Statement of improvements in the theory and practice of the science of medicine / by Thomas Ewell.

  • Ewell, Thomas, 1785-1826.
Date:
1819
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Statement of improvements in the theory and practice of the science of medicine / by Thomas Ewell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    17/176
    ihe mind, most tend to rouse and improve it. A continued routine of but one course of business tends to beget dullness and inaptitude to improve. This is strikingly exemplified by regular farmers and merchants who become cultivators of the soil; the first jog on in the old way, the other per- ceives errors at a glance and improves upon the practises, as observed by Mr. Adam Smith, with a rapidity greatly- exceeding that of the regularly trained agriculturalist. So in study we gain more knowledge from occasional relaxation, than from incessant application. My ideas are better illus- trated by the following extracts from a work entitled Ex- periments on the Bile, by J. M'Lurg, M. D. believed now to be of Richmond, in Virginia, a work written with such elegance, that it has had its beauties borrowed by more than the present professor of the practice of physic in the University of Pennsylvania. The mere arts may be improved by repeated subdivi- sions ; but those which partake of the nature of sciences re- quire a different method of cultivation. It is the remark of a celebrated historian, that the art of war, for some centuries the only object of attention to all the gentry of Europe, ac- quired little improvement in the hands of men who despised every other sort of knowledge. A personal dexterity in the management of their arms was common enough; but an extensive system of operations required an acquaintance with principles, which mere habit could never teach. The reader, I hope, will not find any thing whimsical in this comparison of arts, which have equally the appellation of murderous ; nor be led to fancy that a dogmatic and an empiric differ like a Mareschal Turenne and a savage war- rior ; chiefly because the former pursues more scientifically his destructive schemes. But if there is truth in what has been said, nothing can be more absurd than the vulgar notion of a certain quackish dexterity in medicine; which leads men to confide in igno- rance, supported by its constant companion, presumption. This notion, which tends to degrade physic from the rank