palpitation of the heart, ulcers of the legs and swelling of the feet," with a hundred other symptoms. Now suppose that, instead of the chalk, a few drops of pure cold water had been given to each of the twenty men in question, and they had been watched, and their symptoms noted, as in the other case—it might be shown, by the same kind of experience, that five drops of water did actually produce effects equally numerous and equally important.
Now this is the kind of testimony by which Homœopathy is supported—ridiculous in its character, unreasonable in its nature, and directly contradicted by all reliable experience. But whenever we attempt to show its absurdity and falsity, we are met by its advocates with certain stereotyped arguments which they appear to consider unanswerable. They tell us that the authors of great discoveries have always been opposed and persecuted, and point us to Copernicus, Galileo, Herschel and Newton; and because these men met with opposition when they first announced those discoveries which subsequent observations verified, they infer that Homœopa-
