Medicine can only cure curable diseases, and then not always.

Medicine can only cure curable diseases, and then not always.

(Macbeth:) How does your patient, doctor?
(Doctor:) Not so sick, my lord,
As she is troubled with read more

(Macbeth:) How does your patient, doctor?
(Doctor:) Not so sick, my lord,
As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies
That keep her from her rest.
(Macbeth:) Cure her of that!
Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
Pluck from the memory of a rooted sorrow,
Raze out the written troubles of the brain,
And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Cleanse the stuffed bosom of the perilous stuff
Which weighs upon the heart?
(Doctor:) Therein the patient
Must minister to himself.
(Macbeth:) Throw physic to the dogs, I'll none of it!

I firmly believe that if the whole materia medica could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would read more

I firmly believe that if the whole materia medica could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be all the better for mankind, and all the worse for the fishes.

Though bitter, good medicine cures illness. Though it may hurt,
loyal criticism will have beneficial effects.

Though bitter, good medicine cures illness. Though it may hurt,
loyal criticism will have beneficial effects.

To array a man's will against his sickness is the supreme art of medicine.

To array a man's will against his sickness is the supreme art of medicine.

We do not bear sweets; we are recruited by a bitter potion.
[Lat., Dulcia non ferimus; succo renovamus amaro.]

We do not bear sweets; we are recruited by a bitter potion.
[Lat., Dulcia non ferimus; succo renovamus amaro.]

Constant attention by a good nurse may be just as important as a
major operation by a surgeon.

Constant attention by a good nurse may be just as important as a
major operation by a surgeon.

But in this point
All his tricks founder and he brings his physic
After his patient's death: read more

But in this point
All his tricks founder and he brings his physic
After his patient's death: the king already
Hath married the fair lady.

One doctor, singly like the sculler plies,
The patient struggles, and by inches dies;
But two physicians, read more

One doctor, singly like the sculler plies,
The patient struggles, and by inches dies;
But two physicians, like a pair of oars,
Waft him right swiftly to the Stygian shores.