INTRODUCTORY LECTURE
Course of fjjjpofogi)
MEDICAL  COLLEGE
STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA,
JAMES MOULTRIE, M. D.
CHARLESTON, NOVEMBER 3d, 1856.
       CHARLESTON:
WALKER, EVANS & CO. PRINTERS, 3 BROAD STREET
         1856. 
 
                                  CHARLESTON, S. C., Nov. 4th, 1856.
Prof. Jos. Moultrie, M.D.:
     Dear Sir,—At a meeting of the Students of the Medical College of the State
of South-Carolina, it was unanimously
     Resolved,  That <■ committee be appointed to solicit a copy of  Prof. Jas. Moul
trie's  very eloquent and instructive Introductory Address, for publication.
     In transmitting the above,  permit us to add, that  your compliance with  our
request will  be sincerely gratifying to ourselves personally, and to the members of
the Class generally.
                   Very  respectfully,
                                A. R.  TABER,  Chairman,      ^|
                                J. C. FANT,
                                R. Q.  STACY,
                                WM. H. MOORE,             I  „
                                T  W PAPPTTV               i  ^^^^^'^
                                WM. H. DAUGHTREY, M.D., '
                                W.  L. STEELE,
                                T. J. VANCE,
                                                NOVEMBER 14th, 1856-
Messrs.  Taber, Pacetty, Fant, Daughtrey, Stacy, Steele, Moore and Vance:
     Gentlemen,— [ have the pleasure of acknowledging the receipt of your kind
note the other day, conveying to me a  Resolution of the Medical Class, soliciting a
copy of my late  Introductory Address, with a view  to its publication, accompanied
with your own assurances of personal consideration.
  Prepared  hurriedly,  to  mret the  immediately pending  opening  of the College, I
am  not conscious that it contains anything of originality, or of sufficient merit, to
entitle it to  the distinction which the kindness or conceptions of the Class propose
to accord to it—neverthlei-s, they are the judges of whatever good it may havo con-
ferred, or is  likely, by its  publicity,  still further to bestow.   In  view of this, and in
accordance with the gratification which it at all times affords me to  respond favora-
bly to the reasonable claims of its Members, I have respectfully to  request the Com-
mittee to state that the Address is at its disposal.
         I remain, Gentlemen, very sincerely, yours,
                                                       JAS. MOULTRIE. 
 
Gentlemen of the Medical Class :
  Our common presence within the precincts of this public edifice, and
the preparations made, and which are making, for our mutual reception
and accommodation, call to mind the completion and renewal of a year,
which, however oft-repeated, is ever pregnant with the recollection of the
demands it awakens on our time and responsibilities.  Before entering,
however, upon  a discharge of the  several and respective duties  which
the occasion is so  calculated to  inspire, I cannot forego the pleasure of
previously expressing my cordial salutation—of  proferring to you, what-
ever of advantage  it may be, in  my official capacity, to bestow, or of in-
dividual  hospitality, your own inclination and opportunity may prompt
you to seek.
   Among the self-evident truths, which daily address themselves to  the
notice of man, or  which have an axiomatic existence in  the structure of
his mind, there are none more obvious or universal, than that all things,
within the regions of space and the limitations of time, have a  begin-
ning, a duration, and  a termination.  Every thing, saving the  Infinite
and the Illimitable, within these circumscriptions, has, consequently, a
recorded or unrecorded registry, or history.   And  this is true, not only
of the outer world, but also of the inner ;  in the realms of matter, as
well as the dominions of force.
   So true is this, that if we cast our eyes upon this sublunary planet, or
that allotment in the  universality  of space, or occupancy, within  the
precincts of time, where humanity has its being, and the fulfilment of
its  appointed  destiny, the  declaration of it  is made to us everywhere.
Its geological verity is attested in every stratum  of which it is composed,
and in every storehouse of organic relics which it contains.   There, se-
quence after sequence  follow in almost mechanical  siuvession, evincive
of a purpose, and  demonstrative of a career, manifesting the terms  and
boundaries contained in the statement of our proposition.
   The vegetable races, which live, and grow, and decorate its surface, or
which ancient  or  modern researches have upturned from its bowels, tell
the same veritable story, whether we have reference to  the races, or the
individuals of which they are composed.   Observation shows a seriality, 
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as well as a co-temporality, in  past time, as well as in the present, from
the most simple to the most complex—the most general in structure and
in function, in matter and in force, to the most special, with respect  to
both.   The start of  each is  from  a c<jll — its career  is through like
phases of increment and development, and these are followed by but one
termination
   So of the  animal.   The  implied parallelism  is  complete.   Evidence
of this will repeatedly occur, as we shall have occasion  to notice in the
different parts of our  course. The animal organism begins in a cell. The
first state of the most perfect animal is a cell, and the simplest animal is
also a cell.  And  what  is true of the individual animal and  individual
plant, and of the races of both, is true alike of the succession,  as ordered
in geological  times.  The antecedents and Sequents are the same ; the
differentiations are characterized by the same laws of unity of composi-
tion and progressive  development.   Here, within this aboriginal  field  of
exploration, however, are we alone able fully to  realise the fact, that the
races, also, as well as  individuals, are equally the subject of the rule ; for
it is only here, that we have occular proof of the beginnings  of organic
and  of  inorganic sequences, as well as of a duration and destiny.
   The events of daily life render us habitually sensible of its verity with
respect to man.   He, as  we all know, has a beginning, a career,  and an
end.  This we in general, however, think  of in a vulgar sense.  Tt  is only
recently that we have come to recognise it as  a scientific  truth; it  is
only recently that we have learned that his start is likewise from  a cell;
and  that in all that  he passes through to what  he attains in  manhood,
the  states and stages are representations of what has already been de-
scribed. This knowledge we owe to the recenter investigations of Embry-
ology.
   And  what is true of the parts is true of the  whole.  Not  alone is  it
true of man, and of individuals, and  of  races, and of  present and past
time, but it is true  again of organization, as a whole,  as  of the uni-
verse.  Analysis, retracing its own footsteps—in other words, synthisis—
manifests a law of construction, in conformity with the same.  The com-
plex invariably emerges  out of  the simple.   These, under all known cir-
cumstances, are  the  constituents  of  those;  and it is now a well  under-
derstood aim of chemistry to ascertain what  they are; how many there
are ;  as well as their several and respective re-unions and disintegrations.
Its application to the  organic kingdom, has greatly enlarged the  field  of
its operations, and necessitated  a new division of the science, which,  in
contra-distinction to the  old, has been denominated " Organic."
  The " forces" observe a corresponding order.   The ever-present cause 
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of all the phenomena which have been described, it could not have been
otherwise.   As dynamical elements of knowledge, or objects of intellec-
tion, we  know  them only through their results.   The  doctrine of their
correlation,  indeed, teaches us that they are modified,  and  made to ap-
pear what they are, by the materials with which they are  associated.
Thus, concretely viewed, a strong probability obtains,  that motion is
their rudimental basis;  and that, influenced by the above consideration,
%e order of development is, in a general way, from the inorganic to the
organic—from  the vegetable to the animal—from the unconscious to the
conscious—and from the reflex to the instinctive—and, finally, intellec-
tual.
   In accordance with  these  evolutions, we would, of  course, expect to
find a like  manifestation in  the growth of  human  thought;  and  so
we do.   " Nihil est in intellectu quod not prius  fuit  in sensu"  is  an
old maxim, but nevertheless a  true one.   It  implies,  according to the
sense in which I understand,  and  mean to  apply it,  that that growth
begins with sensation, which  is  soon transformed into  perception, to be-
come the occasion or antecedent  of those still  further  demonstrations,
which are recognised in psychology, as  memory,  association, judgment,
reason and volition ; and of all those subsequent experiences, of unceas-
sing accretiveness and  method, by which  the mind is  enabled to arrive
at, and to retain, a knowledge of the differentiations implied in the char-
acteristics of species, and genera, and classes, and orders.
   It is  not surprising, therefore,  that  we  should find in  methods of
science, as these methods are  applied to the investigation and unfold-
ing  of truth, a further corroboration.  Their historical elucidation, as
well as  daily individual exemplification, show  that their agency is ope-
rative  in the  following order: observation, comparison, induction  and
deduction ;  and the reason of  it is deducible  from what has just  been
said.   What is method, in fact, but the order  according to which the
mind has worked  in the discovery, and registration, and communication
of truth.  Its  general history,  it seems to me, is the history of  philoso-
phy-
   We find, upon the further contemplation  of the subject, consequently,
that the  statement is equally  true of, and verified by, the history and na-
ture of  the sciences.   Offsprings of the  mind, of knowledge, and of
method,  it would have  been strange had it been otherwise.   The " circle
of the sciences," a phraseology long familiar to human ears, is an indica-
tion of the common faith, long entertained  respecting their reciprocal de-
pendencies.  From time immemorial, this  has been matter of vague and
general credence.   But the apprehension that they were not of fortuitous 
8
origin ; that they did not come forth at a birth, as Minerva is represented
to do in heathen mythology from the head of Hercules, and run a co-
temporaneous, unconnected career, accidentally affecting one another; but
that they had  their appointed seasons of appearance and  growth, and,
consequently, that some were necessarily of first existence and contained
the conditions of vitality of those which were to follow ;  are announce-
ments for which the present generations are indebted to the historical
and other labors, which have been conducted amidst numerous and  iso-
lated  fields of research by the votaries of positive philosophy.  Hereafter,
accordingly, it must be understood and appreciated, that their co-ordina-
tion was a pre-determined fact;  and that neither of them can be adequate-
ly studied alone, or elevated to its natural dignity or usefulness, until pro-
vision for so doing or achieving has been made, by the preliminary ad-
vances of its natural predecessors.  This is the declaration of an impor-
tant  principle,  which, in its application, is destined  to exert no little in-
fluence  over the progress of, and provisions for, human education, as yet
but little understood.
   What their  normal sequence  was, or is, may partly be anticipated
from  what has been already said.   The earliest were necessarily  the
most  needed, and, therefore, those which contained the fewest and  the
simplest ideas,  and which  could  be rendered most directly available to
the wants of an infantile or juvenile humanity.   Their historic is their
actual order, and is at the same time expressive of the law of their rela-
tionship.  The enumeration  contains, consecutively, the  following, viz :
Mathematics, Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, Physiology, Sociology and
Ethnography ;  and  the reason of  their differentiated advancement to-
wards their deductive completeness,  is the earlier start which  some have
had than others, as well as  their natural simplicity.  All, nevertheless, by
a common necessity and a common purpose, are tending  to  some com-
mon end, to some prospective good, where the  mission of humanity it-
self, in  whose interests they are united, will realise an explanation, and
find an  ultimate satisfaction.
   Where the  place of physiology is  in the hierarchical  sequence, and
what  are its antecedents and consequents, connections and  relations, may
be ascertained by adverting to the foregoing.  But it has besides a proper
registration  and history.   It has been subject also to alternate  expan-
sions  and contractions ;  and did time permit, we might evoke from this,
some  information as to the mutations which it has undergone.
   The obvious connections of the three general kingdoms of nature—the
dependance  of man on the lower creations for food, for  the chase, for
agriculture, and the implements  of war, could  not fail to bring to his 
9
early  notice all of these, and by progressive steps, to lead  him to their
scientific scrutiny.  We accordingly find inceptions of classification con-
tained among his physiological ideas.   Crude, as these ideas necessarily
were, they  indicate  nevertheless  what  was to  follow.   Where  the
Priesthood,  however,  was  the  depository  of all  knowledge;—where
little  was communicated, and much  concealed;—and where that com-
munication  was conducted  in the  mysterious language of allegory;—
where these ideas were  associated  with theological creeds, and  the
superstitions of religion;  and men  were educated in the faith, that the
bodies of animals were animated by the presence of the souls of their
relatives; there  could be little inducement to enter a field of inquiry,
the successful  labors in which alone could have emancipated the mind
from  its ruling delusions ; and which, as conducted in the modern spirit
of independence, has been the means of elevating the conceptions of  a
science, which is now  regarded  as the chief of the age.
   We do not look, therefore, to  the Indian, the Persian, or the Egyptian,
for any of the changes for the better which occurred in these primitive
times;  but  to the Sage,  the Philosopher, the Naturalist, the Moralist,
and the Physician, who succeeded them.  These, seeking for truth for its
own sake, uncorrupted by ambition, unsubdued by servility, unbiassed by
theology, unprejudiced by religion ; with whom knowledge was a first ob-
ject, its diffusion the next, and influence the last of all, and that only in sub-
serviency to the preceding;  were alone in the enjoyment of that freedom,
and possession of that mental fitness, for the verification of facts, and the
construction of systems, strong  enough to assert their own  prerogatives,
and to endure the tests of a philosophic and intelligent posterity.
   In Greece, as in India, Persia and Egypt, the possession and inculca-
tion of all knowledge being still centred in one and the same individual,
physiology, for a time, made but  feeble advances.   The term stood  at
first, nevertheless, for the expression of an " all-pervading life," which her
early philosophers supposed was manifested in the four recognized  " ele-
ments" of existence—earth, air, fire and water. It subsequently underwent
a change, and was restricted to such phenomena only as are manifested
in the mutations which characterise the organic kingdoms.  As represen-
tatives  of its  newly established position  and connections, names some-
what familiar to our ears  now appear, such as the profession delights even
at  the present day to honor.  And among these, those of Hippocrates,
and Aristotle, and  Galen, and Dioscorides, as well as others not material
to be recalled.  Even as  early as this, the germ of a theory is to be dis-
cerned, then called the " Unity  of the  Forces," which modern science, 
10
under the phraseology of the " Correlation of the Forces," has  raised to
a new acceptancy.
  With the Universities, the new substitutes for Lyceums  and Acade-
mies, which characterised the awakening from the long night of the Mid-
dle  Ages, these investigations were renewed; and  co-equal with them,
other honored names appeared—such  as Paracelsus, Avicenna, Van Hel-
mont and Stahl;  and after these, the less familiar ones of Rondelet and
Belon.   The  results  to  which  they  led,  originated  also the  germ  of
another theory, ascribed to the two last,  which  future researches, have
also greatly illustrated and  enlarged.  Out  of their comparison of the
skeletons  of the fish and the man, have emerged those doctrines  of ho-
mology and analogy, which characterise the  comparative physiology and
anatomy of  the present day, and which I shall endeavor to show, in the
expositions to  come, are amplified in the laws of  " unity of composition"
and " progressive development."
  But as I have already intimated, the history of physiology is not the
intent of our remarks.  I meant merely to  take a few steps backward,
in order to enable me, from the retrospection, to indicate its  relations
and advancements.
  A glance at the enumeration before given, will exhibit the position
recently  assigned it.  This,  as you will  recollect, is immediately after
the  physical  and  chemical.   When  Arithmetic, Geometry,  Algebra,
Physics and Chemistry, were sufficiently advanced, to furnish it with the
conditions of  its  existence and  development, then, and not  till then,  as
a science susceptible of improvement, did it appear—not until then, was
it possible ;  and whatever of exactitude  it possesses now, or success
it may have attained, by processes peculiar  to itself, are, in  a large de-
gree, owing to the helps which it has received from them.  As animal
bodies, inclusive of the human,  have parts that  are numerable, there is
an  obvious necessity for arithmetic; as they  are possessed of extent and
quantity, for  algebra; are liable to rest and motion, for statics and dy-
namics ;  embody solids, and fluids, and gasses, for physics and for chem-
istry ;  and are endued with actions and  functions, for physiology.  As
these, again, relate to society, and pre-suppose employment, there is a
further obvious necessity  for agriculture,  commerce and manufactures.
There is a further necessity, too, for morality, which contemplates, through
the culture of conscience, and the enactments of jurisprudence, the con-
straints which are essential to social harmony; and  that still higher and
more comprehensive exercise of its authority, the peculiarities of which
have obtained for it the name of  " Sociology," or the " Science of Equali- 
11
ty," the discussion and application of the principles of which, have been
the occasion of so many political convulsions in Europe, and disturbing
agitations in America, and which, in the  effort still to  arrive at a  satis-
actory solution and settlement, menaces so grievously the world's hap-
piness and peace.
   From what has in  this manner been spoken, it is appparent that phy-
siology, as I have said, is once more reclaiming to itself its ancient extent
and significancy; and that to know it as it should be known, those who
would enter upon the career which  it prescribes, must fit themselves
for it by varied  as  well  as extensive acquirement.   The  physiology
of to-day is vastly different  from what it was  in  days of yore.   In-
deed, so greatly do  they differ, that were it not for the historic  links
which unite them, it would not  be possible to trace  their genetical
relationship.  My occupancy of a Chair  in this Institution, which has
been  exclusively appropriated to it,  and the  lectures  which I yearly
deliver, jointly Avith  my several colleagues, evidences the estimation in
which it is held, and  its multifarious relations to  the respective branches
which they teach, as  well as to  the essential attainments of a medical
education.  Other evidences of  it, also, will necessarily and repeatedly
be brought to notice in  the course of the observations and reflections
which it will be pertinent to make, in reference to  comparative and human
anatomy and physiology, and their kindred inquiries, phytology and zoolo-
gy.  We  shall have frequent occasion, too, to allude to  the varied,  gene-
ral relations and conditions to which, as we have said, it is indebted for
its origin and progress.
   What  ideas may  prospectively  be  formed  of its  development and
availability, we are in no condition now adequately to determine.  From
what has recently been  accomplished, however,  we are  entitled to  ex-
pect infinitely more.  The services it has already  rendered to  psychology,
fully justifies the remark. All the sciences have their being in the mind.
Hence psychology has been called the "Science of Sciences,"  and  that all
look  to it for " first principles," to guide them in  the several  tasks which
they  have to perform.  A clear  and comprehensive natural philosophy
of the faculties and  operations of the understanding, has long  been a
desideratum in mental science : for the moralist turns  to it  for light to
illumine  the chambers of conscience ; the legislator for a  standard to
measure the degrees  of crime, or of guilt, and  a  sanction to  award their
punishment;  the  educationist for  data to organize systems of instruc-
tion,  which shall conduce towards the promotion of, rather than  counte-
ract, the fundamental teachings  of nature;  the physician for correct and
clear ideas of the nature of insanity, and  apt contrivances for its  preven- 
12
tion and remedy;  and the theologian for a solution of  the problem of
the origin of evil, and a true elimination of those  super-sensualities of
the soul, which have been commissioned to lift it above the sphere of
earth, and to wing it to those elevated regions, where it may commune
with thoughts pertaining immediately with the Infinite.  Their  appeals,
however, have not  as yet been answered.  While, in cotemporaneous lan-
guage, it has borrowed light  from all, it has shed none upon them in re-
turn.   The question naturally arises, therefore, as to why is this  ?  It is
because psychology has  been without an appropriate guide, and has for
ages been wandering in speculation and  hypothesis.  Until very recent-
ly, its home has been in the region of the abstract; but it has, at length,
passed from this, into the domain of the concrete.  It has become  a factor
of physiology, and in  common  with it, commences  to  rebuild  a new
structure on the anatomy and function of the nervous system.   For this
chauge, it is indebted to positive  philosophy ;  and in its renewed  activity,
promises, from its  recent gains, inconceivable advantages  to be hereafter
won in fields of inquiry that  have only been partially explored.
   Who, in this new connection, have been most distinguished for their re-
searches and successes, the annals of the present day very unequivocally
declare.  Among them, may be found the names of physiologists and phy-
sicians.  And the  reason of this lies in the special nature of their call-
ing.  The  Physician, unless  he  prove unworthy of  the  title  which he
bears, must necessarily be a physiologist.   To him, for a  long while, was
entrusted the cultivation of this science and its  congeners, and the ex-
clusive  management of the insane:  an intelligent consciousness  of the
essential characteristics of that disorder must always have been experienced
by him, therefore,  as a painful and pressing necessity.  Out of this source
consequently, has come much of the illumination which  has been shed
and to which we  owe  better  ideas  of the nature of  intelligence.  The
course of investigation into which he was thus led, and which he has pur
sued with so much diligence, relative to the structure of the brain and
spinal  marrow, and nerves, together with their functions and  disorders
as well  as other related objects,  could not fail to introduce new results
and thereby to prepare  the  way for, as  well  as  to  lay the foundations
of,  a renovated psychology, which,  under the guidance  of its new and
positive methods of inquiry, bids fair to clothe itself, in due season, with
the certitudes which  have already invested its predecessors and cotempo-
raries.
  In  elucidation of  the  above, it would be easy to cite  examples; but
passing by  the names of many, it is sufficient to enumerate, from among
the living,  the conspicuous ones of Bell, of Hall, of Carpenter, and  of 
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Noble. With their labors, we shall become partly acquainted shortly.  It is
only proper to remark here,  that these writers, in the important discove-
ries which they have made, relative to reflex action, instinct, intelligence
and volition, have created an epoch in the history of that science.   The
nervous system,  as  an entirety, now  stands forth,  as the  great organic
mechanism  of all their varied phenomena; the link between the forces
which are resident  within, and the forces which  environ them without;
the substratum, through which they severally correlate ;  and by means of
which, the relations of the interior are enabled  to co-ordinate with the
relations of the exterior.  Progress and development thus have asubstan-
tial, as well as a speculative, basis, and  its records are rendered perma-
nent, as well as practicable and consecutive.  Experience, the primordial
basis of  all knowledge, is provided with a fixed  habitation, as well  as a
name ;  is no longer an abstraction, intrinsically and isolatedly related to
mind ;  but a concrete, which has a being in staties as well as dynamics,
in structure as well as action, in matter as well as force.  Experience is or-
ganizable, and organized.  It becomes, in other words, a constituent of or-
ganization,  and may be integrated ;  and in  this fact, lies the perpetuity of
the sciences, and  their improvements well as the perpetuity of society, and
its civilization.   The " organization of societies" a  phrase so rife in hu-
man parlance, and  so  essential to  the language  of the  statesman, the
politician and the  common people,  agreeably to this  doctrine,  is not
merely a metaphor, or fiction of expression, but a conventionalism, deno-
 tive of a  structural and functional truth, having the same organic estab-
lishment in man, ceteris paribus, as that which the instincts have in the
 beaver, the bee,  the termite  and the ant. The essence of materiality, and
 the essence of immateriality, are propositions of the inconceivable, and
 no longer find entertainment within the legitimate exercises of philoso-
 phy.  But if experience,  which is science,  and civilization, and thought,
 are concretes; if every thought is accompanied with  some movement
 among the constituent  primordials of the  brain, and these give rise  in
 turn to correspondent activities of thought; then may they severally and
 reciprocally entail upon one another the influences of  their mutations,
 whether these be for good or for evil.  This observation, let it be remem-
 bered, is  momentous; for it affects alike the physical, and moral, and in-
 tellectual, and theological education of the world.  If pedestrianism aug-
 ments the muscularity of the leg, and the muscularity of the leg augments
 the capabilities of pedestrianism ;  if labor  at the anvil develops the mus-
 cularity of the arm, and the muscularity of the arm enhances the capa-
 bilities at the anvil ;  if thoughts alter the  volume, too, and the form of
 the several parts of the brain, and those altered parts of the brain enlarge, 
14
by reciprocation, the comprehension, and adhesiveness, and veisatility of
thought; then have we attained to a concrete explanation of the fact, that
many actions  which, in their  incipiency, are  conscious and difficult  of
performance, by  uetude are in due season rendered  unconscious  and
easy ; that the voluntary simulate the reflex, and the reflex the voluntary;
and that those which, in the inferior races, are instinctive and automatic,
in the superior, are changed into the intelligent and free.   The law  of
unity of composition and of progressive development, thus finds its illus-
tration and exemplification in the differentiations of  species.
  Human society, for these reasons, as well as human civilization, is de-
pendent,  alike  with comparative society,  upon structure  and  function.
Both have their seat in the neurine material of which that structure  is
composed, and in  those correspondences  of internal  and external rela-
tions and adaptations, in which  we have found the very essence of the ex-
perience which distinguishes the  former, to consist.   Hence its indelible
registration, and transmissibility from generation to generation.
  It is the province only of superior minds, however, to contemplate the
exalted relations which physiology has been thus imperfectly shown to
bear to the  hierarchy of science, or  to cany forward the investigations
to which their meditation leads.   The subject has been introduced at this
time,  therefore,  for the  simple  purpose of elucidating its variety  and
extent, and of affording  a  glimpse merely of that noble field, in  which
you are invited to labor, and to  win, if you choose,  an enduring crown.
As it now presents itself to our reflections and  study, it is  the complex
result of thousands of  minds,  professional  and  unprofessional, severally
and unitedly at work, simultaneously and consecutively,  century after
century;  and in all that lengthened and  lengthening period, there is no
science, which has not, as  has  justly been remarked, been  tributary to
its progress.  Who, then,  it  may be asked, in view of  this complexity
and comprehensiveness, of  its retrospective, present and prospective rela-
tions and developments, is  competent to embrace it,  or to undertake the
instructions called for, by the requirements even of this Chair ?  I know
of none.  From its complete performance, I do not hesitate to sa\. I invol-
untarily shrink.   The fulfilment implies an amplitude of attainment, cor-
rectness of  knowledge, and scientific readiness, which  few  are permit-
ted to aspire to, and fewer still to attain.
  To the  Medical Profession, in view of its own  conceived utility and
dignity, and as that dignity and  utility are offered to the world, its culti-
vation and diffusion is of the utmost importance.  It should not only be
cultivated by its votaries, but it should be insisted upon  as a separate and
indispensable branch in every College, of a medical education; and no 
15
pains should be spared to introduce thestudy of its outlines into our elemen-
tary schools; so that children may acquire some knowledge of its value, and
its extension thus become universal.  No greater boon could be added to
the provided means of civilization than this.  It is the only specific against
quackery.  Professor Draper remarks that "Empiricism could not flour-
ish as it does, if the structure  and functions of the body of man were
better understood.
   I rejoice at  the efforts, therefore, which have recently been made to give
it this direction; and that the success which has attended them, justifies
their continuance.  I rejoice, too, at the necessity which the freer diffusion
of the knowledge of it will impose on candidates who offer for the honors
and emoluments of the Diploma to become well "acquainted  with the
treasures which  it contains.   " A great revolution," I am persuaded, in
common with the author before mentioned, " is impending in the prac-
tice of  medicine,"  and that " in the future, the greatest physicians will
be the greatest physiologists ;"  and in closing, take occasion to superadd
my further testimony to his, that " He  can best  correct the  imperfec-
tions of a machine, who best understands its structure and action." 
v