alm of rationalism,
until to day it comprehends all the elements of an art and a science.
Scientific researches and investigations have added many valuable truths
to the general fund of medical learning, but much more has been effected
by observation and empirical discovery. It is of little or no interest
to the invalid to know whether the prescribed remedy is organic or
inorganic, simple, compound, or complex. In his anxiety and distress of
body, he seeks solely for relief, without regard to the character of the
remedial agents employed. But this indifference on the part of the
patient does not obviate the necessity for a thorough, scientific
education on the part of the practitioner. Notwithstanding all the laws
enacted to raise the standard of medicine, and thus protect the public
from quackery, there yet exists a disposition among many to cling to all
that savors of the miraculous, or supernatural. To insure the future
advancement of the healing art, physicians must instruct mankind in
Physiology, Hygiene, and Medicine. When the people understand the nature
of diseases, their causes, methods of prevention and cure, they will not
be easily deceived, and practitioners will be obliged to qualify
themselves better for their labors. The practice of medicine is every
year becoming more successful. New and improved methods of treating
disease are being discovered and developed, and the conscientious
physician will avail himself of _all_ the means, by a knowledge of which
he may benefit his fellow-men. The medical profession is divided into
three principal schools, or sects.

THE ALLOPATHIC, REGULAR, OR OLD SCHOOL OF MEDICINE.

This is the oldest existing branch of the profession. To it is due the
credit of collecting and arranging the facts and discoveries which form
the foundation of the healing art. It has done, and is doing, much to
place the science of medicine on a firm basis. To the text-books of this
school, every student who would qualify himself for medical practice
must resort, to gain that knowledge upon which depends his future
success. The early practice of this branch of the profession was
necessarily crude and empirical. Conservative in its character, it has
ever been slow to recognize new theories and methods of practice, and
has failed to adopt them until they have been incontrovertibly
established. This conservatism was manifested in the opposition to
Harvey when he propounded the theory of the circu