Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 5.djvu/112

172 operation," said he, "is to mutilate a patient whom we are unable to cure; it should therefore be considered as an acknowledgment of the imperfection of our art" How different a sentiment is this from that entertained by some eminent surgeons, who, with much surgical skill but little humanity, recommend operations at the risk of the patient's life, and handle the knife, when in the public theatre, rather with the view of exhibiting their own dexterous manipulation, than with that of relieving the condition of the unfortunate being who writhes beneatli the torture which is so coolly and ostentatiously inflicted.

In the former part of our memoir we adverted to the difficulties which this eminent surgeon experienced for some years in struggling against those pecuniary adversities, which seem in an especial manner to oppress men of superior mental endowments. But the subsequent tenor of his career teaches a lesson which cannot too strongly be inculcated ; that resolution, industry, and perseverance, will in the end baffle the evil genius which seems at first to throw thorns and impediments around our path. During the first eleven years of his practice, which, it must be admitted, was for him a long and tedious mental probation, his income never amounted to a thousand pounds a year; however, the four succeeding years it exceeded that sum; and for several years previous to his death, it increased to five, and was at that period six thousand pounds a year. Whatever difficulties, therefore, at first beset his progress were eventually surmounted ; he attained the highest rank in his profession; he was universally esteemed and extolled as a man of general science; he had as much practice as he could attend to; his emoluments were considerable; and if we raise up the curtain of domestic life, we shall find him cheered by the society of a wife whom he loved ; whose superior mental accomplishments rendered her a fit companion even for a man of his elevated scientific rank ; besides all which, he was the parent of two children, in whom, it was natural that his best hopes and warmest affections should be centered. "Nor," says Dr Adams, "was he insensible of these blessings; he has often told me, that if he had been allowed to bespeak a pair of children, they should have been those with which providence had favoured him." But the cup of human enjoyment seldom mantles to the brim without containing some drops of alloying bitterness; and there is no doubt but that professional anxieties and ill health rendered his temper irritable and impetuous. He was, says Sir Everard Home, readily provoked, and when irritated not easily soothed. His disposition was candid and free from reserve, even to a fault. He hated deceit, and as he was above every kind of artifice, he detested it in others, and too openly avowed his sentiments. His mind was uncommonly active; it was naturally formed for investigation, and that turn displayed itself on the most trivial occasions, and always with mathematical exactness. What is curious, it fatigued him to be long in mixed company which did not admit of connected conversation, more particularly during the last ten years of his life. He required less relaxation than other men; seldom sleeping more than four hours in the night, but almost always nearly an hour after dinner: this probably arose from the natural turn of his mind being so much adapted to his own occupations, that they were in reality his amusements, and therefore did not fatigue.

We have already seen how much time, even amidst his arduous professional toils and miscellaneous pursuits, he devoted to comparative anatomy, and in collecting preparations to illustrate every department of that interesting science. The museum which he succeeded in founding, remains to this day a monument of his industry, perseverance, and ingenuity. Here we find arranged, in a