GREEK BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE 



the task a love of labor and perseverance, so 

 that the instruction, taking root, may bring 

 forth proper and abundant fruits. . . . 



" Possessing all these requisites to the study 

 of medicine and having acquired a true knowl- 

 edge of it, we shall thus in traveling through 

 the cities, be esteemed physicians not in name 

 but in reality. But inexperience is a bad 

 treasure ... the nurse of timidity and audac- 

 ity. For timidity betrays want of powers, and 

 audacity a want of skill." ^'^ 



Ethically the most influential document in 

 the history of medicine is the Hippocratic oath, 

 still administered to the young doctors of 

 Europe and America, though modified to suit 

 ways of instruction which do not keep to 

 the ancient paternal intimacy of teacher and 

 disciple. 



" I swear by Apollo the physician, and 

 Aesculapius, and Health, and All-heal, and all 

 the gods and goddesses, that, according to my 

 ability and judgment, I will keep this Oath 

 and this stipulation : to reckon him who taught 

 me this Art equally dear to me as my parents, 

 to share my substance with him, and relieve 

 his necessities if required; to look upon his 

 offspring in the same footing as my own 



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