens, and thirteen of other diseases, as fevers, arachnitis, inflammation of the brain &c., making a total of 41, which being subtracted leaves 184 cholera patients, of whom 42 died, and 142 were cured. Of those cured, seventeen were in pulseless collapse when admitted, and many others were in a partial collapse. The number of deaths, therefore, amounts to twenty-two and fourfif hs per cent of the number of casesor less than three in twelve. At the same time, the number of cases in the cholera hospital, treated by Drs. Johnson and Drake before they were dismissed, and by Dr. Raymond in the Pearl street branch, has amounted to 61, of whom (37,) more than threefifths died. The total number of deaths, compared to the admissions being under the Eclectic treatment 36 per cent, under old school treatment 60 per cent. In the Commercial Hospital if the facts are not supressed by the Faculty, it is probable the cholera treatment will exhibit a still worse result.