Notice of some of the leading events in the life of the late Dr. John Thomson, formerly professor of surgery to the Royal College of Surgeons, and of Military Surgery in the University of Edinburgh, and more recently professor of general pathology in the University.

Date:
1847
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Notice of some of the leading events in the life of the late Dr. John Thomson, formerly professor of surgery to the Royal College of Surgeons, and of Military Surgery in the University of Edinburgh, and more recently professor of general pathology in the University. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    tory of surgical diseases. He impressed on his pupils the necessity of studying well the phenomena and progress of those diseases which the surgeon is expected to treat; of discover- ing their natural tendencies and terminations; and of ascertaining, if possible, how much or how little they require of manual, or pro- per chirurgical, interference. He always studied also to distin- guish and appreciate the exact influence of remedies and opera- tions ; and it is believed that his example has tended more than that of any individual to diminish the number of operations, and to di- rect the minds of practitioners to the great use of medical treat- ment in surgical diseases, and to the value of what has been called medical surgery. In short, his course upon surgery was unequal- led in importance and judicious selection; and when students found how much information was communicated in an interesting manner in these lectures, they became indispensable to every one who desired to qualify himself for the conscientious discharge of his professional duties. Dr Thomson devoted much attention in his course to the dis- eases and injuries of the arteries and veins, to the pathological his- tory of aneurism, to the subject of injuries of the head, to the anatomico-pathological history of hernia, to the pathological his- tory of calculous and urinary affections, and to that of diseases of the joints; and all his pupils, who were competent to judge of his instructions at the time of receiving them, or who have since remembered them, will be able to bear testimony to the novelty as well as accuracy of his information, and to the high value of these lectures. It was not only, however, as an instructor who communicated correct and useful information, that Dr Thomson showed his pu- pils what surgical pathology really is, and what the scientific surgeon ought to be. By examining not only opinions, hypo- theses, and theories, but facts and statements of facts in the spirit of candid criticism and inquiry, he taught his pupils to observe, to think, and to reason for themselves; and by setting them the example of original and vigorous yet perfectly logical reasoning, he laboured to train their minds to that species of mental exercise, which is of all others the most useful to the medical practitioner, —the faculty of estimating the true value of medical doctrines, and the actual merits of various remedial measures. His lectures on syphilis and the use of mercury, and the pro- gressive but decided course which he adopted in demonstrating the pernicious effects of this fancied remedy, form a most conspicuous era in the history of modem pathology and therapeutics. Though several other practitioners had already begun to doubt whether mercury was really remedial in this dis'ease ; and both Mr Aber- nethy and Mr Pearson had, by describing affections which they