"The history of medicine from Hippokrates and Galen till the present time has been replete with innovations, new teachers, new schools, new procedures. There has been no one school, no single medical profession, outside of the priesthoods, extending in an unbroken chain from the indefinite Past to our own Twentieth Century. New phases have manifested themselves as regularly almost as those of the moon in the sky. We may not be astonished at Paracelsus for burning the writings of Galen as no longer suitable for the student of the Healing Art. A distinguished physician of Edinburg upon taking charge of the Library of the University, commanded all books of reference that were ten years old to be removed as obsolete. If any would conjure with old names, like Galen, Rhasis, Ibn Sina, or later ones that have been distinguished, the fact is nevertheless unquestionable, that they have had their time. We may profit by their counsel and examples, but we can not be bound to employ their formulas and procedures."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Alexander Wilder, History of Medicine: A Brief Outline of Medical History and Sects of Physicians, from the Earliest Historic Period; with an Extended Account of the New Schools of the Healing Art in the Nineteenth Century, and Especially a History of American Eclectic Practice of Medicine, Never Before Published (1901)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/History_of_medicine
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
History of medicine
38 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by History of medicine →
Related Quotes
"The history of medicine, of all the branches of that art, is the one to which least attention is devoted by physician…"
"Medicine and theology, now it would seem irreconcilably at variance, were in their early periods of development most …"
"To the naturalist, it [the history of medicine] teaches how the branches of his science, which lift their heads so pr…"
"An acquaintance with the history of his science is... especially indispensable to the practical physician, if he woul…"
"We prize infinitely less the fact that history, among almost all people, presents to our eyes the immortal gods as th…"
"Medicine is a science which hath been... more professed than laboured, and yet more laboured than advanced: the labou…"
"To attempt to isolate the history of medicine, and to comprehend its curious ebbs and flows of doctrine from medical …"
"When we take an extended view of the progress of medicine, tracing it from its scanty sources, in the most remote per…"
"The improvement in the healing art has been nearly in proportion to the advancement of the other arts of life, and to…"
"Willis combined the physician's expert anatomical sophistication with the fluent use of an interpretive apparatus tha…"