Sir Frederick Walker Mott –
British neurologist, psychiatrist, and sociologist
We now recognise the brain as the seat of the
psyche, but the functions of the mind are
dependent upon the whole body and the
harmonious interaction of all its parts.
Quoted by W. S. Dawson in Aids to PsychiatryIntroduction
T. J. Mott –
British oncologist, Ipswich, Suffolk
Recent over-use of computers by (medical)
management is like primitive tribesmen using a
motorcycle to cross the road.
Nurses’ League Journal()
Sir Berkeley Moynihan –
British surgeon, Leeds, UK
As art surgery is incomparable in the beauty of its
medium, in the supreme mastery required for its
perfect accomplishment, and in the issues of life,
suffering, and death which it so powerfully controls.
Addresses on Surgical Subjects‘The Approach to Surgery’
No training of the surgeon can be too arduous, no
discipline too stern, and none of us may measure
our devotion to our cause. For us an operation is
an incident in the day’s work, but for our patients
it may be, and no doubt it often is, the sternest and
most dreaded of all trials, for the mysteries of life
and death surround it, and it must be faced alone.
Addresses on Surgical Subjects‘The Approach to Surgery’
On the roll of honour which, in letters of gold,
bears the names of the saviours of mankind, no
man is more worthy of remembrance than Lister.
Addresses on Surgical Subjects‘Lister as Surgeon’
A discovery is rarely, if ever, a sudden
achievement, nor is it the work of one man; a long
series of observations, each in turn received in
doubt and discussed in hostility, are familiarised
by time, and lead at last to the gradual disclosure
of truth.
Surgery, Gynecology and Obstetrics:()
The operation itself is but one incident, no doubt
the most dramatic, yet still only one in the long
series of events which must stretch between illness
and recovery.
Lancet: ()
Every operation is an experiment in bacteriology.
Attributed
Malcolm Muggeridge –
British journalist
The orgasm has replaced the Cross as the focus of
longing and the image of fulfilment.
The Most of Malcolm Muggeridge‘Down with Sex’
I will lift mine eyes unto the pills. Almost everyone
takes them, from the humble aspirin to the multi-
coloured, king-sized three deckers, which put you
to sleep, wake you up, stimulate and soothe you all
in one. It is an age of pills.
The New Statesman‘London Diary’ August ()
Johannes Müller –
Professor of Medicine and Physiology, University of
BerlinWhat does not come under the knife, counts for
nothing.
Referring to anatomical dissection in Handbuch der
Physiologie des MenschenJohn Benjamin Murphy –
Professor of Surgery, Chicago, USAThe patient is the centre of the medical universe
around which all our works revolve and towards
which all our efforts trend.
AttributedVladimir Nabokov –
Russian-born US novelistLife is a great surprise. I do not see why death
should not be an even greater one.
Pale Fire‘Commentary’Napoleon I (Bonarparte)
–
French general and emperorThe greatest proof of madness is the disproportion
of one’s designs to one’s means.
MaximsYou medical people will have more lives to
answer for in the other world than even we
generals.
Napoleon in Exile(Barry O’Meara)A physician and a priest ought not to belong to
any particular nation, and be divested of all
political opinions.
Napoleon in Exile(Barry O’Meara) October ()Medicine is a collection of uncertain prescriptions,
the results of which, taken collectively, are more
fatal than useful to mankind. Water, air, and
cleanliness are the chief articles in my
pharmacopoeia.
Napoleon in Exile(Barry O’Meara)I do not want two diseases – one nature-made, one
doctor-made.
Quoted in Clinical Pharmacologyby D. R. Laurence,
Frontispiece. Churchill Livingstone, Edinburgh ()Ogden Nash –
US poetSenescence begins
And middle age ends,
The day your descendants
Outnumber your friends.A cough is something that you yourself can’t
help, but everybody else does on purpose just to
torment you.
You can’t get there from here ·