Page:Harveian Oration for MDCCCXXXVIII; being a tribute of respect for the memory of the late James Hamilton, Sen. M.D (IA b30377353).pdf/16

 factorily ascertained; but without entering disputatiously into theoretical disquisitions, or absolutely denying that part of the advantage derived from purgative medicines might be ascribed to their efficacy in stimulating the ducts of different glands in the intestinal canal, and thus promoting their respective secretions, he referred the benefit of these medicines, in the diseases which he treated, to their sensible effect in unloading the bowels, rather than to any less obvious and more questionable power, which they may be capable of exciting. No man could be less dogmatical than Dr was in matters of speculation; and, on the other hand, no man was ever more becomingly firm in maintaining the certainty of the conclusions which he had cautiously and deliberately established on the solid foundation of long experience. It must have been very gratifying to him to receive such a testimony of the estimation in which his services were held in other countries, as is contained in a letter from Mr, the translator of his work into French, who says, "that he had been induced to undertake the task by the consideration that such a work can never be sufficiently known in all countries;" and then adds, "whatever be the variations of our medical theories, your prac-