OF 
DR. FROTHINGHAM 
TO A 
MEMBER OF THE MICHIGAN STATE SOCIETY, 
ON THE SUBJECT OF 
HOMEOPATHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN. 
(Reprint from the September Number of the Peninsular Journal of 
Medicine.) 
Editor Peninsular Journal of Medicine—In ynur August 
number is a letter from G. K. Johnson, M. D., of Grand 
Rapids, which I feel compelled to reply to, as it contains cer- 
tain unfounded charges against myself, and erroneous explana- 
tions of late action of the Michigan State Medical Society. 
In regard to the charges against myself, I will say that I have 
never “appealed from professional to popular tribunals,” nor 
“ enlisted a hostile press to assail the State Society.” 
I have never written a word for any paper or medical journal, 
(until my open letter to the Board of Health, published in this 
number of the Journal,) except to correct erroneous or libellous 
statements concerning myself or the faculty, of which I am a mem- 
ber. And whoever asserts the contrary is misinformed or delib- 
erately falsifies. 
It is not I who enlisted a hostile press to assail the State So- 2 
ciety, but Dr. Johnson and others of the sixty-three who voted 
resolutions “ assailing ” the educational system of the State, 
making even a friendly press “ hostile,” and bringing popular 
contempt and ridicule upon a profession whose honor and good 
name they ought to have maintained. When those resolutions 
were reported I remonstrated against their passage, declaring 
that before no civilized people could such a position be sus- 
tained, and the result has corroborated my statement. I was by 
some answered that they did not care for the opinions of the 
press or the people. I can only say in this connection that 
whoever loves his profession more than his own interests, opin- 
ions and prejudices, will labor to increase the public respect and 
esteem in which it is held. It is that more than anything else 
that determines the average of morals and intellect that enters 
it, and the history of civilization shows nothing plainer than 
that a diminished public esteem and confidence in any profes- 
sion has been the unfailing prelude to its decay. If public sen- 
timent is wrong it is our duty to educate it and set it right, and 
not to demean ourselves and increase the contempt it already 
has for us. 
I also deny having “ loaded the State Society with epithets, 
or having carried on against it a wanton crusade.” Not until 
it had <! wantonly ” assailed my character, impugned my mo- 
tives, and advertised me as an “ apostate ” throughout the 
length and breadth of the country; not until forbearance ceased 
to be a virtue ; not until a party of men whom I deemed to be dis- 
honorable schemers, had assumed the control of that Society in 
furtherance of their own selfish interests, did I araign it before 
the American Medical Association for its flagrant violation of 
ethics, and attempted degradation of our profession. Not with 
malice, but with a desire to obtain from the authors of our code, 
a decision of the questions vexing the profession of this State, a 
settlement of which a year of conflict had shown to be impossi- 
ble, and a continuance of which could but add to the scandal 
this controversy has caused to the profession. When I criticise 3 
the State Society, I do not intend to include all its members, 
but only those who by their inconsistent conduct have brought this dis- 
credit upon it, and who evidently packed the last meeting hoping 
to destroy the regular medical school at Ann Arbor. The whole 
of Dr. Johnson’s charges against me I pronounce untrue, and 
demand of him the evidence by which he would substantiate 
them. It is not I who have “joined hands with popular igno 
ranee and prejudice,” but Dr. J. and his co-workers who have 
falsely accused me and others of our faculty of “ aiding and 
abetting” homeopathy, and thus exciting “prejudice” against 
us. 
I must also deny that the object or meaning of the resolu- 
tions was such as given by Dr. J. in his letter. He says 
the first resolution means that the “ State Society was ‘ not con- 
tent’ with homoeopathy in the University, ‘ not content’ that it 
should be fostered by the State, and further, that the teaching of 
Hahnemannic vagaries in the University, ‘ is not, in our opinion, 
calculated to maintain or advance medicine as a science, nor is 
it consistent with the honor or interest of the profession.’ ” 
Now I have the most conclusive proof to show that this was 
not the meaning of that resolution, nor opposition to homoeopathy 
the object of any of the resolutions reported by the committee 
of which Dr. Johnson was a member. It should be remem- 
bered that two of this committee, although agreeing to present 
the first three of the resolutions, voted against the passage of 
the first and second. To the third no member of the Society 
objected. 
Let us quote the resolutions entire, in order more fully to con- 
sider and analyze them. 
Resolved, 1st, That we are not content with the existing situation of 
the medical department of the University,'because in our opinion it is not 
calculated to maintain or advance medicine as a science, nor is it consistent 
with the honor or interest of the profession. 
2d, That a State under our form of government cannot successfully 
teach either medicine or theology, and that the medical profession ought to 
be its own teachers, and the guardian of its honor. 4 
3d, That we regard all legislative interference with the government of 
the University as unconstitutional, wrong in principle and harmful in its 
results. 
4th, That section four of the constitution of this State Society be 
amended so as to read as follows, viz : 
Section 4. The resident members shall be elected by a vote of a 
majority present at any regular meeting, their eligibility having been previ- 
ously reported by the Committee on Admission ; provided, that no person 
shall be admitted to fellowship who proposes to practice in accordance with 
any so-called “ pathy ” or sectarian school of medicine, or who has recently 
graduated from a medical school whose professors teach or assist in teaching 
those who propose to graduate in or practice irregular medicine.” 
Now does not this first resolution distinctly state that they are 
not content with the “Medical Department ?” If they meant 
University, why did they not say so? Such a confusion of terms 
is not to be expected by a committee the chairman of which is 
such a stickler for literary culture. No, they did not mean that 
they were not content with homoeopathy in the University, for 
if they did, and had so expressed it, there would not have been 
a dissenting voice in that Society. The evidence of this I have, 
first, in the admission of members of that committee. 
I offered to Dr. Pratt, chairman of that committee, a set of 
resolutions that protested against the introduction of homoeopathy 
into the University on the ground of its being sectarian in char- 
acter, and asking that all sectarianism be eliminated from the 
University, and was answered by Dr. Pratt that he could not 
entertain those resolutions; that he did not wish to open the 
“ old fight p that “ he could say nothing against homoeopathy.” 
The next day Dr. Ranney, Secretary of the Society, formally 
presented similar resolutions, but no mention was ever made of 
them by the committee, and no word was said in their own resolu- 
tions questioning the right of the. State to teach homoeopathy in the 
University. 
I argued that on the set of resolutions that I offered, we could 
do battle without incurring the charge of bigotry. 
It is contrary to the genius of our educational system to sup- 5 
port sectarianism. It was one of the recommendations in the 
President’s last message to Congress (then published) to so 
change the constitution that no State could make such appro- 
priations as tht one made by our last Legislature in support of 
sectarian medicine, and it has since then been incorporated as a 
plank in the republican platform. On this line we could have 
successfully fought homoeopathy, without disgracing our pro- 
fession, and exciting the ridicule of the intelligent portion of 
our commonwealth. I said, if under this principle, the regular 
medical department is proved to be sectarian, let it be abolished. 
No one will go more cheerfully than I when I see the gun 
“ spiked ” and not left for the enemy to use upon us as an 
engine for the promotion of error. 
But no, homoeopathy was not what they were fighting, so in effect 
said Dr. Pratt to me then. So afterward did Dr. G. K. Johnson 
himself acknowledge to me, declaring that it was the regular 
medical department of the University that he wished to break 
up. And so declared Dr. Brown, another member of this com- 
mittee, and not only to me, but also to others, as I am informed. 
For one I deny the right of any set of men to assassinate the 
Medical Department of the University, and I shall resist such an 
outrage to the extent of my ability. And if our code of 
ethics ” is published as a show of honorable and noble purposes, 
but is to be used merely as a screen from behind which to stab 
our rivals, the sooner it is known the better. 
That it could not have been on the ground of opposition 
stated in the preamble, that these resolutions were framed and 
that the members of the society voted for them, is plainly 
shown by an analysis of the past and present attitude of the 
society toward homoeopathy and other irregular medicine. The 
preamble states as a reason for their action the following, the 
italics being their own : 
The present position of the Medical Department of the University 
and our relations to it bristle with difficulties—difficulties springing on the 
one hand, from the legal relations of the school to the Legislature and to 
the Board of Regents and, on the other hand, from the unwillingness of the 6 
profession to hold any parley or make any compiomise with irregular medicine. 
Let us examine the history of the Society for the past few 
years and see how that unwillingness has been shown. 
When at a meeting of the Society in Grand Rapids in 1872, 
a member of the Society read an able paper showing the active 
efforts homoeopaths were taking to establish themselves in the 
University, and calling upon the Society to take some ef- 
ficient steps to defeat their object, he was insulted by having his 
paper referred back to him as unfit for publication in the transac- 
tions. 
In 1873 a committee of the State Society was appointed un- 
der the following resolution : 
Resolved, That a representative committee of five members of this 
Society, be appointed by the President, to confer with the Board of Regents 
and the Medical Faculty, in l-espect to the relations of the Medical Depart- 
ment of the University, to the medical profession of the State, and in re- 
spect to the future conduct of the said department under any contingencies, 
necessitating a change in its organization. 
This resolution was passed at the time when the question of 
introduction of homoeopathy was under consideration by the 
Regents. Dr. Pratt, of and for this committee, read a long re- 
port before the Regents, prefaced with the assertion that their 
mission did not “ regard any contingencies that might affect the 
internal organization of the medical school under their charge.” 
Both he and Dr. Hitchcock reproved a member of this commit- 
tee for making a minority report representing that the State So- 
ciety objected to the introduction of homeopathy into the Uni- 
versity. 
Still more decidedly did Drs. Pratt and Johnson show their 
willingness to “ parley ” and “ compromise ” with irregular med 
icine by their efforts to secure a law preventing any regular from 
commencing the practice of medicine in this State until he had 
received a certificate from a Board of Medical Examiners the 
majority of which should be composed of irregular practitioners. 
From the bill which they framed I make the following quota- 
tions, italics mine : 7 
“Section i. The Governor shall, by and with the consent of the 
Senate, appoint nine practicing physicians of good reputation, * * * 
who, together with a secretary, shall constitute the ‘ State Medical Board.’ 
* * * The appointments shall be made from members of the State Medicai 
Society, the Homoeopathic State Medical Society, and the Eclectic State Medi- 
cal Society, in proportion to the number of their respective members. * * * 
All vacancies shall be so filled as to maintain the relative proportion of 
members from the several medical societies, on the said Medical 
Board. * * * 
“ Sec. 3. The Board shall appoint from its own members, a Presi- 
dent, a Treasurer, and not more than six Medical Examiners. * * * 
‘‘ Sec. 5. The Medical Examiners shall hold examinations at least 
twice in each year, * * * and shall examine all applicants for exam- 
ination who shall have paid to the Secretary of the Board an examination 
fee of ten dollars, as to their attainments in the following branches of learn- 
ing, and no other, viz.: Normal and Morbid Anatomy, Physiology, Sani- 
tary Science, Surgery other than medical, Midwifery other than medical, 
Chemistry, Medical Jurisprudence and Toxicology. They shall cause a cer- 
tificate to be issued to every person who shall satisfactorily pass the required 
examination. * * * 
“ Sec. 6. It shall be unlawful for any person to practice medicine, in 
any of its departments, in this State after the first day of October, A. D. 
1875, who is not at the time of such practice, duly registered according to 
the following provisions of this act. 
“Any person actually engaged in the practice of medicine in this State, 
who shall register his name with the county clerk of the county in which 
his office is located, prior to the first day of October, 1875, in accordance 
with the provisions of this act, and the requirements of the Medical Board, 
shall receive from such county clerk a certificate of registration, by virtue 
of which he shall be entitled to practice medicine in this State for the period of 
one year from the date above specified, and any person who shall on or after 
the same date, present to the county clerk of the county in which his office 
is situated, a certificate of previous registration under this act, or certificate 
from the medical examiners that he has passed a satisfactory exatnination 
before them, shall receive from such county clerk a like certificate of registra- 
tion by virtue of which he shall be entitled to practice medicine in this 
State for the period of one year from the date of such certificate. 
“ Sec. 12. Any member of said State Medical Board who shall violate 
any of the provisions of this act, or any of the By-laws adopted by said Board, 
* * * shall be fined in a sum not exceeding five hundred dollars, or im- 
prisoned not exceeding three months, or punished by both fine and imprison- 
ment in the discretion of the courts.” 8 
The committee appointed by the State Society to secure the 
passage of this bill reported their action at the meeting of 
Society held June 9, 1875, and can be found in full in the pub- 
lished transactions of the Society for 1875, p. 319, et seq. I 
gather the following facts from their report: 
A meeting of the committee was called at Jackson on the 16th 
of December, 1874, to which the following irregular physicians 
were invited : Chas. Hempel and DeForest Hunt, of Grand 
Rapids; Lodge, of Detroit (homoeopathic); Wm. B. 
Church, of Marshall; R. Brown, of Albion; A. R. Beach, 
of Hudson (eclectic). 
Among those who met in response to this call were Drs. Stod- 
dard of Albion, Hitchcock of Kalamazoo, and two of the Com- 
mittee of Nine, viz: Foster Pratt and G. K. Johnson. Of the 
irregulars, only one condescended to “parley.” This was Wm. 
B. Church, M.D., an eclectic. At this meeting the bill was 
drawn up from which the above extract was made, no one dis- 
senting to its provisions. A copy of this bill was sent to every 
member of the State Medical Society (regular), all the members 
of the Eclectic State Medical Society, and about twenty homoe- 
opathic physicians, (all whose addresses could be obtained). 
This committee called another council to meet in Lansing, Feb- 
ruary 5, 1875, to which, in the language of the report, “ medical 
gentlemen of all schools, and those especially who had express- 
ed dissent, were invited.” 
A special meeting of the State Society (regular), was called 
and held on the nth of February, 1875, to urge the passage of 
this bill upon the Legislature. 
The principal features of the bill above quoted, were ulti- 
mately incorporated into what was termed the “ Thomas bill,” 
and so amended in the Senate as to have the Board composed 
of six censors, two to be regular, two homoeopathic, and two 
eclectic physicians. In this the State Society’s committee ac- 
quiesced, and labored to secure its passage as thus amended. 
“ In the house,” they report, “it (the bill) met a flood of re- 9 
monstrance, mainly from the homoeopaths, who having already 
received the lion's share in the co7nposition of the Board of Censors, 
openly opposed its passage on the ground that by its terms the 
graduates of medical colleges, as well as others, would thereafter 
be subject to examination. On the 26th of April it was tabled 
by its friends to save it from a worse fate.” They charged the 
failure to the apparent apathy of a large share of the regular 
profession, and recommended the appointment of a new com- 
mittee to continue the work, and on motion of Dr. Foster Pratt, 
such a new committee was created, and he and Dr. Johnson are 
still members of it, instructed to continue the same work by the 
society which records not one dissenting voice against the action 
of the old committee. In addition to the acts reported I am 
credibly informed that several members of the society held a 
meeting in Detroit to discuss the above bill, at which irregulars 
met by invitation with them. At this meeting Dr. J. A. Brown, 
one of the Committee of Nine reporting an unwillingness to 
“parley,” acted as chairman, and Dr. E. R. Ellis, a professor in 
the Detroit Homoeopathic College acted as secretary ! ! 
In the discussion of this question it is not unimportant to 
know that the men who furnished the chief data upon which the 
above bill was framed, and who suggested inviting these homoeo- 
paths to meet in consultation upon this bill that was to determine 
the standard of medical qualifications in the whole State of Mich- 
igan, were Drs. Foster Pratt, chairman of the committee of nine, 
and Homer Hitchcock, President of the State Board of Health, 
the latter of whom wrote the clause of the bill requiring the 
Board of Censors to be composed of members of the three State 
Societies. At the late meeting at Ann Arbor, Dr. Hitch- 
cock was particularly censorious upon the faculty for occupying 
their positions, reminding them of that good old time when there 
was honor in the profession. If the inconsistent conduct of Dr. 
Hitchcock in this matter is a fossilized specimen of this extinct 
“ honor” that once existed in the profession, I much prefer that 
more common kind still extant, and which, it is to be hoped, 10 
exists in conformity with that law which provides for the survi- 
val of the fittest. 
Was “ an unwillingness to parley with irregular medicine” 
the feeling that prompted their wanton attack upon the regular 
school at Ann Arbor ? Is inviting them to their meetings to 
take part in the discussion and settlement of important medical 
matters, a parley1? If it is not I do not know what would be 
so considered. Was an “ unwillingness to compromise with 
irregular medicine” the cause of their action ? Did they not 
agree to strike out all knowledge of therapeutics and materia 
medica from the qualifications which the law should demand of 
the physician ? Did they not agree to give a certificate which 
was in effect a recommendation of medical qualification, to any 
homoeopath, eclectic, or cancer doctor who passed a satisfactory 
examination in anatomy, chemistry and other branches men- 
tioned in the above bill ? Did they not offer, under penalty of 
fine and imprisonment, to obey all the “by-laws” of a Board, 
composed of four irregular to two regulars ? Is this compro- 
mise? If it is not, what would be? I am finding no fault with 
the bill, it is a question whether it is not a wise provision to 
secure that kind of knowledge that is the antidote of quackery and 
visionary medical systems. What I do complain of is that 
hypocrisy which is shown by men, who having voluntarily held 
this “parley,” offered this “compromise,” and who having labored 
to secure the passage of this law, have morally committed all 
the acts that the bill contemplates, then advertise to the world, 
that “ unwillingness to hold parley with or make any compro- 
mise with irregular medicine” is their excuse for a mean stab at 
their professional brethren, degrading their profession in the 
eyes of the people and giving the lie to the facts of history by a 
formal resolution. 
Let us consider just what this Board of Censors amounted 
to. It would in effect be a Medical College, only with greater 
power than any college possesses, because nowhere in the whole 
State could any one begin the practice of medicine, who did not 11 
first pass an examination and receive from them a certificate of 
recommendation. It would be a college consisting of a faculty- 
composed of four irregular to two regular physicians, and in the 
original bill, that was drawn up by a committee of the Society, 
this examining board was to be called the College of Physicians 
and Surgeons of the State of Michigan. This bill, with the 
name last designated, requiring a mixed faculty, was freely cir- 
culated at the meeting in Saginaw where it was presented, 
and so far as I remember, but one member objected to it. It 
was referred to a new committee to get the bill in shape to pre- 
sent to the next Legislature. They, without being so instructed 
by the Society, changed the objectional name without otherwise 
essentially changing its features. 
Now let us see what there is at the University that these men 
who made no objection to this affiliation between regular and 
irregular practitioners, so loudly condemn. It is not as Dr. 
Johnson now alleges because “ homeopathy is fostered by the 
State,” for when resolutions are offered condemning this thing, 
they are not entertained, and when at a meeting of these fault- 
finders, I offered a resolution asking the profession to unite with 
the medical faculty to eliminate homoeopathy from the Univer- 
sity, it was by a motion of one of these agitators laid on the 
table. It is not the Homoeopathic College of the University of Mich- 
igan that they are not content with. It is the “ existing situation 
of the Medical department of the University ” that they con- 
demn, and for the information of those not fully conversant with 
the matter, I will say that homeopathy is not connected in any 
way with the regular medical department, but is taught in a sepa- 
rate college, so distinct and separate that no association between 
its faculty and the regular medical faculty is ever required. Du- 
ring the past session I never met a member of the faculty of the 
Homeopathic College, and do not know either of them by sight. 
The regular faculty are required to teach nothing but regular 
medicine, and are not asked to recommend the graduation of irregu- 
lar physicians. The curriculum of the regular school is not 12 
changed in the least, and no irregular medicine is taught as a part 
of it. 
It is true a portion of the faculty have in their lecture rooms 
some homoeopathic students and some literary students, as by 
the system on which the University is organized there is a cer- 
tain latitude allowed in the election of studies, and some of the 
literary students elect chemistry instead of some of the 
studies marked in the regular course for their class. In these 
cases, the professor is required to receive such student and at 
the close of his course of study, he gives him a certificate of his 
qualification in this branch. To the regular medical student a 
different certificate is given, signed by the dean of the faculty, 
stating the length of time he has attended the full course of 
lectures. When a regular medical student applies for a diplo- 
ma, he is examined by each professor, but no intimation is given 
him as to whether or not he has passed satisfactorily, until the 
whole faculty have met, or sent their statement of the student’s 
standing to the dean, and then, after comparing the votes, if no 
objection is made, and the average proficiency reaches the re- 
quired standard, the student is considered passed, and his name 
is sent by the dean of the faculty to the Regents, recommendmg 
him as worthy of the degree of Doctor of Medicine. If he has 
failed to fulfil the requirements of a single professor, he cannot 
be so recommended, if that professor objects, unless that objec- 
tion is overruled by a vote of the faculty. It will thus be seen 
that what the faculty does for the homoeopath’s student, is in no 
sense a recommendation of that student for the degree of Doc- 
tor of Medicine. To say a student is proficient in chemistry is 
not saying that he is qualified to practice. He may have learned 
his anatomy, chemistry, and kindred branches all perfectly, and 
yet, if he has no knoweledge of materia inedica, and therapeu- 
tics, we could not say he was qualified to become a physician. 
Should one of our own students, though brilliant and accom- 
plished in all the branches we teach, have the absurd notion that 
ten grains of morphia was a proper dose, and avow his inten- 13 
tion of using this remedy in that dose, we would not grant him 
a medical degree. Neither, while we hold our present views, 
could we recommend as qualified for the duties of a physician, 
any person who believes the doctrines of Hahnemann. 
What the regular faculty do, is to teach what the regular med- 
ical profession regard as true medical science to all who come 
to their lectures, feeling constrained to do so by the spirit of our 
Code of Ethics, and every principle that should govern our pro- 
fession. And I am individually of the opinion that only the 
most narrow-minded and degrading policy which our profession 
could adopt would require of us any course different from the 
one we took as regards our teaching these homoeopathic students. 
Our code of ethics forbids any secrecy concerning any inven- 
tion or knowledge that is necessary in the prevention or relief of 
human suffering, declaring any such concealment to be “ incon- 
sistent with beneficence and professional liberality.” Now, un 
less we admit that regular medical studies are of no “ real effi- 
cacy” for this purpose, our code forbids us to make any secret of 
them. There was a time when the Asclepiadce, forbade revealing 
such knowledge “except to the elect,” and Hippocrates bound 
his followers by an oath not to reveal their art to any not bound 
by an oath, but in modern times a more liberal policy has been 
declared and followed. If it were not, then should every author 
on regular medicine be compelled to bind his publisher to sell 
his work only to those bound by an oath never to lend or sell 
the book to an “ irregular” or a student that avowed his inten- 
tion to become an “ irregular.” 
As a mere commercial policy, I do not attempt to defend the 
principle that shall command us to make other competing phys- 
icians more dangerous rivals, but, as a benevolent and humane 
profession, we are bound to ask but one question, and that is, 
will this knowledge contribute to the relief of suffering and dis- 
ease ? 
The faculty have been charged with “aiding” and “ abetting” 
the graduation of irregular practitioners by this teaching and ex- 14 
animation of the homoeopathic students, but whoever will 
examine the matter closely will see that by exacting the same 
standard of requirments in the fundamental branches that is 
required of regular students we constitute a check on their grad- 
uation. Every regular physician will admit that the tendency 
among irregular students is to study anatomy, chemistry, and 
kindred branches, much less thoroughly than regular students do, 
and they graduate from schools under the control of their own 
sect, more readily, and with less expenditure of time and money 
than from regular medical schools. There are but two plans for 
the organization of the homoeopathic college in connection with 
the University. One provides for a complete homoeopathic col- 
lege, with no further study by, and qualification of, the homoeo- 
pathic graduate than that demanded by a homoeopathic faculty. 
The other plan, the one now adopted, prevents their sending out 
graduates that are not as well qualified in anatomy and other 
kindred branches as regular students are. 
What a college wholly under the homoeopathic control would 
be may be inferred from a letter which I received from a promi- 
nent homoeopathic physician of this state, declaring that many 
of the homoeopathic physicians were wholly dissatisfied with the 
present arrangement, being desirous of a school entirely inde- 
pendent of the regular department. He submitted a plan of 
organization, in which the teachers of homoeopathic practice and 
materia medica were to occupy the larger portion of the time 
and have a comfortable salary of $2,000 each, but no provision 
was to be made for chemistry ; and anatomy and physiology, 
combined in one chair, was to be taught by a lecturer, with a 
salary of $200, and to occupy one or two months of the student’s 
time. 
Which system should one favor in order to facilitate “ aid and 
abet ” the graduation of irregulars from the University 1 The one 
that gives them a separate school under their own control, re- 
quiring little or no outlay of time or study, or one that exacts a 
long and thorough course before they can receive their degree 1 15 
Is teaching true science aiding and abetting an error? If so the 
more one learns of it, the more of a humbug he must be. Is 
not knowledge the antidote for error ? Is it not a fact, that any 
class that desires to control the opinions of the world, seeks, if it 
is wise, to gain control of the education of the people, and espe- 
cially the opposing parties ? Will the catholic, if he can help it, 
send his children to protestant schools? Will he refuse to educate 
the children of heretics ? No. And if true wisdom governs the 
followers of scientific medicine, it will invite to its halls those who 
are deluded, and teach them the true science and art of healing. 
How was a general belief in dreams and witches driven from re- 
spectable society? By ridicule? No. Only by the dissemination 
of more accurate knowledge of the laws of nature that served as 
an antidote for these delusions. So if we would remove the 
dreamy absurdities of Hahnemann, we must by an extensive 
course in the chemical laboratory and by other correct and ac- 
curate scientific studies teach the votaries of this absurdity, how 
to interrogate nature and learn her laws, instead of creating imag- 
inary laws for her, as they do. 
Let us briefly consider the second resolution. This declares 
that the State in our form of government cannot successfully 
teach medicine or theology. 
Why ? Is it because there are unsettled questions in medicine 
about which there is controversy. If so, what can the State 
teach? It is not grammar or orthography. Can it be history ? 
Can it be Latin and Greek ? Can it be geology ? Political 
science ? Mental and moral philosophy ? Nay. There are dis- 
puted questions in all of these and also in astronomy the oldest 
in the sciences. Even the same system of mathematics that de- 
clares that two parallel lines are such as would never meet, how 
far so ever either way, both of them be produced, proves that 
two parallels would meet if produced to infinity, and bases im- 
portant calculations upon this assumption, and if geometers had 
been as quarrelsome as doctors are, they would never have pro- 
gressed, but would still be fighting over that definition of a point, 16 
which makes something and nothing of it in a single breath. 
Engineers and architects differ much in their estimates, and the state 
could, consequently; neither teach engineering or architecture ; 
and whoever thinks the state might teach law because it is more 
perfect and certain than medicine, had better get once in its toils, 
and he would speedily return to medicine for something fixed 
and definite. Would it not have been more rational for a society 
of medical men to have offered some proof to correct the false 
notion that medicine is unworthy to be ranked among the 
sciences, than to have helped to fasten this stigma long ago 
unjustly placed upon it by other professions'? On what fact of 
history did this committee base its assertion ? 
If the State should teach anything, it should teach medicine, 
for as Spencer has truly declared, “ first in importance to the 
individual is that knowledge necessary to self-preservation.” 
“If it be possible to perfect mankind, the means of doing so 
will be found in the medical sciences,” was a declaration of Des- 
cartes more than two centuries ago, and the learned Whewell 
in the last generation said : “Medicine is one of the greatest divi- 
sions of human culture, and must be considered as taking in the 
whole of physical sciences.” And still later another noted 
writer declares, that the “ study of medicine is the one best, 
suited to the development of the intellectual life.” Does it 
become our profession to defame their own studies as too narrow, 
vague, and s ctarian to be patronized by the State? Then, 
indeed, if the State can not discriminate what to teach in medi- 
cine, it can not discriminate what to employ. No medical charity 
can be sustained by the State. There can be no medical super- 
intendent for an insane asylum, almshouse or State hospital. 
No State Board of Health can be maintained, at any rate in 
this State, since one of the duties of its Secretary, as defined by 
law, is to collect knowledge respecting disease, and all useful 
information on the subject of hygiene, and through an annual 
report, or otherwise, to disseminate such information among the 
people. The Secretary of our State Board of Health was on 17 
the committee reporting this resolution, and voted for its pas- 
sage. 
Is it a wonder that an intelligent press should declare that 
these men forgot they were in the nineteenth century and thought 
they were in the fifteenth 1 
When the fourth resolution is considered, absurdity outdoes 
itself. If there was a violation of ethics, either in letter or 
spirit, by the admission of these homoeopathic students into the 
lecture rooms of the regular medical department, it was Dr. 
Rynd, a Regent of the University, and the members of the 
regular medical Faculty, who belonged to the State Society, who 
should have been disciplined. Was this attempted 1 No. It 
would not have been so efficient in frightening students away 
from the regular school. Instead of this they propose to refuse 
fellowship with the regular graduates of the University. Why ? 
Because they have been taught or believe medical heresy? No. 
Is it because they have done or declared their intention to do 
wrong 1 No. Is it because they are not as well qualified in 
their profession as others 1 No ; but because their teachers had 
revealed our art to others than the elect, in violation of the old 
law, originally proclaimed by the priests of the temples of yRs- 
culapius, who, having turned the therapeutic knowledge they 
possessed into a source of revenue and extortion, proclaimed 
that purely commercial policy that was lately ratified by the 
Michigan State Society. So these graduates, who, by their own 
acts, only offend by sitting in the same room with irregular stu- 
dents, whom they never invite to sit with them, are to be 
ostracized by men who for the past three years have been affec- 
tionately courting irregulars with a view to a closer union. 
Let us briefly consider what effect this frightening of regular 
students or the destruction of the regular department would have 
upon regular practice throughout the State and country. The 
homoeopath would argue, and many would believe, that it was be- 
cause regular medicine could not stand the comparison. It would 
be said when homoeopaths were admitted they had only twenty 18 
students and the regulars more than three hundred, now the reg- 
ulars have none, but the homoeopaths have a flourishing school. 
Does any man doubt that such a result would bolster up homoeo- 
pathy, and increase, at the expense of the regular, the homoeopath’s 
practice. In discussing this subject, the editor of a weekly paper, 
perfectly neutral on the question of homoeopathy, declared that 
in his opinion, if the “ regulars” were afraid to compete in the 
same University with the “irregular” practice, they would act 
just as they did at their last meeting of the State Society. 
Another editor declares that: “ In this State homoeopathy owes 
a debt of gratitude to the men who passed these resolutions.” 
Another says : “ Such action as theirs goes far to prove to the peo- 
ple that if either school must be abolished in the University it 
should not be the homoeopathic.” It is a good rule in morals to 
avoid not only evil but the appearance of evil, and it would be 
wise for our profession to avoid not only bigotry but the appear- 
ance of bigotry. 
Some, seeing the absurdity of urging the faculty to resign, 
strive all the same to force them into it, by joining their assail- 
ants, giving as an excuse for their attack that the faculty should 
have protested. 
The faculty have been protesting for more than twenty years, 
and had succeeded in keeping homeopathy out of the University 
by representing that the profession were so adverse to any false 
system of practice that they would not tolerate any “ compro- 
mise ” with irregular medicine, and that its introduction into the 
University, in any form, would be regarded as an insult to the 
regular profession, and alienate them from the Medical Depart- 
ment. Seeing that the faculty were successful, these men who 
had determined to ruin the school, by the report of Dr. Pratt to 
the Board of Regents, and the activity with which they engaged 
in, and gave prominence to the Board of Censors ” bill, gave 
the lie to the faculty’s protest, helped homeopathy into the Uni- 
versity, and then in derision call on them for another protest. 
Such impudence is only equalled by their passage of resolutions 19 
declaring our position to be inconsistent with honor, and then 
blandly assuring us that they intended no ecnsure, and that it ill- 
becomes us to resent their treatment! 
Is it a protest these men want 1 The faculty made one for them 
and they repudiated it. Let them now make their own protests. 
Let their protest be worthy of liberal men, who are more desir- 
ous to elevate their profession than to aid private medical 
schools. Let them ask the Legislature and Regents to elimi- 
nate all sectarianism from the University, and there will again 
be Union in our profession, and this contest, so disgraceful, will 
be at an end. And, if it so be that an investigation shall prove, 
as the State Society in effect asserts, that regular medicine is too 
narrow, bigoted and sectarian, to be worthy a place in a public 
educational system, though in sorrow for this degradation of our 
science, cheerfully for myself will I leave a position the duties 
of which for the past years, by the reason of these attacks of 
base rivals, and defense needful for existence, have seemed to 
me more like Paul’s fighting beasts at Ephesus than the legiti- 
mate work of a beneficent profession. 
Geo. E. Frothingham, M. D. 
Ann Arbor, August 28, 1876.