But the Bible furnished Simpson with the most powerful argument of all in Genesis ii. 21, where it is written: “And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam; and he slept; and He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh instead thereof.” He strengthened his position by explaining that the word rendered “deep sleep” might more correctly be translated “coma” or “lethargy.” He had taken the full measure of his opponents when he answered them with this quotation; it was a reply characteristic of the man, and completely defeated these self-constituted theologians with their own weapons. They had attacked him as a man of science, and found 129 that his knowledge of the Scriptures excelled their own. He did not fail to read these people a lesson, and point out the harm done to true religion by such conduct and arguments as theirs, reminding them that if God had willed pain to be irremovable no possible device of man could ever have removed it.
Such was the great fight—the fight for anæsthesia—which Simpson fought and won. He was the one man who by his own individual effort established the practice of anæsthesia, while Morton has the honour of being the one man without whom anæsthesia might have remained unknown. Such was the opposition encountered, and such was the timidity of his professional brethren, that but for Simpson’s courageous efforts it would have been the work of years to bring about what it was granted to him to accomplish in a brief period; if fear, ridicule, contempt, and bigotry had not perhaps sunk the new practice into oblivion. Of the hundreds who are daily mercifully brought under the influence of chloroform and ether, few are aware what they owe to Simpson, even if they know how great is the suffering which they are spared.
Simpson felt that the victory was indeed complete when in April, 1853, he received a letter from Sir James Clark, physician in ordinary to Her Majesty, informing him that the Queen had been brought under the influence of chloroform, and had expressed herself as greatly pleased with the result. It was at the birth of the late Prince Leopold that Her Majesty set her subjects this judicious example.
Much trouble to the cause was occasioned by enthusiasts who administered chloroform with more zeal than discretion, and without any study of the principles laid down by Simpson. As a result of imperfect trials, some persons went the length of saying that there were people whom it was impossible to anæsthetise at all, and others who could be only partially anæsthetised. Wrong methods of administration were used. Simpson patiently corrected these, and carefully instructed his students, so that the young graduates of Edinburgh University carried his teaching and practice into all parts of the world. Syme also took up the cause, and valuable work was done in London by Snow, and later by Clover. The teaching of Simpson and Syme led to such successful results that their methods are followed by the Edinburgh School to this day practically unaltered. So satisfactory an agent is chloroform in Edinburgh hands, that other anæsthetics are in that city but rarely called into requisition. All the world over it is the anæsthetic in which the general practitioner places his trust.
Having seen what Simpson did for anæsthesia, we may briefly review what anæsthesia has done for humanity. That it has entirely abolished the pain attendant upon surgery is easily recognised by the profession and patients alike. The patient never begs for mercy nowadays; he dreads the anæsthetic more than the knife; he has no anxiety as to whether he 131 will feel pain or not, but rather as to whether he will come round when the operation is over; happily after one experience he realises that his fears were unfounded, and, if need be, will submit cheerfully to a second administration.
The horrors of the operating-room referred to in the preceding chapter were vanquished with the pain; the surgeon has no longer to steel himself for the task as formerly, to wear a stern aspect and adopt a harsh manner. The patient has no longer to be held down by assistants; instead of having to be dragged unwillingly to the operating-table—a daily occurrence sickening to the hearts of fellow-patients and students, while it served only to harden the surgeon and the experienced old nurse of those days—he will walk quietly to the room, or submit patiently to be carried there, and at a word from the surgeon prepare
“... to storm
The thick, sweet mystery of chloroform,
The drunken dark, the little death-in-life.”