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COMPREHENSIVE MINUTE,








       COMMEMORATIVE
PHILIP SYNG PHYSICK, M.D.,
emeritus professor of anatomy and surgery,
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UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
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PHILADELPHIA




    1838. 
 
                        University  of  Pennsylvania,
                            Saturday, December 16,  1837.

  At a Special Meeting of the Board of Trustees, held this day,
the following Resolutions were adopted unanimously:

  " Resolved, That the Trustees will attend the funeral obsequies
of the late Professor, Dr. Physick, in company with the Profes-
sors of both Faculties, and the Alumni and Students of the Uni-
versity.

  " Resolved, That a Committee  be appointed to prepare and
■present, at the next meeting of this  Board, a Comprehensive
Minute—to stale the long connexion of the  deceased with this
University—and to express the respect  entertained for his able
and faithful services as a teacher—for his  eminence as a prac-
titioner of medicine—and for the virtues which adorned his pri-
vate character."

   The Committee appointed, are—Mr. Meredith, Judge Hopkin-
son, Dr. Mayer, and Mr. Gibson.

           Certified from the Minutes.
                                 James Biddle, Secretary.

TO WILLIAM  MEREDITH  ESQ.,
              Chairman, fyc. 
 
  N.  CHAPMAN, M.D.,
                             Professor, <SfC.


Dear Dr.  Chapman,

  Turning from the honoured dead to the living, I
inscribe this Minute to you.  Not that I think it is
going to enlarge your fame much, but because the re-
lation which you had to the deceased, as a pupil, and
your confidential intimacy with him since—personal
and professional—enable you best to appreciate his
worth.
  There is another reason, not less operative; it is, to
have an occasion for saying, that the friendship and
esteem of more than thirty years' standing, are yet
warm in the heart of
                     Your's, faithfully and
                               affectionately,    l^
                                        W.  M. 
 
COMPREHENSIVE  MINUTE.
  Philip  Syng  Physick was born in this city, on
the 7th of July, 1768.
  His boyhood passed away in the schools of Mr. John
Tod and  Mr. Robert Proud, Masters of " Friends'
Academy."
  In due time he entered the Collegiate Department
of the University, where he profited in classical stu-
dies by the  instruction  of Mr. James Davidson, one
of the best scholars in humanity of his time.  In
        he graduated A. B.
  Moral correctness, diligence, and filial piety, were
presages of his future usefulness and celebrity. They
who think, " that best men are moulded out of faults,
and become  much more the better by being a little
bad," find no authority in his example.
  The profession of medicine was his early choice. He
commenced  the study with the excellent and learned
Dr. Kuhn, who had been the " Professor of Materia
Medica and Botany" since the first establishment of
our medical  school.
  In 1788, he accompanied his father to London, and
was placed under the care of Dr. John Hunter,  the
surgeon and anatomist of the day.
  While he  was yet at the feet of this great  master,
he so won his favour and confidence  that, by his in-
fluence he was preferred to the office of " House Sur- 
8
geon to St. George's Hospital" over many competitors
with powerful patronage.
   In 1791, having received his  Diploma  from  the
" College of Surgeons in London," he visited the school
of Edinburgh, and graduated M. D.

   Thus qualified by study and instruction,  and with
some experience  (especially in surgery,) he returned
to his native city, in 1792, and opened his office as a
practitioner.
   Surgery was at first and perhaps continued to be a
favourite branch.
   His quick and penetrating  eye, firm nerve,  and
manual  tact and power,  peculiarly fitted him to excel
in  practical surgery.   Upon  these,  the master had
relied  much  when  he  predicted  the  future  emi-
nence of the pupil.  He was happy, too, in the  im-
provement and invention of many useful surgical in-
struments to assist the operator and diminish suffering.
   The mortal  epidemic of 1793, brought him into
general  notice and respect.  With faithful brethren,*

  * It were impossible to look back to that dark hour of death and
dismay, and not recall Dr. Benjamin Rush, the great actor in the
tragic scene. His heroic fortitude and  disinterested  benevolence
were above all measure and all return.  They are a monument which
should be imperishable.
  To his  inflexible perseverance in maintaining the  theory of the
domestic origin of yellow fever, we owe many and great  blessings.
The earlier introduction of pure water—more care of personal clean-
liness—increased attention to whatever concerns the wholesomeness
of the air and the general salubrity—for these we are mainly indebted
to Dr. Rush.  They who knew Philadelphia as she was before 1793,
understand their value.
  Stephen Girard, one of the most efficient and useful of the Com-
mittee of Citizens, (he was volunteer nurse at the Hospital,) enter- 
9
" he stood between the dead and the living," and was
appointed to the forlorn hope, to be " Resident Physi-
cian of the Yellow Fever Hospital at Bush-Hill."
   To  his professional cares was added much of the
regulation and control of the domestic economy, and
his authority in this behalf was  strengthened by the
civil commission of the peace, conferred by Governor
Mifflin*
   He  continued there while it was  necessary to keep
the Hospital open, and honourable and valuable testi-
monials of his humane and skilful services followed
him in retirement.
   In 1794, he was elected " Surgeon to the Pennsyl-
vania Hospital,"  and  continued to perform  the active
duties of that station twenty-two years.  His practice
increased with no ordinary rapidity, and in the same
year he again met preferment as " Prescribing Physi-
cian of the Philadelphia Dispensary."
   He  was long  time Surgeon  to the Alms House In-

tained Dr. Rush's opinion of the origin of the fever, and there was
intimate communication between them.  It is not unlikely that this
and their entire concurrence in the necessity of removing local causes
of disease, may have led Mr. G. to think of the appropriation of his
wealth to public purposes, especially the widening of Water Street,
and the improvement of the eastern city front, and its police and em-
bellishment.
   Although it may not be  perfectly apposite to the purpose of this
note, we will not deny ourselves the pleasure of naming Mr. M.
Carey, as a colleague of Mr. G. in the Committee of Citizens.  He
carried  into the performance of its duties, the same contempt of dan-
ger—the same warm and generous heart—which have animated him
through a long life, and placed him with the foremost  in benevolent
works and designs.
   * Dr. Rush says,  " this house was regulated and governed with
the order and cleanliness of an old established hospital."
                B 
10
firmary—Surgeon to the Institution for the  Blind—
and President of the Medical Society.
   The American Philosophical Society elected him a
member in July, 1802.
   Nor  was  our  Professor  without honour  abroad.
The "Royal  Medical  and  Chirurgical  Society  of
London," transmitted the Honorary Diploma to him
in 1836.
   All these  distinctions were solid benefits to our
school.  They were, too, " clear honour, won by merit
of the wearer."
   Dr. Physick's direct connexion with our Medical
Department began in June,  1805, when he succeeded
Dr. William Shippen and the lamented Wistar* in
the Chair of Surgery, then  separated from Anatomy
and Midwifery.f


  * We shall be excused for stepping out of the text, to speak with
affectionate respect of this gentleman.  Great and good are the epi-
thets which belong to his name.  He was eminently great as a phi-
losopher, a physician, and a teacher; and it were vain to seek a better
in the social and domestic relations.  To this day Philadelphia owes
one of the happiest associations of her society to his name and hos-
pitable example.  He died in January, 1818, having .filled different
stations in our school since 1789.
  f These again  were  divided, and to  the latter  Dr. Thomas C.
James was elected in June 1810.  Ill health caused him to resign in
1834, and he did not long survive—a strong constitution was broken
down by incessant toil of mind  and body. Nature  had bountifully
bestowed upon him the essential qualities of the gentleman, and they
were successfully cultivated.   His self-government and courtesy
were beautiful traits.   He was a scholar, and he might have been  a
poet, but he practised self-denial. In the sphere to which he mainly
confined his attention, he had hardly a rival in  general esteem and 
11
  It may be remarked, here, that the style of his lec-
tures was strictly didactic—his  manner grave  and
imposing.  He did not affect the rhetorician, nor by
any means  stir the  imagination—his  own  or his
hearers.
  In July, 1819, he was elected to the Chair of Ana-
tomy,  vacant by the  death of Dorsey, whose  praise
was neither "measured nor confined."  He remain-
ed  there  until 1831.   Then  it was, that  by reason
of  declining health, he  felt  himself  constrained to
withdraw from its duties, and to  tender  his  resig-
nation.
  Upon the happening of this deplored event, having
filled these Chairs with the highest reputation more
than thirty  years—he was unanimously  chosen to
be  " Emeritus Professor of Surgery and Anatomy"
—a compliment (the first of its kind here,) for the be-
stowing of which policy might  have sufficed, for his
name was a pillar of strength.
  But the main design was to render a signal honour,
and so it was received.
   It will not be expected  to  find in this place a no-
 tice of peculiar opinions, if he had any, in the theory
 or  practice of his  art.  But it  is designed to relate,
 briefly and  without overcharging, some of the ele-
 ments of his personal and professional worth.   The


 confidence. And foreign travel, much reading, and manly associa-
 tions, commended him as a companion to highest respect.  If he had
 a defect it must have been more of diffidence in himself and of defer-
 ence to others, than an impartial comparison of merits would justify.
But he was a pattern of the pure man—the amiable friend—and the
Christian philosopher and philanthropist. 
12
same are doubtless to be seen in the histories of emi-
nent medical men, dead and living, but " the ele-
ments were so mixed  in him," as to produce in rare
perfection, with universal assent, a model of the ad-
mirable physician.
  If, as has been said elsewhere, " the science of me-
dicine has relation to every thing;"  and if, as is be-
lieved, there is no virtue but finds its proper place in
the perfect physician, this may be thought high eulo-
gy ; but it is not the less just.
  We have remarked that  the healing art  was Dr.
Physick's early choice.  It was first and last in his
aspiration and his ambition.  To this, other objects
were held in secondary estimation;—in other studies
he did not court distinction.  For this, the fascinating
lures of pleasure were shunned, and the faculties of
mind  and body kept, by exercise and temperance, in
constant training.
  Abhorring empiricism, he was yet bold and decid-
ed in practice.  Doubt and uncertainty were dispelled
by anxious inquiry and meditation in the closet and
on the pillow :—there they were left.
  In  common intercourse his  gravity might have
been mistaken for  coldness—perhaps austerity. But
in the chamber of the sick, his face was effulo-ent of
kindness and sympathy, lighting  to love and hope!
It is hard to say, " utrum eum amid magis venerentur
an amarent."
  Whatever might assuage  pain or administer to ease
and comfort—even the manner of adjusting the  pa-
tient's couch, or the concoction of his diet,—nothing
was beneath his attention.
  The families in which he was  professionally inti-
mate, confessed his faithfulness and skill, with grati- 
13
tude;  and they often felt too, more deeply, that they
had found a friend in the physician.
   Jealous of professional honour, he was sensitively
delicate on the subject of professional reward, lest any
might impute an undue mixture of the alloy of cupi-
dity with the liberal motives to duty.  But he never
" turned disease into commodity."   There was a con-
stant negation of mercenary feelings in numberless,
unstinted  and unrequited services;* for he was  al-
ways prompt at the call of the poor.  Humanity this so
often, in varying degrees, associated with professional
rank, that it is adverted to less for individual encomi-
um than to pay a just tribute to a numerous class.
   Truth was in his regard a prime virtue, so that we
may again apply what has been said of Atticus, " men-
dacium neque dicebat neque pati poterat."  His undevi-
ating regard for truth raised punctuality above the
rank of minor morals.
   His practice, like his fame, had become national.
Physicians and patients, far away and near, asked his
advice;  and  many from remote  cities and States
sought here in person relief by his consummate skill.
His success in healing was indeed remarkable. Upon
whom shall his mantle fall ?  Doubtless there is a fit
successor to be found among those  who best know to
value his teaching and example.
   He was no religionist.—Reverence for religion was
deeply seated in his mind and his affections: nor was

  * In regard to the exalted estimation in which Dr. Physick was
held by our friends of South Carolina—his moderation in charges—
and the frequency of his benevolence, we have a note from Mr. John
Vaughan which we are almost tempted to insert verbatim.  But to
prove works of unbounded charity in the one it is enough to call the
other to the stand as a witness, and to know they were co-labourers. 
14
he indifferent to her outward rites.  It is not known
that he was ever betrayed into an expression which
could disquiet the believer or give boldness to the scep-
tic. And  so ardently did he pant for her promises,
that he fain would have attained assurances more than
are revealed by Faith.
  Behold this imperfect portraiture of the man whom
this University delighted to honour! How richly have
her honours been repaid by the wider expansion of
her own fame,—by the enlarged  reputation of her
school—and by the advancement of medical  science!
  After protracted suffering, our Friend and revered
Professor expired on the morning of the  15th day of
December, 1837.
  The often conqueror is himself vanquished!  The
grave is closed and holds fast his victim!
  Yet say, can  that emaciated Body be all  that re-
mains of this Mind and these  Virtues! 
IT 
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