Page:The Hunterian Oration,1838.djvu/35

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THE HUNTERIAN ORATION.
27

tribute to their intrinsic excellence is the estimation which they enjoy and the influence which they exercise at this day upon the practice of surgery. As an author, Pott is pre-eminent for the vigour, perspicuity, and elegance of his style.

In another and distinct category, did the limits of this Discourse permit, I should here mention the beneficial influence on the progress of surgery derived from the anatomical schools of Ruysch, Winslow, Albinus, Morgagni, the illustrious Haller, the first Monro, and William Hunter. Many of the disciples of these distinguished men were afterwards eminent for their surgical attainments in various countries of Europe. But I content myself with observing, that the correspondence of anatomy and scientific surgery, in their rate of proficiency, is not less uniform than remarkable.

We have now arrived, Sir, at that crisis of our history which ushers Jonn Hunter upon the stage; but the Hunterian zra, the most memorable in the annals of our science, dates little earlier than the commencement of the present century. Shakspeare’s Mare Antony says,

"The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones.”

If to Hunter any evil could be imputed it was buried with him; his great achievements in the cause