Personal Experience Of A Physician
John Ellis
15 chapters
4 hour read
Selected Chapters
15 chapters
PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OF A PHYSICIAN. CHAPTER I.
PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OF A PHYSICIAN. CHAPTER I.
We all admit that every one who attempts to act as a physician, should strive to qualify himself, or herself, for the work by obtaining the best education which our medical schools afford; for to physicians are intrusted, not simply the property or money, but the very lives of their fellow-citizens. As the responsibility is great, so the duty of preparing one's self before commencing practice, and of keeping fully abreast of all new and valuable discoveries in the art of healing, is equally grea
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
I was born in the year 1815, and on the 26th of November, 1891, was 76 years of age. I have not practiced medicine as a business for many years, and I never expect to practice again. As to money, my present business gives me all I need, and money to spare for benevolent purposes. I do not expect, nor do I desire, to receive one cent, directly or indirectly, for the writing of this pamphlet, or for the money which I expect to spend for paper, printing, binding, and sending it, post paid, to every
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
This treatment of diseases, more in the past than at present, consists largely in giving and applying remedies in disease-creating doses. The antiphlogistic treatment consists of blood-letting and the use and application of reducing remedies which directly or indirectly lessen the inflammatory or febrile action; but it is manifest that while it may lessen the activity of the diseased symptoms it also lessens the vitality of the system as a whole, and consequently its power to resist and overcome
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
We know that in various ages of the world the Lord has revealed a knowledge of Himself to man. In the Ten Commandments we have the laws of spiritual life, in accordance with which we must live if we would enjoy spiritual health, precisely as we must live in accordance with the laws of natural life and health, if we would enjoy natural health. We are dependent upon revelation for a knowledge of the laws of spiritual health, and of the causes and methods for the cure of spiritual diseases; but the
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
We behold the dawn of a new day before we see the sun, from whence the light proceeds. The young in the Baptist Church, not having been baptized in infancy, are brought up to feel that they are out of the Church, and that they have to be converted, or "to get religion," before they join the Church, instead of being brought up to feel that, having been baptized, they belong to the Church and must believe its doctrines, and live the life which they teach. Thus I remained out of the Church until I
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SMOKING AND PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT.
SMOKING AND PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT.
From the records of the senior class of Yale College during the Past eight years, the non-smokers have proved to have decidedly gained over the smokers in height, weight, and lung capacity. All candidates for the crews and other athletic sports were non-smokers. The non-smokers were 20 per cent. taller than the smokers, 25 per cent. heavier, and had 62 per cent. more lung capacity. In the graduating class of Amherst College of the present year, those not using tobacco have in weight gained 24 pe
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MUCH-NEEDED INSTRUCTION.
MUCH-NEEDED INSTRUCTION.
Inquiry should be made into the natural causes of disease, into which spiritual causes flow and cause the suffering, wretchedness, and premature deaths which prevail, and men and women should be led by precept and example to see them as evils and to shun them as sins against God. Swedenborg says:— "Thus, by washing the feet, is meant to purify the natural principle of man; for unless this principle appertaining to man, when he lives in the world, is purified and cleansed, it cannot afterwards be
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THE SECOND CLASS OF TEACHERS REQUIRED.
THE SECOND CLASS OF TEACHERS REQUIRED.
Physicians as teachers in our churches should have for a special work the teaching of truth as to the physical life of man in connection with his spiritual life—the laws of health, the causes of prevailing diseases, deformities, insanities, and premature deaths, together with the methods and the duty of shunning them as sins against God. But there are other evils and questions which require careful consideration in our churches, such as the true relation, according to the laws of justice, mercy,
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
As there is a correspondence between the natural and spiritual causes of disease, so there must be a correspondence between the methods of restraining and curing natural and spiritual diseases. First: Spiritual diseases or evils are restrained by punishments which, by force, as it were, counteract the inclination to do evil; corresponding to this method we have the Antipathic method of restraining natural diseases, which is one of the prevailing methods; for instance, for constipation cathartics
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WHY A SEPARATE NEW-CHURCH ORGANIZATION.
WHY A SEPARATE NEW-CHURCH ORGANIZATION.
Swedenborg made no attempt to organize the believers in the revelations made by the Lord through his instrumentality into a separate church organization, and nowhere in his writings does he express the opinion that such a separate organization would ever be needed or desirable. And he apparently expected that the prevailing false doctrines of the churches would, in the increasing light of the New Jerusalem, be seen to be false by the clergy of existing church organizations; and that through them
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SPIRITUAL CAUSES OF DISEASES.
SPIRITUAL CAUSES OF DISEASES.
As I continued my investigation into the causes of disease, and especially as I read the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg, I began to see more and more clearly that diseases, to a large extent at least, have a spiritual origin, and that the great obstacles to the removal of their causes lie in the false doctrines of Christian churches. When selfish men who were leaders in the churches desired to exercise their love of rule in spiritual and natural things and to exercise despotic power, when they d
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COMMUNION WINE.
COMMUNION WINE.
For several years after I joined the Church I paid little attention to the subject of communion wine. But at last an article appeared in a New-Church paper, in which the writer claimed that fermented wine was a good and useful article to be used as a beverage, and he tried to justify its use by the teachings of the Church. Such views were so contrary to what I regarded as true, that I immediately commenced a more careful and critical examination of the writings of Swedenborg, to ascertain what i
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THE RESULTS OF EFFORTS IN BEHALF OF TEMPERANCE.
THE RESULTS OF EFFORTS IN BEHALF OF TEMPERANCE.
The reader may reasonably inquire what results have followed all the efforts which I have made to call the attention of the clergy and laity of the New Church, and the clergy of other churches, to the importance of using as a communion wine, the genuine "Fruit of the Vine" as the Lord has organized, ripened, and sweetened it in the grape, instead of a leavened or fermented wine, which, when used as a beverage, causes disease, drunkenness, insanity, and death, in innumerable instances, among the
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PREVAILING EVILS OF LIFE.
PREVAILING EVILS OF LIFE.
We are living in the midst of prevailing evils of life which should command the special attention of every clergyman and every Christian. Even infants and children are dying on all sides, and those that survive are being contaminated often even in our churches by the example of clergymen and prominent members. But yesterday, as I was speaking to a very intelligent, well-known citizen of New York, he expressed to me the opinion that gambling and a desire to obtain money or valuables without retur
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CANON WILBERFORCE ON SACRAMENTAL WINES.
CANON WILBERFORCE ON SACRAMENTAL WINES.
Canon Wilberforce is reported by the London Temperance Record as saying at a recent meeting in England: "He believed if people desired to go back literally and absolutely to the days of the institution of the Sacrament, it would be a most difficult thing, if not impossible, to prove that the particular cup which their Master took in His hand in that solemn crisis of His life when He instituted the Holy Eucharist was fermented at all. There was abundant testimony to prove it was not. Some went ba
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