Page:Transactions of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia (ser 03 vol 05).djvu/61

Rh be asserted without contradiction, that no one has done so much to improve and extend the important branches which he more particularly cultivated. His works on these subjects are those by which he will be best known to posterity. By reference to dates it will be perceived that his two earliest and most important publications were written while yet he was hardly fifty years old; and those only who know their vast variety and detail, can form any adequate conception of the labor involved in their composition.

Since the beginning of his professional life, the progress of human knowledge had been great in almost every material thing; and not less so in medicine than in other branches of science. The stethoscope and various mechanical means of diagnosis had thrown a flood of light on many diseases. The ophthalmoscope had quite revolutionized the study of those of the eye; and the same principle had been applied with similar, if not equal, results to the affections of all internal organs accessible from without. Greater opportunities were afforded for verification. Anæsthesia had deprived surgery of its terrors. More attention was given to hygiene. Closer observation and more rigid deduction were demanded and bestowed. Facts had accumulated beyond all former precedent. Chemical analysis and synthesis had as truly given a new world to medicine, as Columbus did to Castile and Leon. And the spirit of inquiry, thus fully awakened, is continually extending its field of operation, and making new applications, new conquests, new discoveries. It redounds greatly to the credit of Dr. Wood—himself the great pioneer in all improvement—that he kept his mind free, in an uncommon degree, from early prepossession and prejudice; and was always to be found on the side of real progress and reform.