MEDICINE
(See also Disease, Health, Sickness)
The physician heals, Nature makes well.
Dat Galenus opes, dat Justinianus honores,
Sed genus species cogitur ire pedes;
The rich Physician, honor'd Lawyers ride,
Whil'st the poor Scholar foots it by their side.
'Tis not amiss, ere ye're giv'n o'er,
To try one desp'rate med'cine more;
For where your case can be no worse,
The desp'rat'st is the wisest course.
Learn'd he was in medic'nal lore,
For by his side a pouch he wore,
Replete with strange hermetic powder
That wounds nine miles point-blank would solder.
This is the way that physicians mend or end us,
Secundum artem: but although we sneer
In health—when ill, we call them to attend us,
Without the least propensity to jeer.
| author = Byron
| work = Don Juan. Canto X. St. 42.
Dios que d& la Uaga, d& la medicina.
God who sends the wound sends the medicine.
| author = Cervantes
| work = Don Quixote.
| place = II, 19.
Because all the sick do not recover, therefore medicine is not an art.
When taken
To be well shaken.
Take a little rum
The less you take the better,
Pour it in the lakes
Of Wener or of Wetter.
Dip a spoonful out
And mind you don't get groggy,
Pour it in the lake
Of Winnipissiogie.
Stir the mixture well
Lest it prove inferior,
Then put half a drop
Into Lake Superior.
Every other day
Take a drop in water,
You'll be better soon
Or at least you oughter.
Better to hunt in fields for health unbought,
Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught.
The wise for cure on exercise depend;
God never made his work for man to mend.
So liv'd our sires, ere doctors learn'd to kill,
And multiplied with theirs the weekly bill.
Even as a Surgeon, minding off to cut
Some cureless limb, before in use he put
His violent Engins on the vicious member,
Bringeth his Patient in a senseless slumber,
And grief-less then (guided by use and art),
To save the whole, sawes off th' infected part.
One doctor, singly like the sculler plies,
The patient struggles, and by inches dies;
But two physicians, like a pair of oars,
Waft him right swiftly to the Stygian shores.
A single doctor like a sculler plies,
And all his art and all his physic tries;
But two physicians, like a pair of oars,
Conduct you soonest to the Stygian shores.
Edited by
"Is there no hope?" the sick man said,
The silent doctor shook his head,
And took his leave with signs of sorrow,
Despairing of his fee to-morrow.
Oh, powerful bacillus,
With wonder how you fill us,
Every day!
While medical detectives,
With powerful objectives,
Watch your play.