Anonymous

“ Hunter was a philosopher in more senses than one: he had philosophy enough to bear prosperity as well as adversity, and with a rough exterior was a very kind man. The poor could command his services more than the rich. He would see an industrious tradesman before a duke, when his house was full of grandees. 'You have no time to spare,' he would say; 'you live by it: most of these can wait; they have nothing to do when they go home.' No man cared less for the profits of the profession, or more for the honour of it. ”

“ Another preacher, of a different persuasion, more remarkable for drowsy hearers, finding himself in a like unpleasant situation with his auditory, or rather dormitory, suddenly stopped in his discourse, and, addressing himself in a whispering tone to a number of noisy children in the gallery, said, "Silence! silence! children; if you keep up such a noise, you will waken all the old folks below." ”

“ A nobleman once advising a French bishop to add to his house a new wing in modern style, received this answer:—"The difference, my Lord, between your advice and that which the devil gave to our Saviour is, that Satan advised Jesus to change the stones into bread, that the poor might be fed—and you desire me to turn the bread of the poor into stones!" ”

“ His sermons abound with some of the most brilliant passages; and embrace such a variety of matter, and such a mass of knowledge and of learning, that even the acute Bishop Warburton said of him: "I can fathom the understandings of most men, yet I am not certain that I can fathom the understanding of Jeremy Taylor." His comparison between a married and a single life, in his sermon on the Blessedness of Marriage, is rich in tender sentiments and exquisitely elegant imagery. ”

“ This illustrious physician, President of the Royal Society and the College of Physicians, and the founder of the British Museum, was born at Killaleagh, in the north of Ireland, in 1660. He settled in London in 1684, and was in great repute as a practitioner in the time of Radcliffe, with whom he was acquainted, though they were never friends. On his arrival in London, he waited on Sydenham with a letter of introduction, in which a friend had set forth his qualifications in glowing language, as "a ripe scholar, a good botanist, a skilful anatomist." ”

“ But marriage, like the useful bee, builds a house, and gathers sweetness from every flower, and labours and unites into societies and republics, and sends out colonies, and fills the world with delicacies, and obeys the king, keeps order, and exercises many virtues, and promotes the interest of mankind ”

“ Being once to announce a collection for a young lady, to enable her to take the veil, he said, before the commencement of his sermon, "Friends, I recommend to your charity a young lady, who has not enough to enable her to make a vow of poverty." Preaching during the whole of Lent in a town where he was never invited to dine, he said, in his farewell sermon, "I have preached against every vice except that of good living—which, I believe, is not to be found among you, and therefore needed not my reproach." ”

“ Of nature, that should knit their souls together
In one soft bond of amity and love?
They yet still breathe destruction, still go on,
Inhumanly ingenious to find out
New pains for life; new terrors for the grave;
Artifices of Death! Still monarchs dream
Of universal empire growing up
From universal ruin. Blast the design,
Great God of Hosts! nor let Thy creatures fall
Unpitied victims at Ambition's shrine."
The Bishop, who was present, and who generally voted with the Ministry, was asked by an independent nobleman, if he were really the author of the lines that had been quoted. ”

“ The kind warning was not lost; the student, we are assured, turned out a good and honest man. At another time Gregory attended a poor medical student, ill of typhus fever, who offered him the customary fee of a guinea. The doctor refused it in silence, and with signs of annoyance and anger at the offer; whereupon the student hastily said, "I beg your pardon, Dr. Gregory; I did not know your rule. Dr. A. has always taken a fee." "Oh, he has, has he?" said Gregory; "then, my young friend, ask him to meet me here in consultation—and offer me the fee first." ”

“ His works were announced as the works of John Hunter; and John Hunter on a plain brass plate announced his residence. His honour and his pride made him look with contempt on the unworthy arts by which ignorant and greedy men advance their fortunes. He contemplated the hallowed duties of his art with the feelings of a philanthropist and a philosopher; and although surgery had been cultivated more than 2000 years, this single individual did more towards establishing it as a science, than all who preceded him. ”

“ In this room there was a mirror, in which the doctor saw the student lift and pocket a portion of a pile of guineas that lay on the table. Dr. [74] Gregory took no notice of what he had seen till he was showing the student out; but on the threshold he said, with a voice marked with deep emotion, "Young man, I saw what you did just now. Keep the money; I know what distress you must be in. But for God's sake never do it again; it can never succeed." ”

“ Hannes, fellow?" asked Radcliffe, who was in the room. "Lord A——, and Lord B——," was the assurance of the servant. "No, no, my man," said Radcliffe, in a voice deliberate and full of enjoyment [32] of the irony; "no, no, you are mistaken; it isn't the Lords that want your master, but he that wants them." Hannes was reputed the son of a basket-maker; Blackmore had been a schoolmaster—circumstances which furnished Radcliffe with material for a savage attack on both, when called in to attend the young Duke of Gloucester, for whom they had prescribed until the illness took a fatal turn. ”

“ Of the earnestness of his manner, which could lead to the disgorgement of great plunder by unscrupulous men, the following, from a sermon against the corruptions of the age, may be taken as a sample:—"Take heed and beware of covetousness; take heed and beware of covetousness; take heed and beware of covetousness. And what if I should say nothing else these three or four hours but these words? Great complaints there are of it, and much crying out, and much preaching, but little amendment that I can see; Covetousness is the root of all evil. ”

“ If they are allowed the benefit of sickness, they commonly awake out of their dream of sin, and reflect, and look upwards. They acknowledge an infinite being; they feel their own immortal part; they recollect and relish the Holy Scriptures; they call for the elders of the church; they think what to answer at a judgment-seat. Not that God is a respecter of persons; but the difference is in men; and the more intelligent the nature is, the more susceptible of divine grace." The successor to the deceased Duke did not think ill of the sermon ”

“ The discovery of the circulation of the blood was the most important ever made in the science of physiology, and led to a complete revolution throughout the whole circle of medical knowledge and practice. ”

“ THE GOSPEL A NOVELTY.
When Le Torneau preached the Lent sermon at St. Benoit, at Paris, Louis XIV. inquired of Boileau, "if he knew anything of a preacher called Le Tourneau, whom everybody was running after?" "Sire," replied the poet, "your Majesty knows that people always run after novelties; this man preaches the gospel." The King pressing him to speak seriously, [35] Boileau added: "When M. Le Tourneau first ascends the pulpit, his ugliness so disgusts the congregation that they wish he would go down again; but when he begins to speak, they dread the time of his descending." ”

“ When Paley first went to Cambridge, he fell into a society of young men far richer than himself, to whom his talents and conviviality made him an acceptable companion, and he was in a fair way for ruin. ”

“ Being on a journey, he set himself to improve his time by meditation; when his mind grew intent, till at length he had such ravishing tastes of heavenly joys, and such full assurance of his interest therein, that he utterly lost the sight and sense of this world and all its concerns, so that for hours he knew not where he was. ”

“ Crosby's History of the English Baptists preserves the opinion of Sir John Floyer, the physician, that immersion at baptism was of great value in a sanitary point of view, and that its discontinuance, about the year 1600, had been attended with ill effects on the physical condition of the population. Dealing [41] with the question purely in a professional sense, he declared his belief that the English would return to the practice of immersion, when the medical faculty or the science of physic had plainly proved to them by experiment the safety and utility of cold bathing. ”

“ Then do me the favour to add to the service of your advice that of your skill. I know that you are a clever surgeon." In a moment Lord Radnor had pulled out his lancet case, and opened a vein in his visitor's arm; who subsequently, when the bandage was being put on, as if casually, asked the operator, "By the by, does your Lordship go down to the House to-day?" Lord Radnor answered that he had not intended going, not having information enough as to the question that was to be debated; "But on what side will you, that have considered the matter, vote?" ”

“ When Archbishop Leighton was minister of a parish in Scotland, the question was asked of the ministers in their Synod or provincial meeting, whether they preached the duties of the times. When it was found that Leighton did not, and he was blamed for his remissness, he made the answer and defence: "If all the brethren have preached on the times, may not one poor brother be suffered to preach on eternity?" ”

“ At that period, a converted minister in the Establishment was as great a wonder as a comet; but now, blessed be God, since that precious, that great apostle of the English empire, the late dear Mr. Whitfield, was raised up in the spirit and power of Elias, the word of God has run and been glorified; many have believed and been added to the Lord all over the three kingdoms; and still, blessed be His name, the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls continues to issue His word; and great is the company of preachers, greater and greater every year. ”

“ Where was it ever known that the picture of the Apostle Paul, representing him handing a gentleman and lady up to the side of Jesus Christ, was ever introduced into the primitive love-feasts?... Again, my Lord, I beg leave to inquire whether we hear anything in Scripture of eldresses or deaconesses of the apostolical churches seating themselves before a table covered with artificial flowers, and against that a little altar surrounded with wax tapers, on which stood a cross, composed either of mock or real diamonds, or other glittering stones? ”

“ A bon-vivant, brought to his deathbed by an immoderate use of wine, after having been told that he could not in all human probability survive many hours, and would die before eight o'clock next morning, summoned the small remnants of his strength to call the doctor back, and said, with the true recklessness of a gambler, "Doctor, I'll bet you a bottle that I live till nine!" ”

“ For when shall the common people have leave to exercise, if not upon the Sundays and holidays, seeing they must apply their labour, and win their living, on all working days? Therefore, the King said, his express pleasure was that no lawful recreation should be barred to his good people which did not tend to the breach of the laws of this kingdom and the canons of the Church: that after the end of divine service his people be not disturbed, letted, or discouraged from any lawful recreation, such as dancing, either men or women ”

“ When asked once where a man like him, whose life was dedicated to retirement, could borrow his admirable descriptions of real life, he answered, "From the human heart; let us examine it ever so slightly, we find in it the seeds of every passion. When I compose a sermon, I imagine myself consulted upon some difficult piece of business. ”

“ It has very naturally, however, been objected that physicians act from no such lofty motives, but merely because they prefer that the gratitude or the fears of the patient should be the measure of their reward. And [88] yet, as Mr. Wadd forcibly remarks, "it is a fact, not less singular than true, that the advancement of surgical science is a benefit conferred on society at the expense of the scientific practitioner, since in proportion as the mode of cure is tuto et celeriter, safe and speedy, remuneration is diminished. ”

“ A noble fee, in the interests of humanity, was given by a French lady to a surgeon, who used his lancet so clumsily that he cut an artery instead of a vein, in consequence of which the lady died. On her deathbed she made a will, bequeathing the operator a life annuity of eight hundred livres, on condition "that he never again bled anybody so long as he lived." ”

“ It is to a "country doctor" that England and the world owe one of the greatest benefits that modern medical science has conferred on the race, in the practice of vaccination. The youngest son of a Gloucestershire clergyman, Edward Jenner was placed, about 1763, as apprentice to a surgeon at Sodbury; and it was there, it is stated, that first the possibility of arresting the then dreaded and dreadful ravages of small-pox entered his mind. ”

“ For we see orators have their declamations; lawyers have their merits; logicians their sophisms; and every practice of science hath an exercise of erudition and imitation before men come to the life; only preaching, which is the worthiest, and wherein it is most dangerous to do amiss, wanteth an introduction, and is ventured and rushed upon at first. ”