Page:A Discourse upon the Institution of Medical Schools in America - John Morgan.djvu/80

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part of the healing art which is capable of giving effectual aid by the painful, but wholesome severity of manual operation.

To render any person dextrous in the operations of Surgery, however intrepid he may naturally be, it is necessary that he should practice them often, and devote himself to them. This is inconsistent with the occupation of a Physician involved in a multiplicity of business, and requiring leisure to study the cases of his patients, who linger under a complication of evils widely different.

It is to lovers of humanity like these, so differently occupied, that some owe the movement of their limbs, others the mitigation of obstinate diseases, and others the prolongation and pleasure of their lives.

The business of Pharmacy is entirely different from either. Free from the cares of both, the Apothecary is to prepare and compound medicines as the Physician shall direst. Altogether engaged in this; by length of time he attains to that nicety of skill therein, which he never could have arrived at, were his attention distracted by a great variety of other subjects,

The wisdom of ages approved by experience, the most certain test of knowledge, has taught us the necessity and utility of appointing different persons for these so different employments, and accordingly, we find them prosecuted separately in every wise and