In memoriam : Edmund A. Parkes / [Sir William Aitken].

  • William Aitken
Date:
1876
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: In memoriam : Edmund A. Parkes / [Sir William Aitken]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    o and resignation; and I feel it is incumbent upon me, on this our first official meeting since his death, to bring to your notice and to acknowledge to ourselves the very great loss which the Army Medical School has sustained, and which Sanitary Science has sus- tained by his untimely end. Not only is he a loss to this School, but in him the medical profession has lost one of its brightest gems, and the country has lost one of the most useful, intelligent, zealous, disinterested, self-denying and trusted of public servants. Greatly beloved in his life-time, he is now lamented in his death by all who had the good fortune to know him as we did. We all feel as if we had lost a brother—as if part of our very selves had been torn from us, and which we very sorely miss. Indeed we have not yet come to realise the loss we have sustained by his death, more especially when such radical changes are being made in the medical service of the army, and when the very existence of the School itself is threatened, the prosperity of which was one of the most cherished objects of his life. With the single excep- tion of the last opening day of Session, when he was too ill to come, this is the first time for nearly sixteen years that we have met without him. Many are the interests (both private and public, besides those of this School) which will miss his wise counsels, his fostering care, his gentle tact, and that special charm of disposition and influence which was always ready to pour the oil on the troubled waters. Thus it is that as “ Night brings out stars, so sorrow shews us truths.” But those who are here to-day for the first time cannot be ex- pected to enter into the feelings of grief and sorrow which weigh upon us in the loss of a much loved colleague, with whom we have lived in friendship unalloyed for nearly sixteen years; and whose life shews that on a much shorter acquaintance he endeared himself to every one who had the good fortune to be associated with him in any kind of work. Sorrow for the loss of such a man is a natural human tribute paid to his memory, and is called forth by the irre- pressible feelings of the heart. In all respects, I think Dr. Parkes was one of the most lovable of men—from some indescribable charm of manner and sweetness of disposition ; and his life amongst us, beautiful in its simplicity and self-denial, has always suggested him to my mind as the “ideal” of a “ perfect man.” You cannot have passed through the curriculum of your pro- fessional education at the schools of medicine without having often heard the name of Parkes; for it has been a household word in our profession for nearly thirty years, and now death hath opened still more widely for him the gateway of Fame. Under the circum- stances, therefore, in which we are met together to-day for the first