Excerpt from The Science of Oriental Medicine, Its Principles and Methods: Comprising Biographical Sketches of Its Leading Practitioners, Its Treatment of Various Prevalent Diseases, Useful Information on Matters of Diet, Exercise and Hygiene

Recovery of lost health is an uphill struggle, and the worst fea ture of it is that the means usually employed are things that We so thoroughly dislike, bitter, nauseous doses, that we would be afraid to take in health, but are compelled to swallow in sickness, when one would naturally suppose that they would do us the most harm. It is an odd thing, if you will stop to think of it, that, just as soon as aman is taken ill, he is compelled, or at least advised, to take into his stomach some substance dug out of a mine or distilled from a poisonous plant. This does not seem rational, but it is the established custom.

The Chinese never fell into this way of medical practice. For centuries the use of all minerals and of all poisonous herbs or other substances has been forbidden by law in the Flowery Kingdom, and, with the off-hand ways of trial and punishment in vogue in that country, it would have been all a man's life was worth to prescribe opium, arsenic or any similar substance. The result is that a system of medicine has been practised in China for centuries which depends for its results solely upon strictly non-poisonous substances. In the opinion of the writer, the marvelous results attained by this system of medicine is due largely to this fact, and perhaps also to the pecu liar method of diagnosis employed, through which the physician judges of the patient's condition through the pulse alone. The deli cacy of touch and the quickness of perception attained by experts in this system is something simply marvelous and can be appreciated only by a personal experience.

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