18th-century Physiologist Quotes

Albrecht von Haller
Marie François Xavier Bichat
Lazzaro Spallanzani
Franz Joseph Gall
François Magendie
Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, 1st Baronet

The fate of the physiology of the brain is independent of the truth and falsity of my assertions relative to the laws of the organization of the nervous system, in general, and of the brain in particular, just as the knowledge of the functions of a sense is independent of the knowledge of the structure of its apparatus.

Franz Joseph Gall
Franz Joseph Gall
Every one is fond of comparing himself to something great and grandiose, as Louis XIV likened himself to the sun, and others have had like similes. I am more humble. I am a mere street scavenger (chiffonier) of science. With my hook in my hand and my basket on my back, I go about the streets of science, collecting what I find.

François Magendie
François Magendie
Infinity! What measures thee? Before the worlds as days, and men as moments flee!

Albrecht von Haller
Albrecht von Haller
To say that physiology is made up of the physics of animals is to give a very inaccurate idea of it; as well might we say that astronomy is the physiology of the stars.

Marie François Xavier Bichat
Marie François Xavier Bichat
If I set out to prove something, I am no real scientist — I have to learn to follow where the facts lead me — I have to learn to whip my prejudices.

Lazzaro Spallanzani
Lazzaro Spallanzani
A symbol, however, should be something more than a convenient and compendious expression of facts. It is, in the strictest sense, an instrument for the discovery of facts, and is of value mainly with reference to this end, by its adaptation to which it is to be judged.

Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, 1st Baronet
Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, 1st Baronet