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from Sarah Josepha Hale, Woman's Record; or Sketches of Distinguished Women, from the Creation to A. D. 1854 Arranged in Four Eras with Selections from Female Writers of Every Age [New York: Harper and Brothers, Publishers, 1855, reprinted 1970 by Source Book Press of New York, NY] pp. 757-761

      Wife of T. L. Nichols, M. D., formerly an Allopathic physician in the city of New York, where he is now an eminent "Water Cure" practitioner, with whom she is in profession associated. Before her marriage with Dr. Nichols, which took place in 1848, she conducted with great success a Water Cure establishment in that city, and was widely known as Mrs. Gove -- her name by a former marriage -- the physician for her own sex.

      Few, among living women, deserve more respect than Mrs. Gove-Nichols; she has, in her own example, illustrated the beneficial results of knowledge to her sex, the possibility of success under the greatest difficulties, and above all, the importance that women, as well as men, should have an aim in life, -- the high and holy aim of doing good.

      Mrs. Gove-Nichols, whose maiden name was Neal, was born in 1810; her native place was Goffstown, State of New Hampshire, where her early years were passed. The advantages of education for girls were at that time very limited, and Mary Neal was not in a favoured position to secure even these. But she had an ardent desire to acquire knowledge, and become useful; and Providence, as she believes, aided her fervent wish. When a young girl, chance threw in her way a copy of Bell's Anatomy; she studied it in secret, and received that bias toward medical science which decided her destiny. Every medical book she could obtain she read, and when these were taken from her, she turned her attention to ?French and Latin, -- good preliminary studies for her profession, though she did not then know it.

      When about eighteen years of age, she commenced writing for newspapers; these poems, stories, and essays, are only of importance as showing the activity of her genius, which then, undeveloped and without an aim, was incessantly striving upward. Soon after her marriage with Mr. Gove, a work fell her way which gave the true impulse to her ardent temperament. We will give the account in Mrs. Gove's own words, premising that, at about the same time she read the works of Dr. John Mason Good, and her attention was particularly arrested by his remarks on the use of water; and from his writings, and the Book of Health, which she read during the year 1832, she became convinced of the efficacy of cold water in curing disease.

      "My warrant for this practice," she says, "was obtained wholly from these books. It was not till years afterward, that I heard of Preissnitz and Water Cure, as I now practice i t. From this time I was possessed with a passion for anatomical, physiological, and pathological study. I could never explain the reason of this intense feeling to myself or others; all I know is, that it took possession of men, and mastered me wholly; it supported me through efforts that would otherwise have been to me inconceivable and insupportable. I am naturally timid and bashful; few would be likely to believe this who only see my doings without being acquainted with me. But timid as I was, I sought assistance from scientific and professional men. I went through museums of morbid specimens that, but for my passion for knowledge, would have filled me with horror. I looked on dissections till I could see a woman or child dissected with far more firmness than I could now look upon the killing of an animal for food. My industry and earnestness were commensurate, notwithstanding my health was far from being firm. I had innumerable difficulties to contend against. When I am dead, these may be told for the encouragement of others -- not till then. When I retired to rest at night, I took my books with me the last minute I could keep awake was devoted to study, and the first light that was sufficient, was improved in learning the mysteries of our wonderful mechanism. My intense desire to learn seemed to make every one willing to help me who had knowledge to impart. Kindness from the medical profession, and the manifestation of a helpful disposition towards my undertakings, were every where the rule.

      After my marriage I resided for several years in New Hampshire, and then moved to Lynn, Mass., near Boston. Here I engaged in teaching, and had many more facilities for pursuing my studies than ever before.

      In 1837, I commenced lecturing in my school on anatomy and physiology. I had before this given one or two lectures before a Female Lyceum, formed by my pupils and some of their friends. At first I gave these health lectures, as they were termed, to the young ladies of my school, and their particular friends whom they were allowed to invite, once in tow weeks; subsequently, once a week. In the autumn of 1838, I was invited by a society of ladies in Boston to give a course of lectures before them on anatomy and physiology. I gave this course of lectures to a large class of ladies, and repeated it afterward to a much larger number. I lectured pretty constantly for several years after this beginning in Boston,. I lectured in Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Ohio, and also on the island of Nantucket. Physicians were uniformly obliging and friendly to me. I do not now recollect but one exception, and this was a 'doctor,' who I believe honestly thought that knowledge was, or would be injurious to women, and therefore he opposed me in my efforts to teach. I have forgotten his name, and I presume the world will do the same. But I have not forgotten, and never can forget, the many who have held out the hand of help to me, and through me to others, for i have never learned selfishly; what I have gained for myself I have gained for others.

      The passion that has possessed me from my first reading on pathology, I consider providential. I believe fully, that I have been set apart from my birth for a peculiar work. I may be called enthusiastic and superstitious for this conviction, but it is mine as much as my life. My ill health, from earliest infancy, the poverty and struggles through which I have passed, and the indomitable desire which I have had to obtain knowledge, all seem to me so many providences. During the time that I studies alone, my enthusiasm never for one moment failed. Day and night, in sickness and in health, the unquenchable desire for knowledge and use burned with undiminished flame. I studied day and night, though all the time I had to labour for bread, -- first with my needle, and later with a school.

      It may be said that I wan an enthusiast, and that my enthusiasm sustained me. I grant this; but will those who make this assertion define the word enthusiasm? To me it means, as it meant through those many long years, an unfaltering trust in God, and an all-pervading desire to be useful to my fellow-beings. If these constitute religious enthusiasm, them I am an enthusiast."

      We can add little to this graphic sketch of Mrs. Gove-Nichols, except to give a selection or tow from her latest works, which will show here persevering efforts in the profession she has chosen, rather than her literary merits. Of her remarkable talents, there can be no doubt, nor of her sincerity. Whether she is or is not right, time must determine.

      Besides these engrossing medical persuits, Mrs. Gove found time to continue her literary studies. In 1844, she commenced writing for the Democratic Review; she wrote the "Medical Elective Papers," in the American Review, and was a contributor to Godey's Lady's Book. She prepared her "Lectures to Ladies on Anatomy and Physiology," which work was published by the Harpers in 1844. They also published, about the same time, Mrs. Gove's little novel, "Uncle John, or is it too much trouble," under the nomme de plume of Mary Orne, which she assumed when writing fictitious tales. In this way she sent forth "Agnes Norris, or the Heroines of Domestic Life," and "The Two Loves, or Eros and Anteros;" both written in the hurry of overburdened life, and, as might be expected, evincing that the spirit was prompting to every means of active exertion, while the natural strength was not sufficient for all these pursuits.

      It is not my object to attack any school of medicine. I wish to give a very brief history of the principles and practice of the scientific schools of medicine, and also to give some results of my own labours in water-cure.

      I know that it is considered, by some, presumption for a woman to come before the public as a physician. It is very unpleasant to some to see long-established customs broken, and long-cherished prejudices set at nought, even when a great good is to be achieved. But this is by no means the only class of persons in the community.

      "Upward and onward," is the governing thought and the impelling motive of thousands. To these I speak -- to these I bring the results of my investigations and my labours. The thought and the deed commend themselves to such as these with no hindrance from respectable custom or grey-headed prejudice.

      In looking over the history of medical science, we find that Allopathy has great claims on our respect. The Allopathic school has always insisted on its professors being educated.

      Whatever has been known of anatomy, physiology, and pathology, in the past, has been taught by the Allopathic school; and there is no difference between the professors of Allopathy and Homeopathy in this respect. Both insist on thorough education. Both schools have been laborious in noting the characteristic symptoms of disease, and the effects of what they considered remedies. Perhaps the Homeopathic school has been most earnest and assiduous in this last work; but Homoeopathy being of recent date, must rest its claims to our gratitude more on the zeal and minuteness of its observations and discoveries, than on the length of its days, or the voluminousness of its records. The members of the Allopathic profession have differed with regard to the primary cause of disease. Those of the Homoeopathic profession, I believe, have been united.

      Amongst the Allopathists, one portion have advocated what was termed the Humoral Pathology, and another, the Nervous Pathology. Of all the nervous pathologists, Dr. Billings is clearest. He says, "all diseases have exhausted nervous influence for their cause." He says further, --

      "During health, the capillary arteries go on with the work of nutrition and secretion, the muscles are fed, the mucous surfaces are lubricated just enough to prevent any sensation from the substances that pass along them -- the serous surfaces are made sufficiently soft to slide upon each other without sensation, and the skin is kept soft by an insensible vapour. All this time, there is another process going on, which is the removal of superfluous matter by the absorbents."

      After demonstrating that all these processes are carried on by the nervous energy, Dr. Billings shows by irrefragable argument, that the loss of this energy must produce disease.

      Boehaave seems, in the latter part of his life, to have had a glimpse of this doctrine; indeed, he admitted the agency of the nervous power. In proof of this, we may mention that in the 755th of his aphorisms, where he lays down the proximate cause of intermitting fevers, he makes a change in the fourth edition. Hitherto it had stood -- "Whence, after an accurate examination of the whole history, the proximate cause of intermittents is established to be viscosity of the arterial fluid." To this in the fourth edition is added, "perhaps, also, the inertia of the nervous fluid as well of the cerebrum as of the cerebellum destined for the heart."

      This theory of disease is shadowed in Cullen. According to Cullen, the sysstem is superintended and regulated b a mobile and conservative energy seated in the brain, acting wisely but necessarily for the good of the whole. This energy, he considers to be distinct from the soul, and acting not only for the preservation, but the recovery of health.

      Faint traces of this theory of disease may be found in the Brunonian system.

      Darwin carries the idea farther, under the name of sensorial fluid. Broussais comes next to Brown with his theory of "organic contractility."

      Humeral Pathology asserts, that morbid changes in the blood are the cause of disease.

      Homoeopathy asserts that psora i s the cause of disease.

      A little reflection shown that all these statements are true, and that it would be an error for either school to assert that the evil it sees is only the cause of disease.

      It is clear, that if all the functions of they system are carried on, and the whole maintained in a state of health by the nervous energy, then if this nervous energy is wasted by any abuse, either by too much labour, too much thought, the domination of passion, or by taking poisonous stimulants, the nervous power had been left to do its work.

      Thus we see that the observations of nervous and humoral pathologists have all been valuable and truthful.

      The practice of both these schools is understood. It is to give as remedies the most virulent poisons known to us.

      The extreme minuteness of the doses used by homoeopaths, has been a great recommendation to those who have seen the bad effects of allopathic doses, and yet have not lost their faith in medicine.

      I have used homoeopathic medicine with care and in entire good faith, upon myself and my patients. The result of my trials with it has been to convince me, that though it has been and is, a great negative good to the world, it has no positive efficacy. But the hygienic rules insisted on by Homoeopathists are worthy of all praise.

      With regard to allopathy, I must say that I studied it honestly, and because it poisons and oppresses the human constitution with drugs, and debilitates it with bleeding. I consider it one of the greatest evils that now rests upon the civilized world. But I do not attach the blame of this evil to individual practitioners of the art. Monarchy and despotism are bad -- gigantic in their badness, but kings and despots may be good men.

      These evils have their origin with the people, and our only hope of removing them is in promoting the intelligence of the people.

      I maintain that the cause of disease is one -- the want of nervous energy. Numerous occasions spring from this cause. In the fact, that diseasing matter is left in the system, not only for years but for generations, is seen the foundation of the assertion of all homoeopathic school, that psora is the cause of all disease.

      The great questions for humanity are, What is the cause of disease? and what remedial treatment is best?

      As a water cure physician, I maintain that nervous energy is restored, and morbid matter cast out of the system, by means of the proper application of water cure.

      We see that in case of disease, morbid matter must be expelled from the system, and by means of the nervous energy. It becomes important, then, to know whether we shall add to the evil already in the system, and to the labour of the already enfeebled vital energy, the most virulent poisons known to us, and which are called medicines, and thus still farther waste the vital energy by compelling it to strive to expel the poison of the disease and the poison of the medicine at once.

      I contend that we can add to the vital power continually, by the water cure.

      With regard to the evils of blood-letting, I have only to say in the language of Scripture, "the blood is the life." The regular medical profession is rapidly purifying itself from the heresy of blood-letting, or the taking of life of patients.

      Majendie, Marshall, Hall, Eberle, and many others, are doing this work, and there is no doubt that the good sense of the community is aiding in it more than physicians or people are aware.

      It is impossible to do any justice to the subject of blood-letting in a paragraph, and I shall not therefore attempt it. In my "Lectures to Ladies on Anatomy and Physiology," page 226, some interesting facts and authorities are given. The regular profession of medicine has been, and is, the depository of much knowledge. My hope is, that it will not lag behind the age.

      It is known that the faculty bleed less, and give less medicine, and use more water, than formerly. I see no good reason why this reform should not go on progressively with the intelligence and consequent demand of the public.

      The greatest men in the profession have sanctioned the use of water. Hippocrtes, the father of medicine, used water in his treatment of disease. His works bear testimony to the cure of cramp, convulsions, gout, and tetanus, by water.

      Galen, who lived in the second century, cured fever with water only.

      Celsus recommends water for the cure of certain diseases.

      Boerhaave recommends water to make the body firm and strong.

      Hoffman, a contemporary of Boehaave, wrote on water for the cure of disease. He said if there was a universal medicine, it was water. Hahn also wrote on water cure; and one of the best water cure works was written by Currie, a Fellow of the Royal Society, Liverpool, and published in 1799.

      In 1749, Rev. John Wesley published a work on water cure. He gives a list of eighty diseases curable by water.

      Dr. Billings and others have had a correct theory of disease. Their error has been in introducing medicines into the system, which they thought increased the nervous or contractile power. the medicines being poison, and recognized a such by the vital organism, have aroused all the energy left in the body to cast them out. The poison has not increased the power, but stimulated what remained, to action, and has thus resulted in still greater wastage to the system. Increase of action has been mistake for increase of power, and the stimulation of poison for the tonic or strengthening effects of medicine.

      The frightful effects of various kinds of medicine can hardly be exaggerated. One of the most common in calomel.

      Salivation and the destruction of the organs of speech, and of the nose, incurable rheumatisms and paralysis, with rottenness of the bones, have been caused by calomel, and minor ills produced by it are every where. But with regard to the effects of medicines, a volume would not do them justice.

      Of homoeopathic medicines, I must say, that if I believed in their potency at all, I should believe it an evil potency, because they are the poisons of allopathy. Chalk, charcoal, and cuttle-fish, and several other substances used by the homoeopathists, are exceptions. These, surely, cannot do injury. I should not fear to drink the water of Lake Superior, if a few grains of arsenic had been mixed with the whole of it. On the same principle I have never homoeopathic medicines.

      The darkness of this civilized era, with respect to the effects of medicines upon the human system, and the blind faith of even educated people in physicians, is to me one of the most astonishing phenomena in the world. But there is encouragement. Light -- more light, is the anxious cry of many.

      Some years since, I passed through the Albany Medical College. I saw there human bones that had rotted down under the poison of mercury. I saw tumours, ranged in glass vases, weighing from one to more than twenty pounds. Doctors had doubtless done all they could to cure disease. With what they had done, or in spite of it, the victims of ignorance and abuse had died. Knowledge would have saved them from suffering which cannot be described, and from premature death. When I saw these things, and many more that I cannot speak of, in the College, a devotion to woman -- to the work of spreading light on the subject of health than disease, was kindled in my heart, that death only can quench.

      I felt then that I would lay myself on the altar, and be burned with fire, if woman could be saved from the darkness of ignorance, and the untold horrors of her diseases.

      In 1848, I obtained books from England on the Water Cure, and much practical information from Henry Gardner Wright, an English gentleman, who spent some time in this country during that year. He brought several works on Water Cure, and being in bad health, he applied the water in his own case successfully at my father's house, where re remained some months. The books that he brought, the accounts that he gave me of Priessnitz' practice, and Water Cure practitioners in England, and his application of water in his own case, added to my practical knowledge and conviction on the subject, removed the last remnant of my faith in drugs, and induced me to practice water cure alone in every case that came under my care. I soon saw what qualifications are requisite to make a successful practitioner of water cure. There are no rules of practice applicable to all case, but the water cure physician must have judgment to adapt the treatment to the vital or reactive power possessed by the patient. A practice that would be eminently successful in one case, would surely destroy life in another. Care and ability in the diagnosis of disease, and skill in adapting the treatment to the strengths of and peculiar idiosyncrasy of the patient, are indispensable to success in water cure.

      In 1844, at the opening of Dr. Wesselhoeft's water cure house in Brattleborough, Vermont, I went to that place. I boarded near the water cure house for three months, and observed the practice very carefully. I also gave lectures to classes, composed of ladies who were under water treatment , and others. From Brattleborough I went to Lebanon Springs water cure house. They had no resident physician, and I concluded to remain for a time in that capacity. I took charge of the patients there for three months with the best success, and then came to New York, in the latter part of the autumn of 1844. I went to Dr. Shew's water cure house in Bond street, and attended to out-door practice till May, 1845, when I went to reside at my late water cure house, 261 Tenth street. There I have given lectures to classes of ladies, and have taken board and day-patients, and have also attended to out-door practice, as at my present residence.

      The first two years I had a large number of board-patients, who came from a distance, from Connecticut, Northern New York, Rhode Island, Ohio, Kentucky, and several from the southern States. During the past year, my practice has changed its character. Water cure houses have been established in different parts of the country, and patients can be treated nearer home; consequently, I have not had so many board-patients. I have now a much larger practice in the city, which is doubtless owing to the spread of intelligence respecting water cure amongst the people.

      I have looked over the records of my practice in this city, noting all failures and deaths, and their causes. Only two patients have died under my care -- both children; one died in t he summer of '47 and the other in the summer of '49. The first died of disease of the brain and dysentery, the last of dysentery. Both were about nine months of age; both were born of unhealthy mothers, and were scrofulous. They seemed not to be organized to live any longer.

      It may seem strange that, with a large practice, I have had so few deaths. I do not attribute this to my skill altogether, though I believe that I undersand my profession; but it has so happened.

      I am no looking toward the education of women as physicians, and particularly to attend midwifery practice. If our medical colleges are not soon opened to woman, others will be founded where she will be educated. The spirit of the age will not any longer submit to bonds.

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