Allopathy and Homoeopathy Before the Judgement of Common Sense!   By: Frederick Hiller (1820-)

Before the Judgment of Common Sense!

by

F. HILLER, M.D.

San Francisco: Bruce's Job Printing House, 535 Sacramento Street, 1872

It is difficult to carry the Torch Light of Truth through the masses, without stepping occasionally upon a toe or burning a wig or a head dress.

To

WILLIAM SHARON, Esq., ISAAC L. REQUA, Esq., A. K. P. HARMON, Esq., SAMUEL G. THELLER, Esq.

GENTLEMEN:

I have taken the liberty to dedicate this offering to you, as a token of respect and esteem. This, together with a grateful remembrance of the courtesies extended to me, and the support which I have derived from your friendship, will be, I hope, a sufficient excuse for the liberty I have taken.

Very truly, yours, etc.

F. HILLER, M.D.

San Francisco, 1872.

TO THE

MEMORY

OF

SAMUEL HAHNEMANN

THE DISCOVERER OF

THE TRUE LAW OF CURE

Born April 10th, 1775; Died June 4th, 1843.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:

It is a remarkable and at the same time a terrible and most lamentable fact, that the practice of medicine an art of daily necessity and application, most nearly affecting the dearest interests and well being of mankind, and to the improvement of which we are encouraged and impelled by the strongest motives of interest and humanity, of love for our neighbor and emulous zeal for professional skill and superiority therein should, after a probation of so long a period, and recorded experience of at least two thousand years, still remain, as it confessedly does in most respects, so little understood and generally of such doubtful and uncertain application.

The present age, unlike any that has preceded it, is peculiarly one of rigid, radical and fundamental examination. Everything in the Heavens above, or in the Earth beneath, is tested and retested; analyzed, synthetized and submitted to the crucible of stern reason, and the logical conclusion of experience; even to the extreme of possibility. This is true not only of the material universe, but of all mental and moral conditions, of social, political and even religious institutions. Nothing, in this day, and especially in this country of free thought and liberty of speech, is taken for granted merely because it can lay claim to the honors of a great antiquity, or can number thousands or millions of adherents. Vast differences are to be observed in governments, churches, creeds and social practices; and all, however opposite and apparently antagonistic, are working out a solution to the problem

"WHAT IS TRUTH?"

Conservatism is fast dying out, hidden and smothered by the ever flowing tidal waves of progression. Radicalism ceases to become radical, by the daily and hourly recurrence of startling discoveries, and new, unheard of, and unexpected adaptations of old laws. The mistakes of to day will be found to be mistakes, and will be rectified. Whenever and wherever freedom holds her sway, evil must work out its own destruction, and good enthrone itself in the hearts of those benefitted by its benign influence. In this spirit, and with such views, let us look at the progress of Medical Science that we may learn from the experience of the past to correctly estimate the developments of the present and aid wisely in the working for a more glorious future.