Memoirs of John Abernethy, F.R.S : with a view of his lectures, writings, and character / By George Macilwain.

  • Macilwain, George, 1797-1882.
Date:
1853
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Memoirs of John Abernethy, F.R.S : with a view of his lectures, writings, and character / By George Macilwain. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    This was becoming again crowded; and although it formed a satisfactory arena for the development and illustration of his principles, the increasing audiences were significant of the coming necessity of a still larger building, and which, in fact, was a few years afterward constructed. He had, in fact, arrived, as we imagine, at a point which was comparatively smooth water, and which we are inclined to regard as the zenith of his career. In the opening of his beautiful lectures at the Col- lege, Abernethy, in one of his warm and earnest en- deavors to animate his audience to regard the love and the search for truth as the only impulse which could urge on and sustain industry in the Science'' of our profession, had observed that, ;i unfortunately, a man might attain to a considerable share of public reputa- tion without being a real student of his profession. There have been, indeed, too many examples of that, as also of those who, after years of labor, have failed to attain a scanty living. Abernethy had been a real and laborious student in science, and he was now reaping an abundant and well-deserved fruition. Few surgeons have arrived at a position so calculated t<i satisfy the most exacting am- bition ; although the full extent and bearing of his prin- ciples were by no means universally understood, yet the general importance of them was so, and in some measure appreciated. In a greater or less degree, they were answering the tests afforded by the bed-side in all parts of the world. Ample, therefore, as the harvest he was reaping in a large practice, he was enjoying a still higher fruition in the kind of estimation in which he was held. He