Rabindranath Tagore –
Bengali poet and mystic
Even so, in death the same unknown will appear
as ever known to me. And because I love this life,
I know I shall love death as well.
Gitanjali
The fish in the water is silent, the animal on
the earth is noisy, the bird in the air is
singing.
But Man has in him the silence of the sea,
the noise of the earth and the music of
the air.
Stray Birds
Robert Lawson Tait –
British surgeon, Birmingham
I advised abdominal section and found the
abdomen full of clot. The right Fallopian tube
was ruptured and from it a placenta was
protruding. I tied the tube and removed it.
Quoted by W.I.S. McKay in Lawson Tait—His Life and Work.
Balliere Tindall and Cox ()
When in doubt, drain.
Quoted in Archives of Surgery: ()
The Talmud
A dream which is not interpreted is like a letter
which is not read.
BerakothIX.b (transl. M. Simon)
In eating, a third of the stomach should be filled
with food, a third with drink, and the rest left
empty.
Gittin
A physician who heals for nothing is worth
nothing.
Baba Kamma, VIII.a
Whoever eats bread without previously washing
the hands is as though he had intercourse with a
harlot.
Sotah.b
The best of doctors will go to hell.
KiddushinIV.a
The house which is not opened for charity will be
opened to the physician.
Attributed
Wine is the foremost of all medicines—
wherever wine is lacking medicines become
necessary.
Attributed
A. J. P. Taylor –
British historian
The greatest problem about old age is the fear that
it may go on too long.
Observer()
Jeremy Taylor –
English theologian
To preserve a man alive in the midst of so many
chances and hostilities, is as great a miracle as to
create him.
The Rule and Exercises of Holy DyingCh. , Sect. John Taylor –
English dissenting divine and Hebraist
A doctor is a man who writes prescriptions till the
patient either dies or is cured by nature.
AttributedEsaias Tegnér –
Swedish Professor of Greek and poet, Lund
Today is my forty-third birthday. I have thus long
passed the peak of life where the waters divide.
Letter to F. M. Franzen, November ()William Temple –
Archbishop of Canterbury
Science has its being in a perpetual mental
restlessness.
Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association
Vol. XVII, ‘Poetry and Science’Alfred, Lord Tennyson –
British poet
Every moment dies a man,
Every moment one is born.
The Vision of SinPt IV
Science moves, but slowly slowly,
creeping on from point to point.
Locksley HallTerence – (Publius Terentius After)
Carthage-born Roman comic poet
Old age is an illness in itself.
PhormioAct IV (transl. J. Sargeaunt)Tertullian –
Carthaginian father of the Church
To hinder a birth is merely speedier man-killing;
nor does it matter whether you take away a life
that is born, or destroy one that is coming to the
birth. That is a man which is going to be one; you
havethe fruit already in its seed.
ApologiticusIX (transl. S. Thelwall)Dylan Thomas –
Welsh poet
An alcoholic is someone you don’t like who drinks
as much as you do.
Dictionary ofth Century Quotationsquoted by Nigel Rees.
Fontana London ()
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Do not go gentle into that good night
When I take up assassination, I shall start with
the surgeons in this city and work upto the gutter.
The Doctor and the Devils ·