Take a little rum
The less you take the better
Pour it in the lakes
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Take a little rum
The less you take the better
Pour it in the lakes
Of Wener or of Wetter.
Dip a spoonful out
And mind you don't get groggy,
Pour it in the lake
Of Winnipissiogie.
Stir the mixture well
Lest it prove inferior,
Then put half a drop
Into Lake Superior.
Every other day
Take a drop in water,
You'll be better soon
Or at least you oughter.

This is the way that physicians mend or end us,
Secundum artem: but although we sneer
In read more

This is the way that physicians mend or end us,
Secundum artem: but although we sneer
In health--when ill, we call them to attend us,
Without the least propensity to jeer.

The rich Physician, honor'd Lawyers ride,
Whilst the poor Scholar foots it by their side.
[Lat., Dat read more

The rich Physician, honor'd Lawyers ride,
Whilst the poor Scholar foots it by their side.
[Lat., Dat Galenus opes, dat Justinianus honores,
Sed genus species cogitur ire pedes.]

You tell your doctor, that y' are ill
And what does he, but write a bill,
Of read more

You tell your doctor, that y' are ill
And what does he, but write a bill,
Of which you need not read one letter,
The worse the scrawl, the dose the better.
For if you knew but what you take,
Though you recover, he must break.

Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to read more

Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them
And show the heavens more just.

It requires a great deal of faith for a man to be cured by his own placebos.

It requires a great deal of faith for a man to be cured by his own placebos.

Even as a Surgeon, minding off to cut
Some cureless limb, before in use he put
His read more

Even as a Surgeon, minding off to cut
Some cureless limb, before in use he put
His violent Engins on the vicious member,
Bringeth his Patient in a senseless slumber,
And grief-less then (guided by use and art),
To save the whole, sawes off th' infected part.
- Guillaume de Salluste Du Bartas,

The only profession that labors incessantly to destroy the reason for its own existence.

The only profession that labors incessantly to destroy the reason for its own existence.

So liv'd our sires, ere doctors learn'd to kill,
And multiplied with theirs the weekly bill.

So liv'd our sires, ere doctors learn'd to kill,
And multiplied with theirs the weekly bill.