[25] Cabot, Richard C

[25] Cabot, Richard C.: _Studies of the Action of Alcohol in Disease,
Especially upon the Circulation_, Med. News, LXXXIII, 1903, pp. 145-153.
Read before the Association of American Physicians, May 13, 1903.

CHIEF SURGEON"S OFFICE,

HDQRS
CHIEF SURGEON"S OFFICE,
HDQRS. DEPT. HAVANA AND PINAR DEL RIO,
QUEMADOS, CUBA, July 21, 1900

According to MacVail, in the pre-vaccination period smallpox

was nine times as fatal as measles and seven and one half times
as fatal as whooping cough
According to MacVail, in the pre-vaccination period smallpox
was nine times as fatal as measles and seven and one half times
as fatal as whooping cough. To-day in the vaccinated community
its fatality is negligable, in the unvaccinated it is as high
as it was in the Middle Ages. In the city of Berlin, where
vaccination is absolutely compulsory, there is no smallpox
hospital at all; the cases of smallpox in that city being only
a few unvaccinated foreigners. In 1912 the deaths in New York
City were as follow: 671 from measles, 614 from scarlatina, 500
from typhoid fever, 187 from whooping cough and 2 from
smallpox.

In November, 1789, Dr

In November, 1789, Dr. Jenner inoculated his eldest child
Edward, aged 18 months, with some swinepox virus, and as
nothing untoward happened, he inoculated him again with
swinepox on April 7, 1791. The child had a slight illness, very
like vaccinia, from which he rapidly recovered. The moment for
the crucial experiment was not yet; it came in due time, but
Jenner had to wait five years for it, and five years are a long
time to a man who is yearning to perform his crucial
experiment. Happily for suffering humanity, in the early summer
of 1796 the opportunity came; the hour and the man were there
together.

1

1. The place of imagination in mental economy: Practical nature of
imagination--Imagination in the interpretation of history, literature,
and art--Imagination and science--Everyday uses of imagination--The
building of ideals and plans--Imagination and conduct--Imagination and
thinking. 2. The material used by imagination: Images the stuff of
imagination--The two factors in imagination--Imagination limited by
stock of images--Limited also by our constructive ability--The need of a
purpose. 3. Types of imagination: Reproductive imagination--Creative
imagination. 4. Training the imagination: Gathering of material for
imagination--We must not fail to build--We should carry our ideals into
action. 5. Problems for observation and introspection . . . . . . . . 127

We have thus seen that in regard to the doctrine called in modern times

the Freedom of the Will (_i
We have thus seen that in regard to the doctrine called in modern times
the Freedom of the Will (_i.e._, that volitions are self-originating
and unpredictable), the Stoic theorists not only denied it, but framed
all their Ethics upon the assumption of the contrary. This same
assumption of the contrary, indeed, was made also by Sokrates, Plato,
Aristotle, and Epicurus: in short, by all the ethical teachers of
antiquity. All of them believed that volitions depended on causes: that
under the ordinary conditions of men"s minds, the causes that volitions
generally depended upon are often misleading and sometimes ruinous: but
that by proper stimulation from without and meditation within, the
rational causes of volition might be made to overrule the impulsive.
Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, not less than the Stoics, wished to create
new fixed habits and a new type of character. They differed, indeed, on
the question what the proper type of character was: but each of them
aimed at the same general end--a new type of character, regulating the
grades of susceptibility to different motives. And the purpose of all
and each of these moralists precludes the theory of free-will--_i.e._,
the theory that our volitions are self-originating and unpredictable.

In a chapter (VII

In a chapter (VII.) entitled "certain principles co-operating with our
moral powers," he discusses (1) a regard to character, (2) Sympathy,
(3) the Sense of the Ridiculous, (4) Taste. The important topic is the
second, Sympathy; which, psychologically, he would appear to regard as
determined by the pleasure that it gives. Under this head he introduces
a criticism of the Ethical theory of Adam Smith; and, adverting to the
inadequacy of the theory to distinguish the _right_ from the _actual_
judgments of mankind, he remarks on Smith"s ingenious fiction "of _an
abstract man_ within the breast;" and states that Smith laid much
greater stress on this fiction in the last edition of the Moral
Sentiments published before his death. It is not without reason that
Stewart warns against grounding theories on metaphorical expressions,
such as this of Smith, or the Platonic Commonwealth of the Soul.

Epicurus adopted the atomistic scheme of Democritus, but with some

important variations
Epicurus adopted the atomistic scheme of Democritus, but with some
important variations. He conceived that the atoms all moved with equal
velocity in the downward direction of gravity. But it occurred to him
that upon this hypothesis there could never occur any collisions or
combinations of the atoms--nothing but continued and unchangeable
parallel lines. Accordingly, he modified it by saying that the line of
descent was not exactly rectilinear, but that each atom deflected a
little from the straight line, and each in its own direction and
degree; so that it became possible to assume collisions, resiliences,
adhesions, combinations, among them, as it had been possible under the
variety of original movements ascribed to them by Democritus. The
opponents of Epicurus derided this auxiliary hypothesis; they affirmed
that he invented the individual deflection of each atom, without
assigning any cause, and only because he was perplexed by the mystery
of man"s _free-will_. But Epicurus was not more open to attack on this
ground than other physical philosophers. Most of them (except perhaps
the most consistent of the Stoic fatalists) believed that some among
the phenomena of the universe occurred in regular and predictable
sequence, while others were essentially irregular and unpredictable;
each philosopher devised his hypothesis, and recognized some
fundamental principle, to explain the first class of phenomena as well
as the second. Plato admitted an invincible Erratic necessity;
Aristotle introduced Chance and Spontaneity; Democritus multiplied
indefinitely the varieties of atomic movements. The hypothetical
deflexion alleged by Epicurus was his way, not more unwarranted than
the others, of providing a fundamental principle for the unpredictable
phenomena of the universe. Among these are the mental (including the
volitional) manifestations of men and animals; but there are many
others besides; and there is no ground for believing that the mystery
of free-will was peculiarly present to his mind. The movements of a man
or animal are not exclusively subject to gravitation and other general
laws; they are partly governed by mental impulses and by forces of the
organism, intrinsic and peculiar to himself, unseen and unfelt by
others. For these, in common with many other untraceable phenomena in
the material world, Epicurus provides a principle in the supplementary
hypothesis of deflexion. He rejected the fatalism contained in the
theories of some of the Stoics, and admitted a limited range of empire
to chance, or irregularity. But he maintained that the will, far from
being among the phenomena essentially irregular, is under the influence
of motives; for no man can insist more strenuously than he does (see
the Letter to Menoecens) on the complete power of philosophy,--if the
student could be made to feel its necessity and desire the attainment
of it, so as to meditate and engrain within himself sound views about
the gods, death, and human life generally,--to mould our volitions and
character in a manner conformable to the exigencies of virtue and
happiness.

The recorded history of Rome begins with small and vigorous

tribes inhabiting the flanks of the Apennines and the valleys
down to the sea, and blending together to form the Roman
republic
The recorded history of Rome begins with small and vigorous
tribes inhabiting the flanks of the Apennines and the valleys
down to the sea, and blending together to form the Roman
republic. They were men of courage and men of action, virile,
austere, severe and dominant.[1] They were men who 'looked on
none as their superior and none as their inferior.' For this
reason, Rome was long a republic. Free-born men control their
own destinies. 'The fault,' says Cassius, 'is not in our stars,
but in ourselves that we are underlings.' Thus in freedom, when
Rome was small without glory, without riches, without colonies
and without slaves, she laid the foundations of greatness.