Prophylaxis : an anniversary oration delivered before the New York Academy of Medicine, Wednesday, Dec. 19th, 1866 / by John Ordronaux.

  • John Ordronaux
Date:
1867
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Prophylaxis : an anniversary oration delivered before the New York Academy of Medicine, Wednesday, Dec. 19th, 1866 / by John Ordronaux. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    philosophy is cumulative and immortal, and descends unaltered to posterity. And without the develop- ment of such a philosophy, knowledge being only traditional, we should be standing little in advance of our fathers in any science. Every age has per- ceived and acknowledged this law of genesis, and consequently every age has produced its own philoso- phy. Yet, inasmuch as no great events happen pre- maturely, each in the fulness of time taking its ap- pointed place, so, even amid the infancy of science, we perceive germs of thought and glimmerings of truth which have only fructified in after ages. For, if it requires centuries, and changes of government and laws to build great cities, or found empires, no less so is it with the establishment of a true system of philosophy. Battles must be fought between con- tending factions, persecutions be endured by defeated minorities, and schools be convulsed and overthrown, before the equilibrium of truth can finally be ob- tained; and whether in theology, metaphysics, or medicine, history ever consecrates the victory in lan- guage teeming with painful significance. In the separate characteristic of every age we find one dominant idea. And that of our own, under the best sanctions of Christian belief, is the tendency everywhere manifested to convert dogmatic into rational philosophy, and to substitute a knowledge of the positivism of universal laws for that of empirical observation. In law, medicine, theology, and govern- ment, radical changes are being effected, because the educated mind of the world gives, as by a precon- ceived intuition of its truth, universal assent to this
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