Observations on the Oleum Jecoris Aselli, or Cod-liver

The introduction of a new therapeutical agent into general practice cannot fail to interest the medical profession and the public, and, profiting by the experience attained in a consideration of the manner in which former remedies have been brought into notice, extolled for their efficacy, persevered in for a time, and then gradually permitted to fall into disuse, and finally sink into oblivion, it will doubtless be useful to review the circumstances attendant upon the proposal now so generally entertained of the administration of the cod-liver oil for a variety of diseases and disorders.

One of the great evils attendant upon the introduction of a new remedy is the universality of its application to cases, often of very dissimilar nature. Its inefficiency to such a variety of purposes thereby speedily becomes apparent, and those disorders to which it may be beneficially applicable cease to be subjected to its operation: the novelty is gone; a prejudice against its use is created, and some new proposition speedily serves to banish it from a position it might probably, with advantage, have held in the Materia Medica.