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To confess ignorance is often wiser than to beat about the bush with a hypothetical diagnosis.

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
Beat
Beats
Ignorance
Often
Hypothetical
Diagnosis
Confess
Wiser
Bush

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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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The extraordinary development of modern science may be her undoing. Specialism, now a necessity, has fragmented the specialities themselves in a way that makes the outlook hazardous. The workers lose all sense of proportion in a maze of minutiae.
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The value of experience is not in seeing much, but in seeing wisely.
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Too many men slip early out of the habit of studious reading, and yet that is essential.
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Jaundice is the disease that your friends diagnose.
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Throw away all ambition beyond that of doing the day's work well. The travelers on the road to success live in the present, heedless of taking thought for the morrow. Live neither in the past nor in the future, but let each day's work absorb your entire energies, and satisfy your wildest ambition.
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Acquire the art of detachment, the virtue of method, and the quality of thoroughness, but above all the grace of humility.
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Beware of people who call you 'Doc.' They rarely pay their bills.
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The clean tongue, the clear head, and the bright eye are birthrights of each day.
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To do today's work well and not to bother about tomorrow is the secret of accomplishment
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Soap and water and common sense are the best disinfectants.
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The young doctor should look about early for an avocation, a pastime, that will take him away from patients, pills, and potions.
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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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The greater the ignorance the greater the dogmatism.
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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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Conservatism and old fogeyism are totally different things the motto of one is Prove all things and hold fast that which is good and of the other Prove nothing but hold fast that which is old.
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Courage and cheerfulness will not only carry you over the rough places in life, but will enable you to bring comfort and help to the weak-hearted and will console you in the sad hours.
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We doctors have always been a simple trusting folk. Did we not believe Galen implicitly for 1500 years and Hippocrates for more than 2000?
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Advice is sought to confirm a position already taken.
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Let each hour of the day have its allotted duty, and cultivate that power of concentration which grows with its exercise.
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