Learn'd he was in medic'nal lore,
For by his side a pouch he wore,
Replete with strange read more

Learn'd he was in medic'nal lore,
For by his side a pouch he wore,
Replete with strange hermetic powder
That wounds nine miles point-blank would solder.

Because all the sick do not recover, therefore medicine is not an
art.
[Lat., Aegri quia non omnes read more

Because all the sick do not recover, therefore medicine is not an
art.
[Lat., Aegri quia non omnes convalescunt, idcirco ars nulla
medicina est.]

Who worse than a physician
Would this report become? But I consider
By med'cine life may be read more

Who worse than a physician
Would this report become? But I consider
By med'cine life may be prolonged, yet death
Will seize the doctor too. How ended she?

Learn from the beasts the physic of the field.

Learn from the beasts the physic of the field.

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.

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.

Water, air, and cleanness are the chief articles in my pharmacy.

Water, air, and cleanness are the chief articles in my pharmacy.

You behold in me
Only a travelling Physician;
One of the few who have a mission
read more

You behold in me
Only a travelling Physician;
One of the few who have a mission
To cure incurable diseases,
Or those that are called so.

We have to ask ourselves whether medicine is to remain a humanitarian and respected profession or a new but depersonalized read more

We have to ask ourselves whether medicine is to remain a humanitarian and respected profession or a new but depersonalized science in the service of prolonging life rather than diminishing human suffering.