physicians-from-france

"The well-informed surgeon must not consider it an unnecessary condescension to occupy himself with cares which the vulgar consider too minute and unimportant, but which, if neglected and forgotten, so often entail the most disastrous results."

"He was an excellent observer and a great worker, who knew how to adopt and adapt others' ideas very practically."

"OK, meet me tomorrow morning at eight. Sharp. Otherwise I leave."

"I may not have had any biological babies but I have many children—all those I have helped to survive and grow-up and still welcome me to their villages with glad cries of Mama Daktari. In Swahili, ‘Mama’ means ‘Madam’ or better still 'Mother', and in my heart this is what it means to me."

"He was a man of very clear judgment, of ripe experience, of solid wisdom, and deservedly occupies a place as one of the greatest of French surgeons of the nineteenth century."

"Some of his suggestions with regard to operations were important advances in abdominal and pelvic surgery. He was, lastly, noted as a great teacher of surgery and a consummate operator."

"Je le pansai, Dieu le guérit."

"A l’erreur opposons la vérité, à la foi l’évidence, la science aux religions. Les propagandistes religieux ne font connaître aux enfants qu’une seule doctrine. Faisons-leur connaître toutes les doctrines, non seulement dans leur état actuel, mais dans leur genèse et dans leur développement. Instruisons-les des ressemblances et des analogies qu’elles ont entre elles, et aussi des ressemblances et des analogies qu’ont entre eux leurs fondateurs et leurs propagateurs. Puis laissons-les libres de choisir entre les hypothèses, et si aucune des anciennes ne les satisfait, libres d’en imaginer de nouvelles."

"Pour être sûr qu'on n'aime que lui, il exige qu'on haïsse les siens et qu'on se haïsse soi-mèmc, ordre monstrueux qui est encore suivi à la lettre par les demi-fous de nos monastères."

"Les propos tenus par les hystériques ou les fous délirants sont tenus par les démons, avec lesquels Ieschou entre eu convcrsation."

"Il se livrait constamment au prosélytisme et avait des explosions de fanatisme contre les profanes, les sceptiques et les incrédules."

"La foi en leschou est si bien la condition essentielle pour entrer dans le royaume, que bons et mauvais y seront admis indscintement, puurvu qu'ils l'aient cru et suivi, ou qu'ils aient cru Iohanan le Baptiseur affirmant la mission du Nazaréen."

"Comme beaucoup de dégénérés, Ieschou n'avait pas le sentiment de la famille. Son indifférence à l'égard de sa mère eut pour résultat de placer la pauvre paysanne au dernier rang dans sa suite."

"Ce qui signifie: "Laisse ceux-là enterrer leurs morts qui, ayant refusé de me suivre, ne posséderont point la vie éternelle.""

"Le juif Joshua, que les chrétiens appellent Jésus-Christ, était un dégénéré vésanique, et, selon toute appatence, un mélancolique à délire systématisé. Vous savez, Messieurs, qu’en Orient les fous ont eu de tout temps un caractère sacré, et qu’on rencontre encore dans l’Inde et en Égypte des saints très analogues aux saints catholiques de la décadence latine et du moyen âge, les uns et les autres n’étant que psychopathes. Si les saints sont devenus si rares dans le monde civilisé, c’est qu’on les enferme. J’ai eu l’occasion d’entendre récemment dans un asile un délirant mystique d’une éloquence rare, et qui eût eu, à n’en pas douter, un succès considérable au temps des apôtres. Qu’on ait fait un Dieu de Joshua, comme on fit un prophète de Mohammed, lequel était un épileptique et un halluciné, rien là qui soit étonnant pour qui est au courant des mœurs orientales."

"Son temperament anarchiste sa haine des riches les lui fait écarter du divin séjour. L'un d'eux s'en étant allé tout triste parce qu'il lui avait ordonné de vendre ses biens et d'en donner le produit aux pauvres, il s'écrie."

"The most filthy, dismal, and hideous of all I ever witnessed, and I doubt if there can be any other in the world more repulsive. Another particularly odious Edict of Faith was the obligation of Goa’s citizens to spy on behalf of the Inquisition. [Its] infamy never reached greater depths, nor was more vile, more black, and more completely determined by mundane interests than at the Tribunal of Goa, by irony called the Holy Office. Here the Inquisitors went to the length of imprisoning in its jails women who resisted their advances, and after having satisfied their bestial instincts there, ordering that they be burnt as heretics."

"Cardan is the first, who in his fifth book, De Subtilitate, says, that , by conversion into ceruse, or by , gains one-thirteenth part in weight, and gives this reason for it—The lead dies, for the celestial heart, which was its soul, vanishes; whose presence gives it life, and renders it light; as its absence occasions its death, and makes it heavy."

"I answer, and proudly maintain, "That this increase of weight comes from the air, thickened and made heavy, and in some measure rendered adhesive in the vessel by the violent and long—continued heat of the furnace—which air mixes with the calx (its union being assisted by the continual stirring), and attaches itself to its smallest particles—no otherwise than as water, when sand is thrown into it, makes it heavier by moistening it, and adhering to its smallest grains.""

"This he confirms by the example of animals, which become heavier after death, from the extinction of the celestial heat, the soul, (as he thinks), both of animals and all other mixed and compound bodies."

"Hammer a piece of cold iron for a considerable time; you will unite its parts and diminish its bulk, and then it will appear heavier when put into the balance."

"Thus, the motion of the orbits of the planets from east to west, having its cause in a higher heaven, is called by all violent, without, however, its doing them any injury. Moreover, they who argue thus condemn themselves, since they are compelled to admit, that not only the motion of water and air, but their very abiding places, are held by violence:—that of the latter, under fire, and that of the former, above earth."

"What shadows would be if there were no bodies, such natural motion in the upper regions will become, without levity. For, of a truth, it would be monstrous, to see natural effects without a natural cause. That is said to move naturally whose cause of motion is in itself."

"Having thus vanished levity, and its upward motion, from all the boundaries of nature, we aver anew, that the elements of air and fire, which alone come into the dispute, are endowed with gravity."

"[N]othing gains weight but by the addition of matter, nor loses it but by its subtraction—so inseparably are matter and weight united, as has been shewn above in the sixth essay."

"But if we investigate the subject by the balance, a case occurs in which, without any addition or subtraction of matter, a substance will appear more or less heavy; namely, by its contraction or expansion."

"I have now made the preparation; laid as it were the foundations of my answer to the Sieur Burn's [or Brun's] demand; namely, that having put two pounds six ounces of fine English tin into an iron vessel, and heated it strongly on an open fire for six hours, stirring it continually, without having added anything, he obtained two pounds thirteen ounces of a white ; which at first occasioned him great surprise, and the desire to ascertain whence these seven ounces of increase were derived."

"[W]e must not only inquire whence these seven ounces are derived, but, moreover, whence that which has replaced the loss of weight, necessarily arising from the enlargement of volume of the tin, by its conversion into calx, and from the vapours and exhalations that have escaped."

"I imagine there are many persons who would have been startled (effarouchées) at the mere statement of this answer, had I given it in the outset, that will now receive it willingly, being, as I may say, tamed (apprivoisées) and rendered tractable, by the evident truth of the preceding essays. For doubtless they whose minds were preoccupied with the opinion that air is absolutely light, would have rushed to the encounter, exclaiming, Why do we not extract heat from cold, white from black, light from darkness, if from air, a thing absolutely light, we can extract so much weight? And they, who might have given credit to the weight of air, would have been unable to persuade themselves, that it could ever increase the weight of a substance balanced in itself."

"On this account I have been obliged to shew, that air is possessed of weight; that it is proved by other investigation than that of the balance; and that even by that instrument, a portion previously altered and thickened, may make its weight manifest."

"[T]wo ingots one... of gold, and the other of iron, which appear by the balance to be equal, are nevertheless not so—for the iron is as much heavier than the gold, according to reason, as the air which it displaces is heavier than that displaced by the gold..."

"This opinion is defective, to say no worse of it, in many respects. First, in attributing life to lead. Secondly, in supposing that the presence of the celestial heat makes it light, and its absence heavy. Thirdly, because it assigns the same reason for the increased weight of lead by calcination, and of animals by death. There is nothing of the kind. For as to life, how can lead possess it, since it is a homogeneous body, without difference of parts, without organs, and without any vital effect or action? If it move downwards, so does ceruse, which is only its corpse; if it be cooling (rafraischit), so is ceruse. Then how could it preserve this life, under a million of forms, that it may be made to assume and to cast off, yet always continuing to be lead? How, in the furnace (which would be a much greater wonder), where it may be kept in fusion a day, a month, or a whole year? It must have a very tenacious soul to undergo so much without being dislodged!"

"I hope, Monsieur, that you will concur with me, in making known Rey's excellent work. Your journal is read throughout France, it is spread over foreign countries; if you would insert this notice in it, the chemists of all countries would soon know, that it was a Frenchman, who by the power of his genius and reflections, first guessed the cause of the increased weight that certain metals experience when converted into calces, by exposure to the action of fire, and that it is precisely the same as that, whose truth has just been proved by the experiments which M. Lavoisier read at the last public sitting of the academy of sciences."

"M. de Bordeu, in his "Recherches sur les Maladies Chroniques,"... makes so honourable mention of John Rey, that we invite the curious to have recourse to it.—M. Jean Frederick Corvin sustained a thesis, entitled Historia aëris factitii, under the presidency of M. Spielman, at Strasbourg, on the 4th of December, 1776, a pamphlet of sixty pages... with figures in which John Rey is named as the first author, who has written on this important subject. The elements of chemistry for the public course of the academy of , of this year, may also be consulted. M. Sage praises it in his Mineralogie Docimatique, lately reprinted. Finally, M. Bayen, a celebrated chemist, was the first to do justice to John Rey, and he has permitted his Letter to M. L'Abbé Rozier to be printed at the beginning of this edition."

"P.S. We may presume, that copies of Rey's work are rare. That which I have before me belongs to M. de Villiers, physician of the faculty of Paris, who has the best chemical library in France, and which he has sincere pleasure in laying open to the cultivators of the science. M. de Villiers's copy came from the library of the late M. Villars, physician at Rochelle, which was sold by his heirs in the course of last year. This copy was defective, it ended at p. 142, containing only the beginning of the 28th Essay. I requested M. Capperonier to allow me to transcribe, from the copy in the king's library, the two pages that are wanting in M. de Villiers's,—which he had the goodness to accede to. Thus, they who may wish to read John Rey's work, are informed, that there is a copy of it in the king's library, at the end of which they will find two manuscript letters; the first from Father Mersene to the physician, John Rey, in which he attacks the natural philosophy of that author,—the second, Rey's answer to Mersene, in which he defends himself with all his might."

"Literary usurpations are, in time, discovered, and some celebrated geniuses, who were the wonder of their age, have ended like Ronsard, who was no more thought of when Malherbe appeared. In short, the academy of sciences was not yet in existence, and the spirit of sect prevailed in all the little committees of science (bureaux) that were then held at a few private houses."

"For this matter, every where filling the space closed in by the curvature of heaven, is continually pushed, by its own weight, towards the centre of the world. Earth, it is true, as the heaviest, readily occupies this situation, and forcing its fellow-elements to retire, causes water, the second in weight, to be also second in place; so that the air, driven from the lowest, as well as the second station, holds the third place, leaving the highest region to be occupied by fire, the lightest of all."

"The re-print contains an Avertissement, parts of which I have thought worth inserting, as well as a letter of M. Bayen to the Abbé Rozier.—The first gives a short account of Rey, and mentions some facts which shew his work to have been well known and highly esteemed by Professor [Jakob Reinbold] Spielman of Strasbourg, as late as the year 1766, and to have been honourably spoken of by M. de Bordeu, circumstances which make Lavoisier's ignorance of its existence still more extraordinary."

"John Rey, M.D., was a native of Bugue, on the Dordogne, in the dependencies of the Barony of Lymeil, a city of the province of Perigord, situated above the confluence of the Dordogne with the Vizère, and belonging to the Duke de Bouillon, to whom his Essays are dedicated. It is not known in what university John Rey took his Doctor's degree, but he tells us he had a brother of the same name, the proprietor of an iron foundry, with whom he lived, and where he studied Chemistry and Natural Philosophy."

"The author of the Avertissement next mentions several of Rey's correspondents, and especially, Marin Mersene. He then states, that "the Essays" are very scarce, that when they appeared Mersene had doubts on the subject, which Rey answered in a masterly manner. Raphael Trichet copied these letters, and in the catalogue of his library, Rey's Essays are inserted in the class of Philosophy, Natural History, &c. The volume passed from thence into the king's library, and was mentioned to the editor, (M. Gobet,) by M. L'Abbé Desaunays. The reprint was from a copy furnished by M. de Villiers, from his own library, who had the liberality to sacrifice it for the public good". I translate the following, verbatim."

"Reputation is a strange thing! John Rey, who preceded the immortal Pascal, the celebrated Descartes, and the great Newton, is almost unknown in the republic of letters. His style resembles that of Michel de Montaigne,—he has the same energy, and less diffusiveness, it is surprising that so powerful a writer should have been absolutely forgotten."

"His book, which treats of one single experiment, was not calculated for his time,—it belonged wholly to our own:—printed in a small provincial town, for the use of some friends, it had none of those celebrated puffers, (proneurs,) who assign the various ranks in science; for they who would receive the wreath of immortal fame must address their adoration to those great cabals, which have established their thrones in the scientific world,—but the glories that surround the heads of the spirits, so cried up in these circles, gradually fade away."

"God, creating the universe, neither made it perfectly like Himself, nor perfectly unlike, for He, being One, has made the world as not one, from the diverse multiplicity of its innumerable parts, ordaining, nevertheless, that they should collect into a certain unity by their exact contiguity. The upper world has no connexion with this subject; the lower, and elementary world, owes this contiguity to the weight divinely impressed on its parts, aided by the subtle fluidity of some of its simple bodies. It is by this quality, with which the matter of the four elements is more or less invested, that they are separated from one another, and each transported to its proper place, as the generation of compounds, and the beauty of the universe requires."

"M. Spielman, professor of chemistry, at Strasbourg, recommends the Essays of John Rey to students, in the edition of his "Institutions de Chimie" of 1766..."

"It was not, Monsieur, till after I had published in your journal, the second part of my experiments on the calces of mercury, that I became acquainted with Rey's book. I could not mention it in the very short enumeration I then gave of the different opinions on the cause of the increased weight of metallic calces; my fault, involuntary as it was, must be repaired, and to this end, I hasten to do justice to an author, who, by the profoundness of his speculations, has succeeded in assigning the true cause of that increase."

"The cause of the increased weight that certain metals experience by calcination, has, at all times, been a subject of speculation and research with chemists and natural philosophers. Cardan, Cæsalpin, Libavius, and many others, formerly endeavoured to explain this phænomenon; but amongst them all, we must, in justice, distinguish John Rey, a physician of Perigord, who lived at the beginning of the last century. His work, perhaps unknown to all the chemists and naturalists of the present day, appears the more deserving to be rescued from oblivion, because the reason which he assigns for the increased weight of the calces of and tin, has an immediate relation with that, which is on the point of being acknowledged by all chemists."

"Almost all philosophers, ancient and modern, fearing an eternal confusion of the elements, were they all endowed with weight, conceived the two uppermost to be furnished with a certain levity, by means of which they bounded up on high, each to occupy its peculiar place, like as the two lower ones are pushed downwards by their own weight. But having clearly shewn in the last Essay, that levity is not necessary for that effect, weight alone being sufficient, I embrace the maxim, which they themselves have prudently laid down, that we should never multiply existences unnecessarily; assuming that God and Nature do nothing in vain, (which they also teach.) I think it would be otherwise were we to admit levity, since it is of no use."

"I say much more; that fire, being of so subtile a nature, that it can hardly be called a body, is consequently almost stripped of all resistance; whence it follows, that the air, mounting up without impediment, would reach the skies, driving fire from its place, and compelling it to seek a lower station, to the injury of their own doctrine. To this I will add another inconvenience, namely, the perpetual and unprofitable strife, which would ensue between the heavy and the light elements, the latter pulling upwards, and the former downwards, with all their might; whence would arise, at the place of their contiguity, incomparably greater distress than the packthread experiences which is pulled in opposite directions by two strong hands, till at last it is broken by their efforts: far different from that knot of friendship, in which nature has been pleased to unite the neighbouring elements, planting in their bosoms similar qualities, whence they communicate and amicably sympathize with each other. It follows from all this, that levity is a term that signifies nothing absolute in nature, and must be rejected; or, if we retain it, it must only be to denote the relation of one substance having less weight to another which has more."

"Now casting a look on all that moves, I see nothing that ascends by its own proper motion. Water, indeed, rises in a glass, if we throw earth into it; but all will allow, that it is not from any levity that is in the water, but rather, that the earth, by falling to the bottom, makes the water ascend. Now, if water does not acknowledge levity as the cause of this motion upwards, why should air confess it, which ascends in like manner when pressed on by water? Why fire, which does the same? It will be said, I doubt not, that if the upward motion of the elements be not natural to them, it must be violent; whence this absurdity follows, that each obtains its place in the universe by force. To this I answer, that the elements not having the cause of these motions in themselves, they may, so far, be called violent; but that this violence is gentle, and nowise ruinous."

"Sir,—Wishing a few days since, to calcine some tin, I weighed out two pounds six ounces of the finest sort, from England, put it into an iron vessel fitted to an open furnace, and keeping it continually stirred over a strong fire, without adding any thing, I converted it in six hours, into a very white . I weighed it to ascertain the loss, and found there were two pounds thirteen ounces of it. This occasioned me incredible astonishment, not being able to imagine, from whence the seven ounces of increase could be derived. I made the same trial with lead, of which I calcined six pounds, but in this I found a loss of six ounces. I have inquired the cause of many learned men, particularly of Dr. N. but no one has been able to declare it."