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In the case of the medical profession, the more distinguished it is and the more serviceable to the world, the more unrestricted it should be for those who practise it. It is only just that the art of healing should carry with it some privilege in respect to the liberty of practising it; that no compulsion and no commands should be put upon a holy calling, taught by the gods and exercised by men of learning; that it should not be subject to enslavement by the law, or to voting and judicial punishment, or to fear and a father’s threats and a layman’s wrath. Consequently, if I were to say to you, as clearly and expressly as this: ‘I am unwilling to give treatment, and I do not do so, although Ican; my knowledge of the profession is for my benefit alone and my father’s, and to others I wish to be a layman,” what tyrant so high-handed that he would constrain me to practise my calling against my will? Such things should, in my opinion, be amenable to entreaties and supplications, not to laws and fits of anger and courts: the physician ought to be persuaded, not ordered; he ought to be willing, not fearful; he ought not to be haled to the bedside, but to take pleasure in coming of his own accord. Surely his calling is exempt from paternal compulsion in view of the fact that physicians have honours, precedence, immunities, and privileges publicly bestowed on them by states.
