Plagues

The question of the need for new books upon medical topics must ever remain undecided, by general agreement, in the medical profession.
There is no such thing in medical literature as an insistent demand from the profession for new volumes upon old topics.
Authors need not hope, therefore, to create the impression that they are meeting long-felt though unexpressed wants of medical readers in launching new books.
On the other hand, the creator of a new volume upon an old subject should seek justification for literary paternity in the progressive changes in the status of our knowledge of disease, its causes, prevention, and cure. Such changes are admittedly going on with a certain degree of constancy and at such a rate of frequency that new presentations of old themes, are both justified and desirable from time to time.