TRANSACTIONS 
OF THE 
Thurber Medical Association, 
AT ITS 
Forty-Second Annual Meeting 
HELD AT 
MILFORD, MASS., OCTOBER 3, 1895. 
G. M. Billings, Printer, Gazette Office. 
1896. TRANSACTIONS 
OF THK 
Thurber Medical Association, 
AT ITS 
Forty-Second Annual Meeting 
HELD AT 
fj 
MILFORD, MASS., OCTOBER 3, 18*5. 
MILFORD, MASS.: 
G. M. Killings, Printer, Gazette Office. 
1896. OFFICERS. 
PRESIDENT. 
DR. AMBROSE J. GALLISON, Franklin. 
VICE-PRESIDENT. 
DR. WILFRED W. BROWNE, Blackstone. 
SECRETARY. 
DR. JOHN MARSHALL FRENCH, Milford. 
TREASURER. 
DR. CHARLES MACKIN, Milford. 
LIBRARIAN. 
I)R. CHARLES H. COLE, Milford. 
ORATOR. 
DLL J. CUSHING GALLISON, Franklin. 
ALTERNATE. 
DR. LEONARD 1). WHITE, Uxbridge. 
LIBRARY COMMITTEE. 
DR. CHARLES H. COLE, Milford. 
DR. L. 1). WHITE, Uxbridge. 
DR. J. M. FRENCH, Milford. 
COMMITTEE ON NECROLOGY. 
DR. J. C. GALLISON, Franklin. 
DR. WM. L. JOHNSON, Uxbridge. 
DR. L. I). WHITE, Uxbridge. Massachusetts Medical Society. 
LIBRARIAN’S OFFICE, 
19 Boylston Place, Boston, Mass. 
EDWIN H. BRIGHAM, M. D. 
LIBRARIAN. 
In answer to Communication of 
189 PROCEEDINGS 
'Fhe forty-second annual meeting of the Thurber Medical 
Association was held in the office of Dr. Chas. H. Cole, 161 
Main street, Milford, on Thursday, Oct. 3, 1895, at *2 o’clock p. w. 
The meeting was called to order by the president, Dr. 
Leonard 1). White of Uxbridge. 
The records of the last monthly meeting were read and 
approved, after which the secretary presented his annual re- 
port, as follows:— 
Milford, Mass., Oct. 3, 1895. 
To the officers and members of the Thurber Medical Associa- 
tion:— 
In accordance with the custom of this society, your secre- 
tary begs leave to present tbe following report of the condition 
of the Association, and the business done during the year end- 
ing Sept. 30, 1895. 
The number of members reported one year ago was 29. 
During the year four persons, Dr. Lorenzo Chapman of Wren- 
tham, Dr. H. F. R. Watts of Franklin, Dr. Ralph C. Fish of 
Hopedale, and Dr. W. W. Browne of Blackstone, have been 
admitted to membership; one, Dr. George E. Bullard of Black- 
stone, has been reinstated; two, Dr. F. A. Wilmarth and Dr. 
J. S. Boynton, have been permitted to resign on account of 
removal; one, Dr. I. C. Rope of Holliston, has been dropped from 
the roll on account of nonpayment of dues; and one, Dr. John 
Barns of Milford, has been taken away by death. The pre- 
sent membership is 30, a net increase of one, and the largest 
ever reported. 
Nine meetings have been held during the year. The aver- 
age attendance has been 7\. Twenty members have been pre- 
sent at one or more meetings. Ten papers have been read, as 
follows:— 
“The Germ Theory,” by Dr. Blake; “The Prevention of 
Syphilis,” by Dr. Cole; “Electro-Therapeutics,” by Dr. Fish; 
“Notes on Trional,” “Doctor Daniel Thurber,” and “A Case of 
Gunshot Wound of the Liver,” by Dr. French; “Recent Pro- 
gress in Diseases of the Blood,” by Dr. J. C. Gallison; “Lights 
and Shadows of a Doctor’s Life,” (Annual Address for 1894). 4 
by Dr. Patten; “Insomnia and Hypnotics,” and “Surgically 
Clean,” by Dr. L. D. White. 
During the year I have collected from the members for 
dues and dinner tickets, $0S, of which $59 has been turned 
over to the treasurer and his receipt taken therefor, while the 
remaining $1 is still in my possession, owing to the removal of 
the treasurer from the vicinity. Three members only are in 
arrears one year for dues. All others are paid to Oct. 1, 1895. 
All of which is respectfully submitted. 
.1. M. FRENCH, Secretary. 
The report was accepted. 
In the absence of the Treasurer, the following statement 
of the financial condition of the Association was presented by 
the secretary:— 
Du. 
Balance in treasury Oct. PI, 1894, $ 9 82 
Received from secretary during the year, 5900 
Now in hands of the secretary, 4 00 
Total receipts, $09 82 
Cr. 
Paid secretary, postage and stationery, $ 2 81 
Paid G. M. Billings, printing, etc., 11 00 
Paid Hotel Willian, annual dinner, 1894, B4 00 
Total payments, 47 81 
Balance in treasury Oct. 1, 1895, $22 01 
In addition to this, there is a fund of $000 invested in the 
Milford Savings Bank, upon which there will be two years’ 
interest due Oct. 12, 1895, amounting to $49.44. 
This statement was accepted in lieu of the report of the 
treasurer. 
The Librarian then presented the following report:— 
To the honorable gentlemen of the Thurber Medical Asso- 
ciation, the Librarian submits the following report:— 
It is much to be regretted that I must report on this 
occasion that recent additions of books voted to be placed in 
the library have not yet arrived; but it is expected that befoce 
the next regular monthly meeting these new volumes will be 
on the shelves. They are as follows:— 
Dennis’ System of Surgery, 4 vols. 
Hamilton’s Legal Medicine, 2 vols. 
Gowers’ Diseases of the Nervous System, 2 vols. 
American Text-book of the Practice of Medicine, 2 vols. 
Liebig and Rohe’s Medical Electricity, 1 vol. 5 
These books, in all eleven volumes, will eost $54. Some 
of them have been ordered, and are now on the way. 
The number of books on the shelves is 914. This does 
not include the Monroe and Metcalf libraries, which are packed 
away. 
From two to three books are taken out on an average each 
month. 
1 have no recommendations to make. 
Respectfully submitted, 
CHAS. H. COLE, Librarian. 
'Plie report was accepted. 
The following bills were then approved and ordered paid: 
(t. M. Billings, printing, etc., $5.80; J. M. French, postage, etc., 
$1.80; (’has. IT. Cole, expense, 55 cents. 
It was voted that the amendment to the constitution, pro- 
posed at the last meeting, lay over until the next month. 
It was voted to elect, with the other officers, a committee 
on necrology, of three members. 
It was voted that one or more candidates he nominated 
for each office, and all he voted for on one ballot, by the Aus- 
tralian system. 
The following persons were then nominated for the var- 
ious offices:— 
For president, A. J. Gallison. 
For vice-president, W. W. Browne. 
For secretary, J. M. French. 
For treasurer, Charles Mackin, Chas. H. Cole. 
For librarian, Chas. II. Cole. 
For orator, .1. C. Gallison. 
For alternate, L. I). White. 
For library committee, L. I). White, .1. M. French. 
For committee on necrology, .1. C. Gallison, Win. L. John- 
son, L. I). White. 
Dr. Cole declined to be a candidate for treasurer. 
There being now but one candidate for each office, the 
secretary was instructed to cast the unanimous ballot of the 
society for the candidates named, which was done, and they 
were declared elected. 
The secretary then read a memorial of Dr. John Barns, 
which was ordered published. 
The Association then took a recess, and after paying the 6 
annual dues, purchasing dinner tickets, and supplying them- 
selves with samples of the goods of the Chas. H. Phillips 
Chemical Company, as exhibited by his agent, the members, 
with their ladies and invited guests, in all to the number of 
sixteen, seated themselves at the tables of Hotel Willian, 
where a bountiful repast was served, and enjoyed by all. 
Those present at the dinner were: Dr. A. J. Gallison and 
wife, Rev. Bryant McLellan (chaplain), Rev. E. W. Whitney, 
Dr. Chas. Kingsley and wife, Dr. L. D. White and wife, Dr. 
Levi White and wife, Dr. William B. Nolen, Dr. Frank II. 
Jenckes, Dr. Charles Mackin, Dr. W. W. Browne, Dr. Chas. 
II. Cole, Dr. J. M. French. 
At the close of the dinner, the company gathered in the 
parlor, and listened to an interesting, able and suggestive ad- 
dress on “Heredity and Education,” by Dr. Chas. Kingsley. 
Following the address, remarks were made by Revs. Mc- 
Lellan and Whitney, Drs. Nolen, L. D. White, Levi White, 
and others. 
The only drawback to the general enjoyment of the occa- 
sion seemed to be in the small attendance, less than one-half 
as many being present as last year. 
At half past five o’clock the meeting adjourned, and the 
members and guests departed for their homes. 
Attest, 
J. M. FRENCH, Secretary. IN MEMORIAM. 
Died in Milford, Sept. 27, 1895, Dr- John Barns, aged 
78 years. 
John Hams was born in Buckfastleigh, Comity of Devon, 
England, Oct. 24, 1 SI7, and came to America in 1831. lie 
studied medicine for three years with Dr. J. C. Harris of Ash- 
land, a member of this society. He attended one course of lec- 
tures at the Berkshire Medical College in Pittsfield, Mass., and 
nearly completed his studies at the College of Physicians and 
Surgeons in New York City; but owing to the failure of a 
manufacturing company in which his means were invested, he 
was compelled to postpone, and finally to abandon his purpose 
of obtaining a degree, and engage at once in practice. 
He came to Milford in 1854, and the next year was re- 
ceived into membership by the Massachusetts Medical Society 
and our own Association. He was, therefore, at the time of his 
death, the oldest member of our Association. 
On April 30, 1803, he married Phoebe Battey, of Burrill- 
ville, li. I., who, with four adult children, survives him. He 
practised his profession in Milford for over 40 years, enjoying 
in his prime a large general practice, and also devoting special 
attention to the diseases of the eye and ear, in which branch he 
retained a considerable office business up to a short time before 
his death. He probably also made a greater use of electricity 
than any other physician in this vicinity. 
He was a republican in politics, and in religious belief a 
member of the Society of Friends, as is also his wife. 
Some 21 vears ago he suffered from a severe attack of 
cerebro-spinal meningitis, and he never fully recovered from 
its effects. It was followed by a gradual breaking down of the 
nervous system, and finally by occasional attacks of hepatic 
and gastro-intestinal derangement, which increased in fre- 
quency and severity, and finally caused his death. 8 
lie was buried in Smitlifield, Rhode Island, on Monday, 
September 30, the services being conducted by the Society of 
Friends, of which he was a member. 
An obituary notice which appeared in the Milford Journal 
on the day of his death, contained the following just estimate 
of his life and character:— 
“The deceased was of a quiet, self-contained, but most 
winning nature, upright and conscientious to an unusual de- 
gree, and especially devoted to whatever tended to elevate or 
ennoble humanity. 
“He was an ardent lover and student of nature, and 
brought to the practice of his profession not only an acute in- 
tellect, but a sympathy that did much to brighten the sick 
room. 
“Modest and unselfish, he did not seek office or political 
distinction, finding in his home life, his study of nature, and 
his circle of personal friends, all that sufficed to make life rich. 
Milford is the poorer for the departure of this good man.” 
So, brothers of the Thurber Medical Association, our mem- 
bers are passing away. Only a few months ago, and our 
youngest was taken in the vigor of early manhood, falling in 
the thick of the fight. Now our oldest is gone, passing quietly 
away full of years and good deeds. Who can tell to which one 
of us next the summons may come? But of that little need 
we reck, if of us it can be said when we are gone, as well it 
can be said of him, “He was a good citizen, a faithful physician, 
a Christian gentleman.” THE ANNUAL ADDRESS. 
HEREDITY ANI) EDUCATION. 
CHARLES KIXOSLEY, M. 1)., FRANKLIN. 
The medical profession, standing today as it does at the 
head of the professions, is constantly making marked progress 
in scientific and social directions, ever tending in science to 
bring to the front the best men and measures. The peculiar 
and intimate relation between the profession and society fits it 
to bring before the public all that is latest and new. The en- 
largement of a physician’s sphere is of modern date. Until 
recently nearly all the physicians believed (and possibly some 
still believe) that their office extends no farther than to admin- 
ister medicine and collect fees. But today they stand as pub- 
lic advisers, and the requirements for a physician to practise 
are more than double what they were even a few years ago. 
Therefore, who are better qualified to make scientific discover- 
ies and become the leaders of science as well as the leaders of the 
professions? Or who are better qualified to disabuse the pop- 
ular mind of error? Or who can speak with more authority 
on problems affecting life and death? 
That Providence causes death and disease and that it 
could be effected by no human hand was, and is now, by some 
the popular belief. True, Nature does cure, but without 
human aid she is as helpless as human power is without 
Nature’s aid. While the mother was mourning over the death 
of her child, thinking that it was an act of Providence either 
for the punishment of some of her own sins or for the sins of 
its ancestors, our Kochs and Pasteurs were proving without 
doubt that these deaths were not due to any higher power, but 
were human crimes instead, and that one half of the diseases 
that carried off our youths before they reached manhood came 
through lack of knowledge of disease in general, and were for 
the most part preventable; and that it was not God, but man, 
that struck the cruel blow. 10 
Who can demonstrate more effectually than a physician 
that a child not oidy will inherit his parents’ form and features, 
hut their crimes and vices as well? A child begotten of an in- 
toxicated parent will as a rule inherit this tendency, for “as 
the twig is bent the tree inclines.” The physician has carried 
the sanitary investigation into our homes, also into our school- 
rooms, making an advancement which is one of the most ben- 
eficial of the age. He has extended his work into the prisons, 
causing the dark, damp dungeons to be a thing of the past. 
Year after year physicians have fought for laws in our Legis- 
latures, until now We have good sanitary laws, which year by 
year are rapidly lessening the mortality of infectious and con- 
tagious diseases. 
Hut let us return to our subject,“Heredity and Education, 
their relations to each other and to the human race.” 
Heredity is the law by which plants and animals transmit, or 
tend to transmit, their characteristics to their descendants. 
“Like begets like.” Now reduced to a system and regulated 
by law, the evolution of human organism has been simply a 
system of heredity. Let the process of evolution start with the 
lowest form of animal life, or with the most primitive savage, 
the process of development lies through the same lines of her- 
edity. Heredity is the most important, ever-acting and inevi- 
table force by which man’s destiny is detenni led. The ambi- 
tions of a family may reach through generation after gener- 
ation, but the family traits are sure to be continued through 
each generation. Not only the most prominent, but the most 
minute points, lie in the child as well as in the parent. Human 
abilities and disabilities, virtues and vices, health and disease, 
degree of intelligence, whether it be genius, mediocrity or 
idiocy, all depend for the greater part on heredity, acting 
through variation, selection, and training. Special breeds of 
animals have been permanently established by observing these 
laws, and there can be no doubt that by the same process an 
improved race of men might be established. 
Heredity does not mean improvement in each generation, 
—much to the contrary; for statistics will show that the last 
two or three generations show' the evil effect of modern society 
life, and of other modern ideas which tend to weaken the 
children. Observation, experience and analogy agree that the 11 
primitive man existed as a savage, but step by step lie lias 
been changed from that stage to a higher or lower form of civil- 
ization The present state of the world affords us examples of 
all stages, from the lowest savage to the highest civilization. 
The chief factors in this development have been heredity and 
education. Let us take, for example, the primitive races of 
Australia and the highest civilization of Europe or of America; 
between these two extremes can he found all degrees, and an 
example to illustrate every step, even in the most minute 
points of evolution. Civilized man has ’20 per cent more brain 
matter than the savage, 100 per cent more gray matter on the 
surface. All this comes from hereditary force and early educa- 
tion acting through tens of thousands of years. We have still 
farther examples, as when we attempt to raise, by education 
alone, the savage to the average civilized life. In some cases 
the improvement is sporadic in the brightest of the race, hut 
even at its best it stops at the lowest points, showing that it 
can not he accomplished in one generation, but must come 
through a number of generations by heredity. 
In view of the wide difference which we find in man’s con- 
dition, we come to the conclusion that some races have learned 
more than others, and that their acquired wisdom has been 
saved and permanently transmitted to the race. This is the 
work of heredity handing down from one generation to the 
next the advancements it has made, and that generation, 
with its increased opportunities of education, keeps adding to 
what it already has inherited. Thus with proper care could 
be raised a wonderful race of human beings. Have we evi- 
dence that heredity is still at work, or have we as a race 
reached the summit of human perfection, where heredity can 
do no more? For a long time much attention has been paid to 
breeding domestic animals, most attention being given to dogs, 
horses, and cattle, and the results so far have been astonishing. 
There is nothing more interesting or instructive in the history 
of civilization than this breeding of special animals. 
The lesson does not end in the study of brutes, but ex- 
tends to, and involves human destiny. One man in his work 
on Hereditary Genius says: “I agree that as a new race can be 
obtained in animals and plants, and can be raised to so great a 
degree of purity that it will maintain itself, with moderate 12 
rare in preventing the more faulty members of the flock from 
breeding, so a race of gifted men might be obtained under ex- 
actly similar conditions.” Man, savage or civilized, is an an- 
imal, and subject to the same laws that govern all animals be- 
low him. Whatever methods will improve animals, and will 
make a better and a higher class, can be applied to man as 
well. 
The same methods of breeding if applied to man would 
produce results which would far surpass man’s expectation; 
for man being a superior animal would meet with superior re- 
sults. Take a select class of men and women and apply a 
system similar to the one applied to the American trotter. 
Wonderful would be the result, surpassing our most sanguine 
expectations; and in a few generations we should see a distinct 
and mighty race, as far above our present stage of civilization 
as we are at present above the Digger Indian. This is no idle 
theory, unsupported by facts. Take the history of the ancient 
Greeks. Where could such a grand and noble race of people 
be found? You cannot say that this was chance, for history 
tells of their system whereby none but the perfect were allowed 
to reproduce; and if a weakling were born he was not suffered 
to live. This system includes methods revolting to some of 
us, but you will all admit that the results were better than we 
have at the present day. Their first aim was to have a strong 
and heroic race, and for such a race the}' selected strong and 
heroic parents. In fact, they modeled men as they did marble, 
fashioning marble to man, and man to marble, and both stand 
unparalleled in sublime grandeur. Amid the shadowy chron- 
icles of obscurity, the ancient Greek manhood and womanhood 
stands out as clear as the facades of their temples, as bold as 
their lofty columns, and as .Jove-like as their inimitable stat- 
uary. But today the Greek civilization, and with it the grand 
race, has melted away, because the Greeks mixed their blood 
with inferior races, and gave the world mongrels, with which it 
remains content. It has been said on good authority that “if 
Athens had maintained its excellence and spread over large 
countries, displacing inferior population, (which it might well 
have done, as it was exceedingly prolific,) it would assuredly 
have accomplished results advantageous to human civilization 
that transcend our power of imagination.” 13 
"Flie inherent capacity of man has never been fully tested. 
The inborn greatness of the human race has never been de- 
veloped. Man’s potentality remains an unknown quantity in the 
great problem of Nature. Occasionally we have a glimpse of 
glory. Occasionally there may he thrown high upon the 
beach a Socrates, a Shakespeare, a Newton, or a Franklin, but 
the rapidly ebbing tide sinks back to the level of a sluggish 
sea, only to leave them there high upon the sands, far away 
from the common crowd. Man raises high his standard of 
ideality, as high as the Apollo Belvidere of the Oreeks; hut un- 
like the Attican, he neither plans nor labors to grasp his ideal- 
ity. He has lofty aspirations which he never realizes, results 
which he conceives but to which he never attains, and in his 
disappointment he comforts himself with the hope of a better 
and immortal life in another world. Hope in another world! 
a thing commendable in itself, but it should not be indulged in 
to the extent of distracting our aims and ambitions from 
working out and accomplishing all that is best in this world, 
and the highest perfection to which by our birthrights we are 
entitled. 
If a Shakespeare has lived, why may not one live again? 
What one man can attain, why cannot all average men? Why 
cannot an American reach the perfection of the ancient Greeks? 
Is it possible that we have reached the height of our perfection? 
Iteason and self-pride revolt at the thought that the Greeks, 
Shakespeare, or any other attained their greatness by any 
chance or fate. But rather let us think that Nature, seeing 
the degeneration of mankind, sent out these few great men, 
or a great race, as an example, that through their greatness 
and high degree of perfection we might become ashamed of 
our ignorance, and be led on to attain the highest possibilities 
which are in our natures. 
As I have said, no mind can conceive the latent potential- 
ity of the human race. By proper efforts in the right direction 
man may be developed into a being grander than his loftiest 
ideals. When pure-bred dogs, male and female, are paired, 
the result is thorough-bred puppies, having the form, style, in- 
stinct and reason peculiar to the breed. But if a pure-bred dog 
be paired with one of inferior breed, the result will be the 
meanest of curs. What is true of the dog is true of all animals. 14 
ft is necessary to maintain purity of stock to have pure stock. 
The question naturally arises here, why it sometimes happens 
that great men often beget degenerate stock. Why do great 
families become extinct? Why did not Newton and Daniel 
Webster leave sons worthy of their sires? The Greeks an- 
swered this question when they mixed their blood with in- 
ferior races. If a thoroughbred horse be paired with one of 
a scrub stock, the colt will disgrace his sire, no matter how il- 
lustrious he might be. Cross breeding, breeding between pure 
and inferior stock illustrates the whole phenomena of race de- 
generacy, and on this subject nothing more need be said. 
Where do anatomists find their comparison in the state- 
ment that perfect men and women are rare, if not in the perfect 
animals which are bred with so much care, while a perfect man 
constitutes the exception, not the rule? If it is rare to find a per- 
fect man physically, how much more rare it is to find one per- 
fect physically, mentally, and morally, that is to say, a perfect 
human being. If he is perfect physically he becomes a prize 
tighter, or is marred in some way with a mental or moral de- 
fect. Do not conclude that Nature’s powers are so limited 
that she exhausts them in making man perfect in one particu- 
lar, and is compelled to leave him bankrupt in other qualities. 
We might as well say that if a man has a strong heart he 
must of necessity have a weak liver. Hut as we can see no 
perfect man, we may be inclined to believe that Nature is in- 
competent. We do see stout men with bad morals, weak men 
with strong minds, moral men with bad stomachs. If Nature 
can endow one man with one of these perfect points, why may 
she not bestow all three on one man, and show us a perfect 
being? She can; for man was made the image of the only per- 
fect man, and she would make every man so, were it not for 
his own stubborn perversion of her laws. 
Ignorance makes half-breeds of us all. Spencer well said, 
“To tens of thousands that are killed, add hundreds of thou- 
sands that survive with feeble constitutions, and millions that 
grow up with constitutions not so good or strong as they should 
be, and you will have some idea of the curse inflicted on their 
offspring by parents ignorant of the laws of life.” It is sad 
to think that man, with his wonderful brain, and his wonder- 
ful hands, which, if exercised in the right direction, would 15 
make him the monarch of all created things in every point, 
should he in breed inferior to the trotting horse, and in per- 
fection inferior to the pointer or setter. Man has improved, 
some races more than others; but not in accordance with his 
advantages has he attained that standard of excellence reached 
by the (1 reeks two thousand years ago, nor has he improved as 
rapidly as the animals domesticated by him. The first step 
towards improvement is to teach the children that the inevi- 
table obligation of individuals upon this earth is reproduction, 
the highest and noblest function of the animal economy. Habit 
and custom, religion, emotion and sentiment, and the passion 
and unreason which commonly control pairing in the human 
race today, all tend to defeat the practical application of this 
principle which is so promising to our race. We pride our- 
selves on our ancestry, and regard posterity with contempt. 
We deify the past, while in our ignorance, born of false mod- 
esty, we treat generations to come as if they were to inhabit 
some other planet, bet us try a change. Let us think less of the 
past, and turn our attention to the study of how our children 
may come into the world with strong constitutions, how they 
may walk, think, and act better than we. Then let the dead 
past bury its dead, and let us who are alive live understand- 
ingly with those who will succeed us in this struggle for ex- 
istence. It only takes two to make a matrimonial bargain. 
The society, the race, or the state has nothing to do in the case 
except to promote all kinds of matches. No matter how ill- 
suited the two may be morally, physically, or mentally, the 
state can do nothing but sanction it. More diseases are spread 
through marriage than in any other way, and if we are ever to 
have a pure race, we must first take some steps towards pre- 
venting the propagation of bad and faulty individuals. 
I would not for a moment say a word against the broad 
spirit of philanthropy which prompts the state to afford asy- 
lums to the insane and criminal classes. They cannot be 
treated too well, unless it is to be carried so far as allowing 
sucli classes to perpetuate their kind. Society can and does 
protect itself against deadly beasts and poisonous reptiles, but 
there are human beings more dangerous than the tiger or 
rattlesnake. Hundreds of dollars are freely contributed from 
this land for the support of the institution in Paris for treat- 16 
ment and cure of persons bitten by dogs supposed to be mad. 
There are lurking poisons in the veins of some men more dead- 
ly, because more latent and widespread in their havoc on the 
race, than hydrophobia. No offspring is tainted with rabies, but 
hereditary crime, disease, and insanity infect children unborn, 
and spread a leaven of degeneracy throughout a nation of peo- 
ple. This kind of poison the state seems to have no right to 
prevent or destroy. The ancient Greeks rose up in their might 
and exterminated the individual who stood in the way of race 
improvement. With them the individual had no rights the 
race was bound to respect. We have reversed the rule, and 
practically today the race has no rights which the individual 
is bound to respect. To the human race the cost of reversing 
this rule has been terrible, aided by the old superstition that 
the only thing about man worthy of being cared for is his soul, 
the body no more worthy than the dust from whence it sprung. 
The breeder loons for steady improvement; not so in man, 
who is, or should be, the highest of animals. Can it be that a 
body scarred with vice and polluted with disease will contain 
a soul as pure and grand as a soul contained in a body perfect 
and strong, as man should be? The only way to evangelize the 
world is to evangelize humanity. To make man better, you 
must improve the race. A young couple marry, never once 
thinking what their offspring will inherit. There is no man- 
ager to protect society and to guard the ill-mated pair against 
themselves. There is no mentor at hand to say to the man, 
“The woman you love conies from a family wherein there has 
long been drunkenness, or epilepsy, or insanity;” or to the wo- 
man, “The man whom you love and to whom you are about to 
bind yourself comes from a diseased family, or he himself car- 
ries in his blood a poison that will break out in his children.” 
You may escape your hereditary destiny, but your children 
will be tainted. 
To know ourselves not only as individuals, but to know 
our race, know its demands, know where it is weak and how it 
may be made strong, is knowledge of the most importance. 
Ignorance of the laws of life, and of our duty and how to per- 
form it, causes nine-tenths of all woe. I wish there were some 
way whereby two people wishing to marry could know each 
other before, as they do two or three years after marriage. 17 
The sins of a child are laid up against him, instead of the 
ancestor from whom the sin is inherited. The deatli of a child 
is attributed to its present surroundings, instead of the parent 
from whom it obtained that weak and diseased constitution. 
What is the relation between heredity and education? 
Heredity transmits, education disciplines. Heredity transmits 
the gain made in one generation to the next, while education 
improves on those gains and passes them forward to he made 
permanent to the race by heredity. Heredity is the stock in 
trade, and education the gain to lie added to the original stock. 
If heredity and education were allowed full sway in the right 
direction, and that is the direction they are inclined to take, 
they would increase the stock of human superiority as rapidly 
and as enormously as money kept at compound interest. They 
are correlative forces: the one adding to, the other saving; and 
thus the twin forces labor hand in hand through the ages. The 
best heredity is that which transmits a harmonious and 
symmetrical being, and that is the best education which de- 
velops and organizes the human being in all its normal propor- 
tions. 
To comprehend the true nature of heredity and education 
and their relation is no easy task. The present craze in relation 
to the aim, scope and methods of education is due to the want 
of proper understanding on this point. When so many educa- 
tors and school authorities are today sharing in the educational 
delusion now epidemic, it makes the case look well-nigh hope- 
less. Education is to develop all the faculties, giving undue 
prominence to none. The best results of a good education will 
be seen in that class, the members of which possess a more or 
less perfect physical,mental, and moral nature; and results not 
so good, where there is a deficiency in one or the other attribute. 
The poorest results will be obtained where there are faulty or- 
ganization and faulty educational methods. A thief becomes 
shrewder, not better, by education. Education cannot make an 
athlete out of a cripple or a weakling, a scholar out of an idiot, 
or amoral man out of a child void of moral sense. .In brief, the 
limit of education is determined by hereditary traits, of the in- 
dividual. If this be the case, and there can be no doubt that 
it is, heredity has more to do with a man’s destiny than educa- 
tion. One young man may never acquire the taste for liquor, 18 
no matter how much he may be thrown in the company of men 
who drink, while another young man cannot keep away from 
it, no matter how hard he tries to avoid it. • The difference is 
in their inherited tastes. 
As heredity has more to do with a person’s destiny than 
education, we should pay more heed to bringing up sound 
children, as well as giving them good education. Where in- 
herited tendencies are good it follows that the education will 
be much easier and more efficient. The savage had very little 
done for him by heredity, and see the difference between try- 
ing to educate the savage and the Anglo-Saxon child. Take 
the children in any town, and give them the best of instruction, 
and you will see from the very start a wide difference in the 
aptitude of the pupils for acquiring knowledge and discipline, 
a difference that will grow more and more marked until the 
completion of their education. Look farther, and you will find 
that difference not in the scholar’s unwillingness to try, but in 
his hereditary traits, individually considered. Look into any 
school and you will find one that will easily keep the lead of 
his class from the start. He learns as if by intuition; it is no 
special effort, because it is inherited genius; you will find 
others who are above the average and who have little trouble 
in keeping there; things come so easily to them because of their 
inherited talents; their ancestors did much for them. Then 
you will find possibly a number of dull ones always lagging 
behind, yet with some of them trying hard to keep up, until 
they are all discouraged. He patient with them, for their dull- 
ness is inherited. But the majority of these pupils are mod- 
erately good scholars, able to keep along with hard study and 
close application to work, and at the close of school life are 
able to perform the duties required of them with credit and 
success. Education does the most for this class, and the me- 
thod of education based upon a standard that will fit the aver- 
age scholar is the method that will do the most universal good 
to the human race. But mark you that no amount of educa- 
tion will raise the average class to the rank of talent, much 
less of genius, any more than you can raise the dullard to the 
average rank. 
The popular notion shared by some educators is that the 
mind of a child is an empty receptacle, into which can be poured 19 
all kinds and quantities of knowledge. This being true, each 
young head can contain an equal amount of knowledge, an 
equal value being given to every unit. On account of this 
theory comes the high pressure system of schooling called 
“cramming.” By this system our schools are turned into brain 
factories, run by routine; our teachers the machine, our pupils 
the raw material; the one to grind, the other to be ground, 
in the educational mill. People can be divided into live classes: 
the idiot, the dunce, the average, the talented, and the genius. 
The school can do but little for the idiot, and it really does but 
little for the genius, for he will learn even if there are no 
schools. Nature and society are for him a great school. Place 
him in a vast wilderness, and he will find knowledge in the 
rocks and trees. Genius, not education, gave the world 
Homer, Socrates, Shakespeare, and Bonaparte. Had Homer or 
Shakespeare attended our modern school, and been obliged to 
confine his attention wholly to a few branches only for nine or 
ten months out of the twelve, the world might have lost his 
genius. It seems that our educators have hit wide of the mark, 
and have put into our schools too much of a force system, too 
many branches, too much cramming without any special aim, 
which only tends to break down health and destroy individual- 
ity, and which interferes with the natural bent of youthful 
minds. Its aim seems to be to make an average scholar of 
each one, whether he be a genius or an idiot, with the result 
that it makes the dunce duller, and does not give the genius 
the liberty of thought he requires. 
When a special set of muscles of the animal economy is 
developed while others are inactive, the former improves, 
while the latter degenerates. The prize tighter directs all his 
efforts to develop muscles, neglecting his mind and morals. 
A hard student will direct all his efforts toward developing his 
brain, neglecting his muscles. Education in both cases is bad 
in method and result, and which is worse is hard to say. Big 
heads and thin legs, strong legs and small heads, strong brain 
and weak stomach, and vice versa, are all legacies of these edu- 
cational methods, and fatal steps toward the extinction of 
American manhood. As I have said, it will not do to develop 
even as good an organ as the brain at the expense of the mus- 
cles. The true man is one with mind, body and morals sym- 20 
metrically proportioned. And the true education is their har- 
monious development. 
The object aimed at in our schools today is to develop 
the mind, and to that end parents send their children to 
school. I am glad to say that improvement in manual exer- 
cise is gradually taking place in our public schools, but as a 
rule it is not forced enough upon those who do not take to it 
naturally. Who are the foremost men of our cities in business 
and professions? Men from the country, with strong muscles 
and clear brains, even if not so highly cultured, and morals fit- 
ting to one raised in an old fashioned orthodox town. Let the 
early careers of tile men who have been eminent leaders in the 
world be a chart for all the young people of the present day. 
If you ask the question, what is the best plan to school 
our boys and. girls for success in life, 1 can answer no better 
than to copy from Galton of England: “To gain energy of body 
and mind, good health, gn-eat independence of character, ten- 
acity of purpose, practical business habits.” Do your children 
get energy of body and mind, good health, great independence 
of character, tenacity of purpose, and practical business habits? 
Go still farther: Granting that the foregoing are or should be 
hereditary traits, do our schools tend to develop them? Educa- 
tion is coming to mean only knowledge received at school; and 
the practical knowledge which is of the utmost value in mak- 
ing a business or professional man, which is obtained out of 
school by observation, is being scoffed at. Men today take 
much more pride in referring to their college days than in 
speaking of the little country school-room where they obtained 
their foundation. 
Finally let me say, in the name of all that is dear and 
sacred, let us have a regard for the generations which are to 
take our children’s places. Don’t add to their woes; don’t in- 
crease their maladies; don’t transmit to them more diseases or 
lunacies. Train the mind less and the bcdy more. Strive to 
hasten the reform of the present school system and methods 
toward developing the child into a perfect being, physically, 
mentally and morally. MEMBERS. 
List of Members of the Thurber Medical Association, 
October i, 1895. 
Christopher I). Albro, Milford 
Joseph A. Bacon, Whitinsville 
Charles A. Bemis, West Medway 
LeGrand Blake, Milford 
Wilfred W. Browne, Blackstone 
George E. Bullard, Blackstone 
Lorenzo Chapman, Wrentham 
Charles H. Cole, Milford 
John J. Duggan, Milford 
Ralph C. Fish, Ilopedale 
John Marshall French, Milford 
Ambrose J. Gallison, Franklin 
J. Cushing Gallison, Franklin 
Frank H. Jenckes, Woonsocket, U. I. 
William L. Johnson, Fxbridge 
George King, Franklin 
Charles Kingsley, Franklin 
Marcus W. Knight, Milford 
Charles Mackin, Milford 
Gregory A. Martin, Franklin 
George F. Melefant, Millville 
William B. Nolen, Franklin 
Frank II. Patten, Hopkinton 
Walter A. Phipps, Hopkinton 
Gardner C. Pierce, Ashland 
Nathan W. Sanborn, Wellesley Hills 
George W. Ward, Upton 
Henry F. R. Watts, South Boston 
Leonard I). White, Uxbridge 
Levi White, Milford