Religion and disease are synonymous.

 

Feeling it a duty I owe myself and others to define my position as a man and a doctor so that I may not be misrepresented, I take this method to lay before the public my ideas so that they, being my judges, can decide the merits of my claim. For three years, I have been in this city attending to the duties of my practice without interfering in any way with the world outside of my business. I have given my whole attention to the sick, believing that my method of healing is entirely new and unknown to the world, and my object is to reduce it to a science so that it can be practiced by everyone for his own good. This is the sole reason why I remain here. I seek no favors of any one. I do not write this to get patients, for I have as many as I can attend to, but to separate myself from all others who see fit to assign me a place among the humbugs of the day.

The first writer in the mental-science period to employ the term "New Thought," capitalized.

Dr. William H. Holcombe(1825-1893) was born at Lynchburg, Va., May 29, 1825, of an old Virginia family; his grandfather having served in the Continental army, and his father was a distinguished physician of the old school. Dr. William H. Holcombe was sent to the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1847. He removed to Cincinnati, and was there during a siege of Asiatic cholera, which caused him to become interested in homeopathy. The great success he met with in his experiments induced him to devote himself to the new school of medicine, and he became one of its most talented disciples. Dr. Holcombe went to Natchez, Miss., in 1852, and he and his partner, Dr. Davis, were appointed physicians and surgeons to the Mississippi State hospital. In 1864 Dr. Holcombe removed to New Orleans, where he made his home until his death, Nov. 28, 1893. He was chairman of the Yellow Fever commission in 1878, and published an excellent report of the work done during the epidemic of that year. For many years he was one of the editors of the North American Journal of Homeopathy, and president of the American Institute of Homeopathy in 1876. He was the author of several books and treatises, publishing, in 1852, "The Scientific Basis of Homeopathy," and, in 1856, "Yellow Fever, and its Homeopathie Treatment." Dr. Holcombe also wrote 2 volumes of poetry, and 8 religious works, embodying the doctrines of Swedenborg. His last literary composition, "The Truth About Homeopathy," was completed a few days before his death. Dr. Holcombe was a man of lofty and noble nature, and of tenderest charity, a true philanthropist, who won the respect and devotion of all who knew him. William Henry Holcombe, physician, practised his profession in Lynchburg, Virginia, Cincinnati, Ohio, and New Orleans, Louisiana. In 1874-'5 he was president of the American institute of homoeopathy. He published a number of books contributing to both homoeopathic and Swedenborgian literature. Holcombe, was the first writer in the mental-science period to employ the term "New Thought," capitalized, to designate the new teaching in the sense in which the term is now used. In his pamphlet, Condensed Thoughts about Christian Science, 1887, Dr. Holcombe says,