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HISTORY OF DENTAL SURGEEY ' 183

• ' ' NEW DEPARTURE '
' ACCEPTED CREED. CREED.
IV. "A tooth that is worth filling IV. "A tooth that can be so treated
at all is worth filling with gold. as to be satisfactorily filled with
anything is worth filling.
V. " 'Unskillful and unscrupulous' V. ''Skillful and scrupulous dentists
dentists filled with tin covered with fill with tin covered with gold,
gold, thereby causing galvanic ac- thereby preventing decay, pulpitis,
tion, pulpitis, death of the pulp, ab- death of the pulp, and abscess, and
cess, and loss of the tooth. thereby saving the tooth.
VI. "A filling, to be good, must not VI. A filling may be the best known
leak. for the tooth and yet leak badly.
VII. "Gutta-percha, properh/ used, VII. "Gutta-percha, properly vsed,
is good enough for temporary fill- is the most permanent filling mate-
ings. rial we possess.
VIII. "A good gutta-percha filling, VIII. "A poor gutta-percha filling
in its proper place, is better than a in its proper place, is better thau
poor gold one. a good gold one.
IX. "Amalgam, per se, is a poor fill- IX. "Amalgam, per .^e, is an excel-
ing material. lent filling material.
X. "The use of 'plastic' filling ma- X. "The use of 'plastic' filling ma-
terials tends to lower the standard terials tends to lower that dentistry
of dentistry, thereby diminishing which has for its standard of ex-
its sphere of usefulness. cellence 'ability to make gold fill-
ings,' but very much extends the
sphere of usefulness of that dentis-
try which has for its standard of
"
excellence 'ability to save teeth.'
It may be doubted whether articles four and five of the "accepted creed"
were ever generally accepted, certainly they were not universally. A great
many men filled teeth with amalgam which, for various reasons, they could
not, or did not think it advisable to fill with gold, and also a great many made
combination fillings of gold and tin in various ways, in both cases irrespective
of their belief, or notwithstanding their disbelief, in the new departure theories.
Article ninth was true at that time as regards almost all of the amalgams
in use, but is not true now of the best of the amalgam alloys. With these a
filling can be made, in a place appropriate for it, that will be a very close