In an address before the Medical and Surgical Society of Baltimore, January 17, 1859, Dr. Lewis H. Steiner defined quackery as that mode of practising medicine, which adopts one and the same remedy for every disease, of whatever origin or nature. Quackery, wherever found, is based upon a misapplication of some recognized principle or fact, and hence invariably presupposes the existence of a modicum of truth, as its starting-point.
Precisely as the counterfeit coin has a certain value with the unwary, on account of its resemblance to that which is genuine, so all quackery must proceed from a false application of a known truth, or an attempted imitation of this truth in various forms.
An analogy was drawn between a quack and the weaker animal in a dog-fight by a writer in "The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal," April 1, 1846. For, said he, it is a trait of human nature to side with the under-dog. And it is this trait which causes some people to be pleased at the quack's success, for they regard him, in a sporting sense, as a little dog, and demand for him fair play. The maudlin sympathies of such persons are aroused by the sight of an adventurer striving against odds, with one sole end in view, namely, the accumulation of shekels under false pretences.
Probably at no period in the world's history has charlatanry been more flourishing than during the first decade of the twentieth century, and that too in the face of unexampled progress in medical Science. The reason is not far to seek. The modern quack utilizes the power of the unconscious or subjective mind over the body. This is the effective agency, not only in so-called mental healing, but also in semi-scientific cures of various sorts, in faith-cures, as well as in the cures ascribed to relics and charms.[231:1] The widespread heralding of patent medicines is also founded upon the principle of auto-suggestion. The descriptions of symptoms and diseases in the advertisements of charlatans, suggest morbid ideas to the objective mind of the reader. These ideas, being then transferred to his subjective mind, exert an unwholesome influence upon his bodily functions.[231:2] His next procedure is the trial of some vaunted nostrum. Thus the shrewd empiric thrives at the expense of his fellow men. He takes a mean advantage of their credulity, though probably in most cases unaware of the vicious psychological processes, which render many his willing dupes.
It has been aptly remarked that the public is ever more ready to believe pleasing fictions, than disagreeable verities. Populus vult decipi, trite saying though it be, is as true to-day as at any time in the past. If it were not so, quackery could not thrive. Gladly the people "honors pay to those who on their understandings most impose." Apropos of the methods of charlatans, is the story of a certain Scotch farmer, whose success in selling his cattle at high prices aroused the curiosity of his neighbors. One day, when fuddled with drink, after much coaxing, he revealed the secret by saying: "On going to sell my beasties, I first finds a fool, and then I shoves 'em on to him."[232:1]
Dr. William Osler, in his "Aequanimitas and Other Addresses" (1904), remarked that "Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers"; and in matters medical the ordinary citizen of to-day has not one whit more sense than the Romans of old, whom the witty Greek writer Lucian scourged for a credulity which made them fall easy victims to the quacks of the second century. Man has an inborn craving for medicine. Heroic dosing for several generations has given his tissues a thirst for drugs; and now that the pharmacists have cloaked even the most nauseous remedies, the temptation is to use physic on every occasion.
Dudley F. Sicher, in the "Popular Science Monthly," September, 1905, comments on the enormous development of quackery, which has been more than commensurate with the growth of medical science and the advance of western civilization, in recent years. According to this authority, the number of resident quacks in Berlin, Germany, has increased sixteen-fold since 1874. And in New York City, there are approximately twenty thousand, against six thousand regular practitioners. "Given on the one hand the limitations of scientific medicine, the dread of disease, and the power of auto-suggestion, and on the other hand, depraved humanity, hard-driven in the struggle for existence, and you have the essential parts, which, with a few minor pieces, make up the quackery machine. . . . Psycho-therapeutics and knowledge of human nature make up the quack's entire outfit." The popular distrust of legitimate Medicine facilitates a recourse to the alleged marvellous specifics and panaceas, so extensively advertised; lineal descendants of the magical remedies of old.
Then, too, the secrecy and mystery associated with the remedies of quacks, appeal strongly to the popular fancy.
Charles Dickens wrote in "Barnaby Rudge" that it was only necessary to invest anything, however absurd, with an air of mystery, in order to give it a secret charm and power of attraction, which people are unable to resist. False prophets, he said, false priests, false doctors, false prodigies of whatever kind, veiling their proceedings in mystery, have always addressed themselves at an immense advantage, to the popular credulity, and have been, perhaps, more indebted to that resource in gaining and keeping for a time the upper hand of Truth and Common Sense, than to any half-dozen items in the whole catalogue of imposture. To awaken curiosity and to gratify it by slow degrees, yet leaving something always in suspense, is to establish the surest hold that can be had, in wrong, on the unthinking portion of mankind.
