MR. MILLICAN AND HOMCEOPATHY.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR:]
Sra,—It is neither my desire nor my intention to raise a con- troversy in your columns, but in reference to a paragraph in the Spectator of December 31st, will you permit me to correct an erroneous impression into which you, in common with other journals, appear to have fallen ?
After naming my authorities in support of ipecacuanha as a remedy in vomiting, you say :—" There cannot be a doubt that, so far as it goes, that does tend to support the principle that similia similibus curantur ; but then, it does not go very far," &c. Now, Sir, the natural inference from this would be that I am a homceopathist, and as such, concerned to establish the truth of the above principle as a general rale of therapeutics; whereas I am not a homceopath, and my contention in the Times and Globe controversies was simply this :—Where A and B differ so essentially on first principles that A regards B's chief rule of practice as axiomatically absurd—i.e., com- parable to such a statement as that "a part is greater than the whole "—it is obvious that any discussion, reasoning, or inter- course on this point between them must be futile. But the moment A allows that the condition of things generalised in the disputed rule occurs in even one instance, then it must be conceded that it may possibly occur in others ; and the fact that the experience of A leads him to accord it a much smaller extent of application than that granted by B as the result of his experience, surely cannot justify A in regarding B as either a liar or a fool, and declining all farther intercourse with him in 58 Welbeck Street, Cavendish Square, W, January 3rd.
[We regret the misinterpretation to which our remark was obviously open.—ED. Spectator.]
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