Address on the progress and dignity of the medical profession : delivered before the trustees, faculty, students and friends of the Starling Medical College at its annual commencement, February 17, 1849 / by B.T. Cushing.

  • Cushing, B. T.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Address on the progress and dignity of the medical profession : delivered before the trustees, faculty, students and friends of the Starling Medical College at its annual commencement, February 17, 1849 / by B.T. Cushing. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    infected districts, stood by the bed-side of disease, and dared the tainted atmosphere of the dissecting room. Every avenue to knowledge which human ingenuity could devise has been explored, and the ravages of the pestilence have thus been materially abated. It is true no means are yet discovered to reach its advanced stages, nor is it probable that there will be. Its poison seems too rapid and subtle for any mechanical agent to meet, when it has once pervaded the entire system. Nor can all be guarded from its approach. It must have its appropriate victims;—the intemperate, the uncleanly, the careless and debilitated—and,—we know not for what wise purposes,—some noble and worthy among us will be drawn into its dreadful whirlpool. But we cannot fail to give the Medical Profession high praise for their labors in this respect, accompanied with the hope that they may yet have more abundant success. This brings me to the most important portion of my subject—one, in which, more than all others, physicians have progressed during the last fifty years. I mean the branches of Pathology, or The Science of What constitutes a Disease—and Nosology, which treats of the various Sorts of Diseases, their Origin and Symp- toms, and strives to classify them as a Whole. Here shines resplendent the dry light, of the genius of Bacon, and it is here that modern practitioners partic- ularly excel those of any former age. The great error of the ancients was to establish ab- stract speculation for experience, theory for fact. They framed hypotheses instead of questioning Nature, and loved rather to form sects and captivate public opinion with subtle doctrines than apply themselves to the se-