But an appeal to the sum-total of the funerals, to prove the efficacy of the fever-powder, is unfair and inconclusive, since a great number of deaths happen from disorders, accidents and casualties with which it cannot possibly have any connection. That it might have a fair trial, our calculation has been restricted to fevers; and if the other diseases, in which it is recommended, had been included, the evidence would have been still more unfavourable.
Another argument in favour of the powder is, _if it had not been attended with general success, it could not, amidst the opposition of Physicians, have grown into reputation_. But transitions, from the highest approbation of antimony, to the absolute condemnation of it, have been so frequent, and are so familiar to those acquainted with its history, that no conclusion can be drawn from its casual reputation, or transitory condemnation; and since, in the course of our enquiry, no advantage has been taken of the penal laws enacted against its use, nor of the public edicts by which it has been prohibited, neither can any concession be made on account of the transient applause, _artfully_, obtained to some of its preparations.
As to the opposition of physicians, the Inventor, indeed, that the prophecy with which he set out might be fulfilled[83], complains, that all laws human and divine, have been trampled upon in opposing him; that he has been persecuted with _malice, rancour, virulence, detraction and unprovoked revenge_, and that his enemies have not only sacrificed _candour, honour, truth and reputation_, but even the _lives_ committed to their care, in order to discredit his boasted arcanum[84].
Were we not witnesses of his triumph, we should naturally conclude that he had suffered as a martyr in the cause of truth and humanity. Yet we find, in his Dissertation, many cases in which the powder was given under the sanction of eminent physicians, and these, too, produced by the author, in proof of its efficacy; though by his own account of the medicine, it is of all others the most improper to be used without an accurate knowledge of its composition, and cannot therefore be prescribed by physicians on any justifiable principles; although they may, from facility or complaisance, yield to the importunity and prejudice of the sick or their relations, and assent, even against their better judgement, to its administration.