with respect to the gastric origin and character of the disease. In 1794 he became one of the surgeons of the Pennsylvania Hospital, where he not only attracted notice by his great expertness and skill, but by his lectures. His regular private course was commenced in 1800, and gave the promise of that reputation and authority he possessed in after years, which have truly warranted the appellation applied to him, “Father of American Surgery.”
Having been elected Professor of Surgery in the University of Pennsylvania in 1805, Dr. Physick was from that time in the possession of the widest field for the exercise of his talents, “and was listened to by the large classes in the University, through the members of which he could disseminate the principles of surgery imbibed from his celebrated preceptor, John Hunter—strengthened and enforced by his own meditation and personal experience obtained in hospital and private practice.”[1] The lectures were carefully written out, and delivered with the manuscript before him or in his hand; for it was an axiom with him that, on so important an occasion as the instruction of youth in an art so necessary to the well-being and happiness of mankind, every care should be taken to render the inculcation of principles and practice clear to the comprehension of students. To be ready with these lectures, his habit was to rise early in the morning and carefully study them before he breakfasted, so that in the delivery nothing would be trusted to the mere effort of memory or the impulses of the moment. To be enabled to do this he retired early, his feeble health entailing upon him the necessity of more than the usual
- ↑ Life of Dr. Physick, by John Bell, M. D. Lives of Eminent Physicians and Surgeons. Edited by S. D. Gross, M. D.
The Life of Dr. Physick was written by his son-in-law, and entitled “A Memoir of the Life and Character of Philip Syng Physick,” by Jacob Randolph, M. D., Lecturer on Surgery. Read before the Philadelphia Medical Society, 1839.
Another Memoir, entitled “Necrological Notice,” &c., was written by William E. Horner, M. D., Professor of Anatomy, University of Pennsylvania. Read before the Philosophical Society, May 4th, 1838.
Dr. Caldwell, of Louisville, Ky., also published a notice of the Life of Dr. Physick in the Louisville Journal.
