May 12 marks the 199th birth anniversary of Florence Nightingale, an English social reformer and statistician, who is considered the founder of modern nursing.

To honor her contribution to the society and medical world, the International Nurses Day is celebrated on her birth anniversary every year. Nightingale, also known as “the lady with the lamp,” rose to prominence while serving as a manager and trainer of nurses during the Crimean War (1853-1856), in which she supervised care for wounded soldiers.

The following are a few quotes by the legendary nurse, courtesy Brainy Quote:

"The greatest heroes are those who do their duty in the daily grind of domestic affairs whilst the world whirls as a maddening dreidel."

"Live your life while you have it. Life is a splendid gift. There is nothing small in it. Far the greatest things grow by God's law out of the smallest. But to live your life, you must discipline it."

"If I could give you information of my life, it would be to show how a woman of very ordinary ability has been led by God in strange and unaccustomed paths to do In His service what He has done in her. And if I could tell you all, you would see how God has done all, and I nothing."

"The most important practical lesson that can be given to nurses is to teach them what to observe - how to observe - what symptoms indicate improvement - what the reverse - which are of importance - which are of none - which are the evidence of neglect - and of what kind of neglect."

"If a patient is cold, if a patient is feverish, if a patient is faint, if he is sick after taking food, if he has a bed-sore, it is generally the fault not of the disease, but of the nursing."

"The martyr sacrifices themselves entirely in vain. Or rather not in vain; for they make the selfish more selfish, the lazy more lazy, the narrow narrower."

"The very elements of what constitutes good nursing are as little understood for the well as for the sick. The same laws of health or of nursing, for they are in reality the same, obtain among the well as among the sick."

"A hundred struggle and drown in the breakers. One discovers the new world. But rather, ten times rather, die in the surf, heralding the way to that new world, than stand idly on the shore."

"Why do people sit up so late, or, more rarely, get up so early? Not because the day is not long enough, but because they have no time in the day to themselves."

"It may seem a strange principle to enunciate as the very first requirement in a hospital that it should do the sick no harm."

"The world is put back by the death of every one who has to sacrifice the development of his or her peculiar gifts to conventionality."

"So never lose an opportunity of urging a practical beginning, however small, for it is wonderful how often in such matters the mustard-seed germinates and roots itself."

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