misunderstood by them; and the physician who has the misfortune to be without it who betrays indecision and worry, and who shows that he is flustered and flurried in ordinary emergencies, loses rapidly the confidence of his patients... In a true and perfect form imperturbability is indissolubly associated with wide experience and an intimate knowledge of the varied aspects of disease. With such advantages he is so equipped that no eventuality can disturb the mental equilibrium of the physician; the possibilities are always manifest and the course of action clear."
By giving us a tale from the classics Osler introduced the lecture's topic: "In the second place, there is a mental equivalent to this bodily endowment, which is as important in our pilgrimage as imperturbability. Let me recall to your minds an incidence related of that best of men and wisest of rulers Antonius Pius, who, as he lay dying in his home at Lorium in Etruria, summed up the philosophy of life in the watchword a equanimity. As for him, about to pass flammantia mosnia mundi (the flaming ramparts of the world); so for you, fresh from Clotho's spindle, a calm equanimity is the desirable attitude. How difficult to attain, yet how necessary, in success as in failure! Natural temperament has much to do with its development, but a clear knowledge of our relation to our fellow-creatures and to the work of life is also indispensable. One of the first essentials in securing a good natured equanimity is not to expect too much of the people amongst whom you dwell. 'Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers,' and in matters medical the ordinary citizen of today had not one whit more sense than the old Romans, whom Lucian scourged for a credulity which made them fall easy victims to the quacks of the time, such as the notorious Alexander, whose exploits make one wish that his advent had been delayed some eighteen centuries."
