| Quote | Author | Source | Email Quote |
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| Some medical beast had revived tar-water in those days as a fine medicine, and Mrs. Joe always kept a supply of it in the cupboard; having a belief in its virtues correspondent to its nastiness. At the best of times, so much of this elixir was administered to me as a choice restorative, that I was conscious of going about, smelling like a new fence. | Charles Dickens | Great Expectations |  |
| Any mummery will cure if the patient's faith is strong in it. | Mark Twain | A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court | |
| "There are one or two elementary rules to be observed in the way of handling patients," he remarked, seating himself on the table and swinging his legs. "The most obvious is that you must never let them see that you want them. It should be pure condescension on your part seeing them at all; and the more difficulties you throw in the way of it, the more they think of it. Break your patients in early, and keep them well to heel." | Sir Arthur Conan Doyle | The Stark Munro Letters | |
| "Dr. Munro, sir," said he, "I am a walking museum. You could fit what ISN'T the matter with me on to the back of a ---- visiting card. If there's any complaint you want to make a special study of, just you come to me, sir, and see what I can do for you. It's not every one that can say that he has had cholera three times, and cured himself by living on red pepper and brandy." | Sir Arthur Conan Doyle | The Stark Munro Letters | |
| It is a most extraordinary thing, but I never read a patent medicine advertisement without being impelled to the conclusion that I am suffering from the particular disease therein dealt with in its most virulent form. | Jerome K. Jerome | Three Men in a Boat | |
| "I'm bad," he said, pouting--"been bad all the week; don't sleep at night. The doctor can't tell why. He's a clever fellow, or I shouldn't have him, but I get nothing out of him but bills." | John Galsworthy | The Forsyte Saga | |
| To say the truth, every physician almost hath his favourite disease, to which he ascribes all the victories obtained over human nature. | Henry Fielding | Tom Jones | |
| "When a doctor does go wrong he is the first of criminals. He has nerve and he has knowledge." | Sir Arthur Conan Doyle | The Adventure of the Speckled Band | |
| For, according to our old saying, the three learned professions live by roguery on the three parts of a man. The doctor mauls our bodies; the parson starves our souls, but the lawyer must be the adroitest knave, for he has to ensnare our minds. | R. D. Blackmore | Lorna Doone | |
