Volume - The Clarence Darrow Collection

66 FROM MIRACLES TO MEDICINE. H
that in proportion as the world approached the " ages of
faith " it receded from ascertained truth, and in proportion
as the world has receded from the " ages of faith " it has
approached ascertained truth ; secondly, that, in proportion
as the grasp of theology upon education tightened, medicine
declined, and in proportion as that grasp has relaxed, medicine
has been developed.
The world is hardly beyond the beginning of medical
discoveries, yet they have already taken from theology what
was formerly its strongest province sweeping away from
this vast field of human effort that belief in miracles which
for more than twenty centuries has been the main stumblingblock
in the path of medicine ; and in doing this they have
cleared higher paths not only for science, but for religion.*
* For the rescue of medical education from the control of theology, especia
in France, see Rambaud, La Civilisation ConUmporaine en France, pp. 682, 683
For miraculous cures wrought by imagination, see Tuke, Influence of Mind i
Body, vol. ii. For the opposition to scientific study of hypnotism, see Hypnotism*
und Wunder : ein Vortrag, mit Weiterungen, von Max Steigenberger, Domprei*
diger, Augsburg, 1888, reviewed in Science, February 15, 1889, p. 127. For
recent statement regarding the development of studies in hypnotism, see Li(^eoii^
De la Suggestion et du Somnambulisme dans leurs rapports avec la Jurisprudence^
Paris, 1889, chap. ii. As to joy in believing and '
exaggerating marvels, see in thj
London Graphic for January 2, 1892, an account of Hindu jugglers by " Professor*
Hofmann, himself an expert conjurer. He shows that the Hindu performances
have been grossly and persistently exaggerated in the accounts of travellers ; that
they are easily seen through, and greatly inferior to the jugglers' tricks seen every
day in European capitals. The eminent Prof. De Gubematis, who also had witnessed
the Hindu performances, assured the present writer that the current accounts
of them were monstrously exaggerated. As to the miraculous in general, the famous
Essay ol Hume holds a most important place in the older literature of the subject;
but, for perhaps the most remarkable of all discussions of it, see Conyers Middleton,
D. D., A Free Inquiry into the Miraculous Powers which are supposed to han
subsisted in the Christian Church, London, 1749. For probably the most judicially
also hif
fair discussion, see Lecky, History of European Morals, vol. i, chap, iii ;
Rationalism in Europe, vol. i, chaps, i and ii ; and for perhaps the boldest anc
most suggestive of recent statements, see Max Miiller, Physical Religion, being tht
Gifford Lectures before the University of Glasgow for 1890, London, 1891, lectuit
xiv. See also, for very cogent statement, and ai^uments, Matthew Arnold's Liter*
ture and Dogma, especially chap, v, and, for a recent utterance of great cleames
and force, Prof. Osier's Address before the Johns Hopkins University, given in Sii
ence for March 27, 1891.