From Still More Distant Panticapaeum and Istra. Have Been to Say Of
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osophers in things medical had thought more deeply than many of those who came after them. We English are the modern Greeks, and we alone have ADDRESS IN MEDICINE. colonized as they did, as free people. There have been other great colonial empires, Phoenician, Roman, Spanish, Dutch At the Sixty-fifth Annual Meeting of the British Medical and French, but in civil liberty and in intellectual freedom Association, Montreal, Aug. 31 to Sept. i, 1897. Magna Graacia and Greater Britain stand alone. The parallel so often drawn between them is of particular interest with ref- BY WILLIAM OSLER, M.D., F.R.C.P. erence to the similarity between the Greek settlements in and the on the PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE, JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY, BALTIMORE. Sicily English plantations Atlantic coast. Indeed, Freeman "I can never think of America the British says, without [From advance sheets of Medical Journal.] something suggesting Sicily, or of Sicily without something BRITISH MEDICINE IN GREATER BRITAIN.\p=m-\THE MAKING OF suggesting America." I wish to use the parallel only to GREATER BRITAIN. emphasize two points, one of difference and one of resem- blance. The Greek colonist took Greece with him. Hellas To trace the evolution of any one of the learned successfully had no geographical bounds. "Massilia and Olbia were would the hand of a of cities professions require master, one who, of Hellas in as full a sense as Athens or could combine the for Sparta." Whilo the like Darwin, capacity patient observa- emigrant Britons changed their sky, not their in tion with philosophic vision. In the case of medicine the character, crossing the great sea, yet the home stayers had never the difficulties are enormously increased by the extraordinary same toward the which to the of the feelings plantations as the Greeks had development belongs history present toward the colonial cities of Magna Grœcia. as has The rate of progress has been too for us to If, been century. rapid shrewdly surmised, Professor Seely was Herodotus reincar- and we stand as it in a appreciate, bewildered, and, were, nate, how grieved the spirit of the "Father of must state of intellectual when we to obtain a History" giddiness, attempt have been to say of "Nor have we even now broad view of the In a Englishmen, comprehensive subject. safer "middle ceased to think of ourselves as a race to dwell on certain of simply inhabiting an flight" it is my purpose the factors island off the northern coast of the continent of which have molded the in lands Europe." profession English-speaking The assumption of gracious care- narrow British superiority which, unless beyond the seas\p=m-\of Medicine in Greater smacks a little of our for this lesser task fully cloaked, just national arrogance, is Britain. Even (though my affiliations are to jar on sensitive colonial nerves. With the wide and I the limitations of apt expansion of my sympathies deep) recognize the empire, and the of a national an my and am not unaware that in my I shall supplanting by imperial fitness, ignorance spirit, this will become impossible. That this sentiment never overlook much which might have rendered less sketchy a in prevailed Hellas, as it did later in the Roman empire, was sketch necessarily imperfect. due to the fact that in advances such slow and largely literature, in science, and in art Evolution by imperceptible degrees the colonial cities of Greece overshadowed the to are of it the of early mother that those who part finger time scarcely cities. It may be because the settlements of Greater seems to move. the are Britian Even great epochs seldom apparent were things of slower growth, that it took several to the During the last neither the generations participators. century and several bitter trials to teach a lesson the Greeks never had colonists nor the mother country appreciated the thrilling to learn. of the duel for the of interest long-fought possession this The Greek spirit was the leaven of the old the The acts and scenes of the world, work- continent. drama, to them ing of which no nationality could resist. Thrice it saved Wes- detached, isolated and independent, now glide like dissolving tern for it had the into each and in the of civilization, magic power of leading captivity views other, vitascope history we can captive, and making even captive the missionaries see the true of events. That we can meet here conquerors sequence today, of culture. What modern medicine owes to it will later. on British soil in a French is one of far appear Britons province, the "The love of science, the love of art, the love of freedom, off results of that struggle. This was but a prelude to the correlated to each of vitally other and brought into organic union" other great event the eighteenth century, the revolt of the were the essential attributes of the Greek and the of a second genius (Butcher). colonies founding great English speaking While we can not claim for the Saxon race the words of Anglo all of these nation—in Bishop Berkeley's prophecy, "Time's it has in a one noblest distinctions, high degree that which in practical offspring." life is the most valuable, and which has been the most precious Surely a unique spectacle that a century later descendants gift of the race to the world—the love of freedom. of the actors of these two dramas should meet in an great Of freedom in her regal seat English city in New Prance. Here the American may forget Of England. in the Bunker Yorktown Louisburg, Englishman Hill in It would carry one too far afield to discuss the and the Frenchman both Louisburg and in difference Quebec, Quebec between the native Briton and his children scattered so Chateauguay ; while we Canadians, English and French, in a widely up and down the earth. In Canada, South spirit, overlooking your unseemly are Africa, forgiving quarrels, only Australia and New Zealand, types of the Saxon race too to welcome to our this land on Anglo happy you country, which, are which will differ as much from and for have so often developing each other which, you fought. Once, and only and from the English as the American does from before in the of the world could such a today the once, history gathering original stock ; but amid these differences can as this have taken Divided the Greeks a everywhere be place. though were, seen those race qualities which have made us what we are— Hellenic sentiment of extraordinary strength united them in national assemblies and festivals. No of "courage, integrity, steady good sense, and energy in certain great flight imagina- work." At a future meeting of the tion is to a notable of our Association, perhaps in required picture representation pro- Australia, a professional Sir Charles with a Arm fifth b. c. in a Dilke, grasp fession in the century meeting such colonial on the subject, may deal with the medical of as under the of problems Greater town Agrigentum presidency Empedocles. Britain in a manner of the address from the mother brilliant of worthy in medicine. My Delegates cities, predecessors task, as I mentioned at the outset, is much less ambitious. Hippocrates of the stamp of Damocedes and Herodicus, dele- gates from the sister colonies of Syracuse and other Sicilian THE INFLUENCE OF GREECE ON BRITAIN. from towns, from neighboring Italy, far distant Massilia, and Could some one with,, full knowledge patiently analyse the from still more distant Panticapaeum and Istra. And in such characteristics of British medicine he would find certain there would have been men of an assemblage capable discuss national traits, sufficiently distinct for recognition. Three cen- ing problems of life and mind more brilliantly than in many turies can not do very much—and that period has only just subsequent periods, in proportion as the pre Hippocratic phil- passed since the revival of medicine in England—but the local Downloaded From: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/ by a University of Iowa User on 05/28/2015 conditions of isolation, which have been singularly favorable to methods and became the founder of modern experimental the development of special peculiarities in the national char- physiology and the great glory of British scientific medicine. acter, have not been without effect on the medical profession. The demonstration of the circulation of the blood remains in 1 can not do more than touch upon a few features, not distinc- every detail a model research. I shall not repeat the oft-told tive but illustrative—features which will be useful as indicat- tale of Harvey's great and enduring influence, but I must refer ing the sources of influence upon Greater Britain in the past, to one feature which, until lately, has been also a special and which may, perhaps, be suggestive as to lines of progress characteristic of his direct successors in Great Britain. Har- in th3 future. vey was a practitioner and hospital physician. There are Above the fireplace in Sir Henry Acland's study are three gossiping statements by Aubrey to the effect that "he fell paneled portraits of Linacre, Sydenham and Harvey ; the mightily in his practice" after the publication of the " DeMotu scroll upon them reads Litera',, Praxis, Scientia. To this great Cordis," and that his "therapeutic way" was not admired; triumvirate, as to the fountain heads, we may trace the streams but to these his practical success is the best answer. It is of inspiration which have made British medicine what it is remarkable that a large proportion of all the physiologic today.