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In seeking absolute truth we aim at the unattainable and must be content with broken portions.

William Osler

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William Osler
Age: 70 †
Born: 1849
Born: July 12
Died: 1919
Died: December 29
Physician
Professor
Sir William Osler
Sir William
WO
Aim
Absolutes
Absolute
Content
Seeking
Broken
Truth
Unattainable
Must
Portions

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Taking a lady's hand gives her confidence in her physician.
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Fed on the dry husks of facts, the human heart has a hidden want which science cannot supply.
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The most essential thing for happiness is the gift of friendship.
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Nothing will sustain you more potently than the power to recognize in your humdrum routine, as perhaps it may be thought, the true poetry of life.
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Care more for the individual patient than for the special features of the disease. . . . Put yourself in his place . . . The kindly word, the cheerful greeting, the sympathetic look - these the patient understands.
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Shed, as you do your garments, your daily sins, whether of omission or commission, and you will wake a free man, with a new life.
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No dreams, no visions, no delicious fantasies, no castles in the air, with which, as the old song so truly says, hearts are broken, heads are turned.
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The higher the standard of education in a profession, the less marked will be the charlatanism.
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We are constantly misled by the ease with which our minds fall into the ruts of one or two experiences
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Beware of people who call you 'Doc.' They rarely pay their bills.
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Perhaps no sin so easily besets us as a sense of self-satisfied superiority to others.
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Shut out all of your past except that which will help you weather your tomorrows.
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He who knows syphilis knows medicine
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A library represents the mind of its collector, fancies and foibles, strengths and weaknesses, prejudices and preferences.
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Advice is sought to confirm a position already taken.
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Be calm and strong and patient. Meet failure and disappointment with courage. Rise superior to the trials of life, and never give in to hopelessness or despair. In danger, in adversity, cling to your principles and ideals. Aequanimitas!
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Nature, the great Moloch, which exacts a frightful tax of human blood, sparing neither young nor old taking the child from the cradle, the mother from her babe, and the father from the family.
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Now the way of life that I preach is a habit to be acquired gradually by long and steady repetition. It is the practice of living for the day only, and for the day's work.
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Take the sum of human achievement in action, in science, in art, in literature subtract the work of the men above forty, and while we should miss great treasures, even priceless treasures, we would practically be where we are today ... The effective, moving, vitalizing work of the world is done between the ages of twenty-five and forty.
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To confess ignorance is often wiser than to beat about the bush with a hypothetical diagnosis.
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