Health, or, How to Live
NO MEDICINE
THE following is a sketch of the conversation said to have passed between Thomas Jefferson and D. P. Thompson, when about establishing the University of Virginia: HHTL 333.1
“Do you design a Medical Department in the University?” HHTL 333.2
“I think not. Anatomy to be sure, is a science; but I have no confidence in Materia Medica, which I have long since banished from my family, choosing rather to rely on nursing and nature for a cure. My attention was first called to this subject when I was Minister to France. During my residence in Paris, my daughter was seized with typhus fever, and I sent for a physician, who was called the most eminent and successful one in the city. He came, examined the patient, gave some directions about nursing, and departed, giving no medicine and leaving none to be given. The same course was taken the next day, and the next, when growing uneasy I said to him: HHTL 333.3
“Doctor, you don’t appear to be doing anything for my daughter. What is the reason?” HHTL 333.4
“The reason is I wish her to get well. I had supposed you knew what my system of practice was, or you would not have sent for me.” HHTL 333.5
“No; what is it?” HHTL 333.6
“To have the most careful nursing, leave the disease to wear itself out, and let nature do the rest, but give no medicine.” HHTL 333.7
“Well, sir, though still uneasy, I acquiesced in the course, and the result was, my daughter recovered with a constitution uninjured by mineral medicine.” Since then — a period of nearly thirty years — I have been my own doctor, and scrupulously following the system of this French physician, have practiced not only in my own family, but among the colored people on my plantation, taking them all through the worst of fevers, and never losing a single patient.” — Health Journal. HHTL 333.8