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THE RESPONSIBILITIES
THE MEDICAL, PROFESSION.
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BY JOHN P
. HAR
RISON, M. D,
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      A P V



   LOUISVILLE, Ky.

PRINTED BY W. W. W0RSLEV.
1831. 
                                Louisville, August 27th, lsol.
Doctor Harrison:
         Dear Sir—
                   Acknowledging our obligation to you for the
instruction received from your lectures during the past summer, and
feeling the importance of the principles,  (to the medical faculty gen-
erally, as well as to ourselves) inculcated in your valedictory ad-
dress, delivered to-day at  the  Louisville Hospital—we  would re-
spectfully solicit a copy for publication.
  With sentiments of high consideration, in behalf of the Class,
             I am, Sir,
                 Your obliged, humble servant,
                                             A. G.  HENRY.
-9@£h
Dear Sir:
          Your polite note, soliciting, in behalf of the Class, a copy
of my valedictory address for  publication, has been received.  It
affords me satisfaction to find that my humble effort to set forth the
high and solemn responsibilities of physicians has been responded to
by your cordial approval.
  I send you a copy of the lecture for publication, agreeably to your
request.
               Yours, respectfully,
                                     JOHN P. HARRISON.
  Mr.  A.  G. Henry.
    August 29. 
                     LECTURE

                           ON THE

RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION.
GENTLEMAN:
           In bringing the series of summer lectures, to which you
have so attentively listened, to a close,  I  cannot take my leave of
you, in the capacity of an humble contributor to your improvement
in medical knowledge, without dwelling, for a few moments, on the
responsibilities involved in the practice of the profession which you
have adopted for your pursuit in life.  The dignity and importance
of the medical  profession, are to be correctly estimated by a due
consideration of the great and responsible duties devolving on phy-
sicians in the exercise of their vocation.  It is a work of magnitude
that you have undertaken.  High and difficult are the  intellectual
and moral efforts demanded,  that you may attain the great ends of
the profession.   In order to fill your minds with a just appreciation
of the extent,  variety and greatness of the obligations which are
connected with the profession of medicine, advert with  serious at-
tention to the leading scope and ultimate aim  of all  medical know-
ledge.  The physician  operates not on brute, unconscious matter.
His sphere of agency brings  him  in direct contact with life—the
life of his fellow men.  He holds  in his  hands the earthly destiny
of his fellow beings;  to him is committed the awful and  responsible
task of watching over, with scientific eye, the workings of disease
as they prey on the  health of fathers,  mothers, children, and of
either, by his skill, restoring them to the cheerful light  of day, or,
by his ignorance, hastening them into the darkness of a  premature
grave.  I am aware that medicine, in its best estate, is an imper-
fect art; that even when its most faithful  and skilful  ministers have
availed themselves  of all the  resources of  the art of healing, they
have, in many instances, to lament the limitation of  their means of
cure.   Still,  much good can be accomplished by a scientific appli
cation of those remedial powers which a  kind Providence has 
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placed in the hands of man.   Disease may be arrested in its ravages
on the human frame—pain alleviated, or subdued,  and life made
more  tolerable,  even under  incurable maladies, by the judicious
prescriptions of the  skilful  physician.  My object,  gentlemen,  in
this lecture, is not to throw a grain of incense on the altar  of  pro-
fessional vanity—not to magnify the men who practise medicine,
but to magnify the office of  a physician,  by indicating some of the
more  prominent  duties devolving on medical men in  the exercise  of
their professional functions.   I  wish you to feel the great  and re-
sponsible position you are at a future day to occupy  in society, and
to impress upon  your minds  the moral necessity which is laid upon
you of making due preparation for your contemplated sphere of life.
Let the importance of the station be rather felt and acknowledged
in its  beneficial results, than ostentatiously displayed by any course
of offensive conduct.  Then the consciousness of the magnitude  of
your  undertaking, instead of being suffered  to evaporate in vain
airs and pompous pretensions, will produce a concentration of your
powers in the exertions you employ to  prepare yourselves for an
honorable discharge  of the  duties  of the profession.  You should
apply to the work with zeal, and anticipate important results.   The
moment you think lightly of your profession, your resolutions abate,
and imbecility and relaxation of effort take possession of the entire
man.   No man  ever excelled in any profession to which he did  not
feel an attachment  bordering on  enthusiasm.  A high and honor-
able feeling of emulation should breathe through all your studies.
This  feeling is  the  plastic spirit which, penetrating the depth of
your souls, rouses every energy of your moral and intellectual being
to run with usefulness and renown the race set before you.   Per-
mit me to remind you that the chief distinction and crowning glory
of man is his intellectual and  moral nature.  That the develop-
ments of this intellectual and  moral nature, are the ultimate pur-
pose of all education.  That the active faculties of  the mind,  and
the best feelings of  the heart,  are  never more  powerfully elicited
than  when brought to bear in the exercise of the high functions ap-
pertaining to that active occupation of life which you have chosen.
And  think not that I utter language, on this occasion,  at war  with
sober reality.  The  estimate put  upon the  medical profession by
the brightest intellects  is in accordance with the above declaration.
Let me adduce the testimony of one or two disinterested witnesses.
The celebrated poet, Pope, thus speaks of the  members of our  pro-
fession:  "They are, in general," says he, "the most amiable com- 
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pan ions and the best friends, as well  as  the  most learned men, I
know."  The learned Dr. Parr, of England, asserts, "That after a
long and attentive survey of literary characters, I hold physicians
to be the most enlightened professional persons in the whole circle
of human arts and sciences."   Blackstone, in the introduction to
his Commentaries, advises physicians to read  law, in order  "to
complete the character of general  and extensive knowledge which
this  profession,  beyond  all others, has  remarkably deserved." I
have sheltered myself behind the above eminent authorities to sus-
tain  me in the high  appreciation which  I have put upon  our pro-
fession.  The demands made on the intellectual and moral capaci-
ties of the physician are full of solemn responsibility.  Diversified
and  accurate knowledge on  all the branches of the science is, of
course, of indispensable importance in order to qualify him to prac-
tice  the art of curing diseases  with  success.  But the  physician
should not only be learned in medical science—intimately conver-
sant with the structure of the human body, and possessed of a com-
prehensive acquaintance with the  principles  of  medicine—but he
must be an honest man.  Not merely honest in his pecuniary trans-
actions; but honest in a higher and more extensive sense.   He must
possess the to kalon of character; he should be a man of honorable,
liberal, and noble bearing in society.
   The science of medicine is a vast field of investigation; and  the
practice of it is a thorny and perilous  way, in which a stern trial is
made of moral  integrity.  To the study of the science, you should
bring faculties  disciplined  by  a previous  training of classical in-
struction, and of the other branches of a liberal education.  Your
minds should be qualified, by previous habits of study, to undergo a
protracted process of analysis,  of deduction, and  of research.   If
your mental powers have not been exercised in intellectual inquiries
before you commence the study of  the science of medicine, you will
be liable to be discouraged by  the first  difficulties which present
themselves,  and abandon the toilsome task altogether, or irritated
into impatience,  your minds will be driven to the more objection-
able plan of  creeping along the  path thus beset with obstacles, with
discredit, to  yourselves and  injury to society.  The great  fault of
the young men of our country is an unwise and restless desire pre-
maturely to enter upon the scenes of active life—whence results a
crude and superficial preparation for the responsible duties of  the
respective professions they follow.   This evil does not exist to the
»ame extent, nor has it so injurious an influence on society, in  the 
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 mechanical avocations as in the professions of divinity,  law and
 medicine.   A young man is generally obliged, by the articles of his
 apprenticeship, to undergo a proper  novitiate that he may be quali-
 fied to be a good  workman.   I am aware that the different religious
 denominations of our country are every day becoming more and more
 convinced  of the demands of society for  an enlightened ministry.
 Legislative enactments guard the bar, in some measure, from the
 incursions  of ignorant lawyers.   And, in some of the states of our
 Union, there are severe laws against quackery in medicine.   Still,
 especially  in Kentucky, the  profession of medicine  is overrun with
 greedy and rapacious followers of mammon, who care neither for the
 honor and dignity of the healing art, nor  for the  lives of a  credu-
 lous public who employ them.
  Gentlemen, truth has its sternness and authority—and it  obliges
 me thus to speak.
  The consequences of this eager and impatient wish to  rush with-
 out  due preparation, upon the arena of active life,  sheds  a  fatal
 blight and  withering spell upon the future eminence of every young
 man who is under its governing authority.
  The late Judge Tilghman, of Pennsylvania,  in his eulogy  on Dr.
Caspar Wistar, who was one of the most distinguished supports and
ornaments of our  profession,  very justly observes, "It has been re-
marked that, with few exceptions, those who have been great in the
learned  professions,  have abstained from practice at an  early age.
The cause is obvious.  The elements of science lie  too deep to be
attained without long and  patient thought.   The mind requires re-
tirement and tranquillity, to exert its powers of reflection to their
full extent.  But these are incompatible with the bustle, the anxiety,
the agitation of active  life."  When a  young man  precipitately
throws himself forward in the ranks of an active medical  career, he
soon feels his inadequateness to the office he has thus most unwisely
—nay, most iniquitously undertaken.   Finding that he cannot sus-
tain himself by the internal  resources  of his own mind, and not
having moral honesty enough to resist the allurements of gain, he
has recourse to the various shifts, crooked ways, and degrading ex-
pedients, by which quackery seeks to entangle its victims.   Or,  if
his  remaining feelings of pride will  not allow  him to practise the
arts and devices of the nostrum vender, he still is apt to  slide into
a sort of vaporing, or assume  eccentricities of conduct alike  incon-
sistent with real science and the honor of a high-minded man.
  Dr. Rush, who  has written with so much ability on the ethics of
the profession, and who has reflected such a flood of light on practical 
7
 medicine, makes the following judicious remarks on that spirit of
 empiricism which so much disgraces  many of the professed mem-
 bers of the faculty.
   "There is," says Rush, "more than one way of playing the quack.
 It is not necessary, for this purpose,  that a man  should advertise
 his skill, or his cures, or that he should mount a phaeton, and  dis-
 play his dexterity in operating to an ignorant and gaping multitude.
 A physician acts the same part in a different way, who assumes the
 character of a madman or brute in his manners,  or who conceals his
 fallability by an affected gravity, or  taciturnity in his intercourse
 with his patients.   Both characters, like the quack,  impose  on the
 public.  It is true they deceive different ranks of people; but we
 must recollect there are two kinds of vulgar,  viz. the rich and the
 poor,  and that the rich vulgar are often on a footing with the poor,
 in ignorance and credulity."
   You thus perceive, from the language just quoted from the great-
 est medical philosopher America has ever produced,  that for a phy-
 sician  "to advertise his skill  or his cures,"  is placing himself side
 by side with him who pretends to cure disease with a secret remedy.
 The principle involved is the same  in both cases.  Both characters
 attempt to impose upon the public by holding out false allurements
 to confidence, and, by a  crafty appeal to ignorance and credulity,
 strive  to win a spurious reputation.  The true dignity and honor of
 our science demand of every physician who regards  his  profession
 with any elevated conceptions of its rank and of its utility, to frown
 upon every man who thus attempts to impose  on the public.  Each
 enlightened and honorable medical  man is bound by the highest
 considerations of the duty he owes himself and of the responsible
 relations he sustains to the profession and to the public, to  employ
 every  moral resource in his power to repress the spirit and exercise
of quackery in medicine.   There are men who make the profession
of medicine a base medium through  which they can practise, suc-
cessfully and with impunity, delusion  and imposture; and who, go-
verned by sordid self-interest, creep their reptile way along a filthy
path, to the summit of public  confidence—whose best acquirement
is that  of a bold  asseveration  of the cures they intend to perform,
and of whom it may be said that the only benevolence they manifest
is that  of giving a quietus to  the troubles of their patients, by a
speedy dismissal from life.  The nostrum vender, or dealer in secret
remedies, daily and  hourly contravenes the obvious philanthropy of
our profession, in wrapping up  in impenetrable mystery and secrecy, 
8
 for his personal profit those means of restoring health which, in his
 venal dissimulation, he pretends to possess.  The great ornaments
 of medicine have been  men  of the warmest  benevolence—whilst
 empirical pretenders have ever, Cacus like, concealed their reme-
 dial agents  in the gloom of a depraved selfishness.  Jenner, the il-
 lustrious benefactor of his race, was a  type of the true physician
 Bombastus Paracelsus was the representative of the vampyre brood
 of quack doctors.
  Medicine  is  a liberal and intellectual  pursuit.   All  mystery
 and  concealment are in  direct  opposition to  the  spirit of  our
 science, both in its  intellectual  and  moral bearings and tenden-
 cies.   "Come and see" is the inscription  which  blazes in living
 capitals on the front of the temple of medical science.  This noble
 edifice stands with its foundations built on  the rock  of truth; its
 portals are  open day and night for the admission  of every sincere
inquirer after knowledge, and  on the walls within are hung the  vo-
tive tablets of the many thousands who have been cured by the faith-
ful ministers that trim its golden lamps, and burn sacred incense on
its altars.   Without its hallowed  enclosure are seen the base tribe
of greedy quacks, and venal pretenders, who ply their lying trade
about its walls, and seek protection under the shadow of its  ample
dimensions.
  To every  true disciple of the healing art is committed a high  and
responsible  trust of keeping the  deposit of his profession's  honor
with untiring watchfulness. To such belongs the delicate and, at
the same time, magnanimous office of watching over the best inte-
rests of the  profession.   That  physician proves derelict to his duty
who is found mingling in the ranks of the nostrum monger  and
prating mountebanks of the profession.   What! Shall the educated
physician be seen associating on terms of professional equality with
him who practises artifice and  imposture in order to circumvent and
delude a credulous community?   Shall  those  who have  gathered
their inspiration and their light from the high priests of our science,
pollute themselves by such disparaging intercourse? Must we coun-
tenance those who call themselves physicians,
              "As nimble jugglers  that deceive the eye,
              Drug-working sorcerers that change the mind,
              Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,"

to play off their cozenage on the people without any disapprobation
on the part of enlightened and virtuous physicians?   Shall a degrad-
ing rivalry in money making extinguish the  light of all  honorable 
9
feeling in the minds  of medical men?  Let each young man who
beholds such a disgraceful exhibition,  as is sometimes seen, of euc-
eessful charlatanry, rest assured that the reign of error and impos-
ture is brief—that the foundation  of  the empiric is laid on perish-
able materials, and that though he may amass wealth, that no sure
and abiding honor attends his career.  Veracity is violated by such
a man every time he administers his nostrum, for he is practically
setting his seal to a delusion  which his own false statements have
engendered?  Is truth, the  tutelary genius of science, the best
friend of  erring man, and the only sure guide and safeguard of our
happiness?  Then, the man who wilfully propagates a lie and  prac-
tically affirms it, is,  most assuredly, the enemy of his race.   The
nostrum vender is,  therefore,  an enemy of man;  he  is a blot and an
anamoly on the beauteous face of God's moral creation, and should
be shunned as the upas tree—for he lives in an  atmosphere of de-
ception, delusion, imposture, and sordid self-interest.
  The responsibilities of the medical man are of a momentous  kind
He is to understand his profession  well before he attempts to  prac-
tise it;  and he is bound, by every just consideration  of his responsi-
veness, to improve himself every day, in order to meet the daily de-
mands  made  on his  skill with augmented  usefulness  to  society.
Gathering, from every available quarter the elements of knowledge,
be must,  by intellectual analysis, convert them into the  sound de-
ductions  of a well balanced  judgment.  But he is  called  upon
likewise to be a man of strict  veracity, of exemplary sobriety, and
cf faithfulness to his professional obligations.   Truth should be per-
sonified, as it were, and put into unceasing exercise by the physi-
cian.   He should reject all. ostentation and  paradeful exhibition of
his business, and manifest a dignified simplicity  in  his intercourse
with society.  A man, filled with  a desire to fulfil  his duty,  lives
for reality, and  not for display.   The  ways of duty  to such a man
are direct, and the  means of accomplishing them simple.   Such  a
one has intellectual and moral  improvewent always before him,  and,
regulated  by this unity of view, he preserves habits  of candor and
honesty with himself  and with those around.   Cultivate, therefore,
this true dignity of character, and, let others debase themselves as
they may, ever preserve this moral excellence.  Animated by these
views and considerations, your course will be onward and  upward;
step by step, you will ascend into a freer atmosphere, and reach  a
more  expanded  prospect.  Thus all your  energies  will  be borne
along unconditionally and  unreservedly towards  the objects to 
10
which you should conseerate yourselves with absolute devotedness.
Let every thing be consistent in your plan, then there will arise  no
embarrassment in the execution of the  work  undertaken—your
minds  being fixed in a just decision, and your efforts springing from
a determination to achieve the object before you.
  Let the crafty empiric boast of his success in a course of sordid
and grovelling self-interest, in which career he has sported with
the credulity and ignorance of the multitude.   But remember that
the only stable success attends the men whose intentions are honor-
able and upright.   Such men,  by degrees,  are discovered and  made
known; they form immutable and advantageous connexions with so-
ciety, and their reputations are guarded by a deep founded esteem,
which is increased and confirmed every day.   Disdain mean, tran-
sient, and little ends, and seek a wide and solid foundation for your
professional standing.  Rise above the mere motive of accumulating
money, to the kindling energy and solemn joy which are inspired  by
an enlarged  philanthropy.  Fear not to  oppose  popular delusion
when it bows down  at the footstool of charlatanry, nor ever hold  in-
tercourse, or in any other way give encouragement to men who are
"cheating the eye" of the public "with blear illusion," in order to
make that illusion  the pander to their base desire of personal ag-
grandisement.
   In conclusion, let me press upon your consideration, the necessity
of a calm  and determined perseverance  in the pursuit of profes-
sional eminence.  Remember that weakness of character is restless,
impatient, and full of contrariety of purposes—that a feverish and
imaginative mind, which is ever changing its plans  of action, can
never arrive at any elevation; that fixedness of purpose is absolutely
essential to success in any laudable enterprise, and that no man can
excel in  any  walk of life unless he has power to adhere to  the mo-
tives which first suggested his determinations.  The world,  it has
been truly said, is  full of people who have conceived  and under-
taken great and noble things, but who failed in their accomplish-
ment.   Perhaps there are very few well regulated minds who have
entered upon the investigation of medical  science that did not form
some brilliant plans of professional eminence, and  hoped to realize
them.   But how soon the efforts of many quail before the difficulties
of the way; how very few reach the bright  goal which once glittered
before their  aspiring wishes!  How melanoholy  is it  to  see  the
ocean of life covered with so many wrecks of lofty hopes and noble
aspirations!   But,  gentlemen, I hope better things  of you.  Your 
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career, I trust, will  be one  of usefulness in the world.   May you
have patience to  labor with sedulity of endeavor in the profession
which you have adopted, and may a hallowed feeling of benevolence
actuate  your minds in diffusing around your path in life the fruits
of that charity which is  "twice blessed"—blessed in him who gives,
by irradiating his soul with the peaceful smiles of an approv-ng con-
science, and in him who receives, by smoothing the  brown' anguish,
and restoring health to the pained and diseased body.  Then your
course will be luminous, with a  divine radiance, and "tne blessings
of them  who were ready to  perish" will descend  on  y< ur heads,
fraught with the purest joys  which man  is allowed to taste in the
present introductory stage of his immortal existence. 
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