Sick-nursing essentially a woman's mission : being the inaugural lecture on the qualifications for and the conduct of sick-nurses delivered at the opening of the new School of Nursing in Saint Bartholomew's Hospital on May 1, 1877 / by Dyce Duckworth.

  • Duckworth, Sir Dyce, 1840-1928.
Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sick-nursing essentially a woman's mission : being the inaugural lecture on the qualifications for and the conduct of sick-nurses delivered at the opening of the new School of Nursing in Saint Bartholomew's Hospital on May 1, 1877 / by Dyce Duckworth. 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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    manner of your w^ork. Your character and motives can no more fail to show themselves in your hourly work than your shadow can fail to be seen in sun- light. Your reliu'ion must be the habit of each moment of your life, and not the profession of your belief, not mere recital of praj^ers or hearing sermons, but labour of that kind which constitutes perpetual })rayer and praise. And is it not the prerogative of your sex so to minister? What said one of Scotland's greatest poets? O Woman ! in our hours of ease Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, And variable as the shade By the light quivering aspen made; When pain and anguish wring the brow, A ministering angel thou ! ' I may tell you tliat we are all ambitious to raise this new School of Nursing which w^e open to-day to the highest pitch of excellence and efficiency. We want you to be wortliy of the efforts which the inde- fotigable Treasurer and the generous Governors of this hospital are making witli this end in view; and another reason which must operate ])Owerful]y upon us, teachers and learners alike, is this, tliat we possess here a very proud motto, which, altliough it be un- written, influences all in the service of this place, and it is—nidli secunclus. We do not know what it is to take the second place in anything we put our hands to. Marmion/canto vi.Walter Scott. 18,30.