SALUTATORY 
TO THE GLASS 
OF THE 
MEDICAL COLLEGE OF OHIO, 
DELIVERED 
AT THE OPENING OF THE SESSION, OCTOBER i, 1867. 
BY 
W. H. GOBRECHT, M. D., 
PROFESSOR OF ANATOMY. 
PUBLISHED BY THE CLASS. 
CINCINNATI : 
R. W. CARROLL & CO., PUBLISHERS AND PRINTERS, 
NO. I 17 WEST FOURTH-STREET. 
1 867. CORRESPONDENCE. 
Cincinnati, October 22, 1867. 
WM. H. GOBRECHT, M. D„ 
Professor of Anatomy, Medical College of Ohio: 
Sir,-At a meeting to-day of the Class of '67 and '68, Medical College of 
Ohio, the undersigned were appointed a committee, to request, for publica- 
tion, a copy of the Introductory Lecture, delivered by you, at the beginning 
of the present session. 
Respectfully submitting the request, and hoping for a favorable answer, 
We remain, very respectfully, yours, 
Chas. E. Wright, 
John H. Van Eman, 
Jas. P. Mooklar, 
Committee. 
Cincinnati, O., 338 Vine-Street, 
October 25, 1867. 
Gentlemen,- 
Although my Introductory Address, or Salutatory, was written without 
any idea of publication as such, as it was prepared for you I do not feel at 
liberty to refuse to surrender that which is, so to speak, your own property. 
Please find the copy inclosed. With many thanks for this indication of 
the confidence and good feelings of the Class, 
I am, very faithfully, yours, 
W. H. Gobrecht. 
To Messrs. Chas. E. Wright, 
John H. Van Eman, 
Jas. P. Mooklar, 
Committee. SALUTATORY. 
Gentlemen,- 
In former times, in the history of Medical Schools, it 
was the custom for each Professor to prepare and deliver a 
special lecture introductory to his own course, setting forth its 
particular importance in such manner as might conclusively 
demonstrate to his general hearers his ability as a teacher, 
commanding their respect and enlisting their sympathies by his 
elegance of style and diction, as well as by the clearness and 
force of his expression. 
This method of opening a session has been in later days, to 
a great extent, abandoned, perhaps for two reasons- 
First: That an entire week was occupied, to the exclusion 
of serious labor, in purely literary efforts, or in glittering gen- 
eralities ; and 
Secondly: That where certain branches are highly demon- 
strative in their character, the teachers of those branches could 
not, in the character of lecture expected, by any means indicate 
their peculiar expertness as teachers. 
Hence the present mode of delivering a General Introduc- 
tory, which method is, in many respects, superior to the former; 
for, while it leaves each Professor untrammeled as to the pe- 
culiar style of the introduction of his own subject, he is, as it 
were, floating in his own atmosphere, and with his own pe- 
culiar and perhaps superior force. He is where you to 
find him. And more than this, it accords with the law of unities. 
We have a Valedictory at the termination of our course, 
when some one teacher, for all, says Fare-WELL to those who 6 
go out from us as Doctors, (we hope to prove Physicians f) 
why should we not have, by one, for all, a Salutatory to 
those faithful students who return to us, to their friends whom 
they bring with them, and to those strangers who, we hope, 
will soon be strangers no longer within these walls'? 
Gentlemen, in the name of the Faculty of the Medical 
College of Ohio, I salute you, I greet you, I bid you welcome. 
I trust that you are WELL-come, not only for those who are to 
teach you, but for your own as yet undeveloped interests. Yet 
this WELL-come word is not all I have to speak. Here at the 
threshold let me further speak: 
1st. Of the profession you desire to enter. 
2d. Of the opportunities which are afforded to enable you to 
gratify this laudable ambition. 
3d. Of the manner in which you should deport yourselves 
while embracing these opportunities. 
I. Of the Profession which you desire to enter. 
The Profession which you desire to enter is old and honor- 
able. Theology, Medicine, and Law are sciences whose vota- 
ries are termed professional, and they must understand their 
arts, or practical applications of their respective sciences, ere 
they are worthy of the appellation. To students with the 
higher aspirations these three pursuits are presented, and it is 
for them to choose. 
In this choice I claim that Medicine holds a rank second 
only to Theology, which, having its dealings with the sacred 
mysteries of the past and future, is employed to instruct man 
how he shall act in the present so as to accord with the behests 
of the Deity and enjoy his approbation throughout eternity. 
Medicine goes far to explain and alleviate the pangs of 
suffering humanity; it embraces all investigations into the con- 
struction, form, functions, and conditions of the human body in 
a natural and healthy state, in the first place, and then caps 
all by a recital of the changes produced by injury and dis- 
ease, relates the symptoms, gives the history, and produces 7 
the remedy, if remedy there be. Its object is to alleviate the 
present condition of man, both physically and mentally, that, 
with a sound mind in a sound body, he may prepare for the 
future. The votaries of this science are not only benevolent, 
but directly beneficent. 
The Science of Law is, in my opinion, a necessity of society, 
and the Art a highly scientific business, and is a fine field for 
men of intelligence with great business capacity. Such qualifi- 
cations may perhaps make almost any lad a more or less suc- 
cessful lawyer, even though his parents have selected his call- 
ing without especially consulting his tastes; but I would as soon 
expect to see a beloved and eminently successful physician, who 
had embraced his pursuit, from the mere idea of having a good 
business, as to find a clergyman who had been ordained in the 
cradle by his parents (desiring to increase their own respecta- 
bility by the pursuits of posterity), unaided by mature con- 
victions, proving a zealous, successful, consistent, and fervid 
elucidator of his doctrines. 
For each profession, then, I claim that there should be 
peculiar adaptability; and I feel satisfied that the records of 
these three honored and honorable professions will sustain my 
remarks. 
I may take it for granted that those of you who are to 
study with us this winter have looked into the matter to some 
extent, and believe that you are about to enter upon, or continue 
in, the right track. I trust that you will never have cause to 
regret the day when some internal, unexplained force drove 
you in this direction. 
Renouard, writing concerning the antiquity of Medicine in 
his History, refers us to Genesis 1, which says when Jacob 
died, "Joseph commanded his servants, the physicians, to em- 
balm his father, and the physicians embalmed Israel." And he 
comments as follows: "Thus at the death of the Patriarch 
Jacob, about 1700 years before the birth of Christ, Egypt pos- 
sessed men who practiced the art of medicine. This passage in 8 
the writings of Moses is the most ancient authentic monument 
that we possess of the Healing Art; all that is more remote in 
the history of Egypt and of other nations, is enveloped in 
uncertainty and obscurity, at least as far as medicine is con- 
cerned." With this commentary as an initiative, let us proceed 
in our own way. 
We may certainly infer that long anterior to this, many 
detached facts concerning the ailments of the human body and 
their treatment were known, and therefore before the calling 
of a physician was distinctly recognized, a sort of Domestic 
Medicine, as we now term it, based on facts, (or purely empir- 
ical,) must have been practiced. But from the date just men- 
tioned (1700 B. C.) we are able to trace a gradual rise and 
progress in this peculiar branch, through long ages, until it ar- 
rived at the status of a science, a position which it did not hold 
at the time referred to. 
Medicine has always been progressive, although errors and 
abuses have frequently disturbed it and occasionally diverted it 
from its course. It would scarcely serve our present purpose to 
speak particularly of the various periods in the advance of our 
science to the present time, other than to say that by this ad- 
vance, (in the words of Prof. Comegys, written in 1856,) "Life 
has been prolonged more than twenty-five per cent, in the last 
seventy-five years, and the duration of treatment lessened more 
than one-third. Now it may be said that the cessation of wars 
and the amelioration of the general condition of the masses ex- 
plains this gain in human life, and deprives Medicine of her 
claims to such titles of glory. But we present these irrefutable 
hospital reports; their wards are the peculiar battle-ground of 
the doctors, and showing these results, we demand that they 
shall be exponents of what has been done for society at large- 
that this increased longevity is due to our Science." 
What is Science? It is classified general principles. 
Art is the application of these principles. 
And we hold that Legitimate Medicine is based upon these 
general principles, which have been deduced from the facts- 9 
the accumulated observations of the long past and present, and 
though not perfect (as we are still progressive,) is vastly prefer- 
able to the pure empiricism and irregularities of our time. Its 
good fruits are shown in the majority of households; though 
not infrequently its votaries are called silently to mourn over 
their inability to save the victims of ideas, falsely called prin- 
ciples. 
Legitimate Medicine we propose here to teach: Classified 
general principles. 
We will not teach the falsely so-called Eclecticism, for 
as this refuses certain mineral drugs, it is merely Exclu- 
siveism. 
Hydropathy, though dissimilar, falls into the same category. 
We will not teach the so-called Homoeopathy, because we be- 
lieve its assumed principle, "similia similibus curantur," (like 
things by like are cured,) to be false, and the preparation of its 
medicaments superlatively ridiculous. I should as soon think 
of treating a case of disease, which required any thing beyond 
hygienics homoeopathically, as my colleague, Prof. Blackman, 
would dream of treating a depressed fracture of the cranium by 
infinitesimal taps of a tack-hammer. 
And so we might explode all other isms. 
Yet there is a matter more directly within our own purview 
to which serious thought may be profitably devoted-I mean 
the medical education of women. Should women be educated 
to be Physicians? I think not. I believe that the feeling of 
this Faculty is against it. 
Efforts have been made in this direction from time to time, 
principally outside of the profession, until the battering-rams 
pounded so loudly at the doors of certain of the weak-kneed in 
the ranks, that from expediency, and perhaps personal interest, 
(without any other fixed principles,) they have fallen from 
grace, and following that indefinite 11 will-with-the-wisp" called 
Women's Rights, they have brought up in a curious quagmire, 
and are now shouting like the fox who lost his tail in a steel 
trap, to all others to come and do likewise, because it is the 10 
fashion. I do not believe that any of my colleagues will be so 
entrapped. 
Let me give you my views on this subject-why I have de- 
cided adversely to the claim. 
I find in the "Religio Medici," written in 1634, by Sir 
Thomas Browne, an eminently pious physician, in Article xxi, 
an allusion to an idea of the Rabbins in reference to the pri- 
mary physical condition of man, and the origin of woman, clear- 
ly indicating that their teaching was that of an original union of 
the sexes, although it is difficult to ascertain whether or not he 
positively rejects the proposition. 
13 uf taking up the idea, let us, in a proper spirit, refer to 
Genesis i, 27: "So God created man in his own image, in the 
image of God created he him; male and female created he them." 
In Genesis ii, 7, 21-24, we find: "And the Lord God 
formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his 
nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. . . . 
And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and 
he slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh 
instead thereof: and the rib, which the Lord God had taken 
from man, made he a woman, and brought hei' unto the man. 
And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my 
flesh: she shall be called woman, because she ivas taken out of 
man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother 
and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh." 
Now I ask, in all earnestness of purpose and for Truth's 
sake, is not this rib allegorical? Do not the descriptions go to 
show that at first physically and mentally man and woman were 
combined in one being, and that foi' the precise purpose of 
q/?er-separation, in order firmly to establish "moderate subor- 
dination," as Scott, the commentator, hath it, and mutual de- 
pendence. 
If this be true, then when the physical attributes of woman 
were removed from the first being to create a help-meet for the 
man, so likewise were her mental attributes removed to endow 
the body thus formed. 11 
Mentally and physically, then, the first being was divided, 
and woman in both respects was then and now is complementary 
to man, and when united in marriage they become one flesh, 
one harmonious whole. 
I think that a candid individual of some observant power, 
even if rejecting this explanation, can not have failed to notice 
in our times (allowing marked exceptions, which only prove the 
rule) how widely different, though overlapping, are these mental 
and physical powers of man and woman. One can not be sub- 
stituted for the other with justice to either. This principle 
has a broader appliance than to medicine alone, but with it we 
are at present particularly concerned. 
I have introduced this argument to show that I have taken 
high ground for the exclusion of females from our ranks, yet 
for special physical and social reasons, as recently set forth by 
Dr. John Bell, of the Philadelphia County Medical Society, 
formerly Professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine 
in this school, the point should be considered as definitely set- 
tled for all time. Now while thus advocating this exclusion, I 
believe that the successful practice of medicine is, in no small 
degree, due to the agency of woman. 
My friend Robert Gwynn said, in a public Masonic celebra- 
tion oration, a short time since: 
"Deriving our origin, as now organized, from an association 
of workmen, men united together for purposes of combined 
bodily exertion, of a nature unfitted for the softer and more 
delicate frames of the female sex, the landmark which excluded 
them as unfit and unable to partake in our physical labors is 
still retained. But they have not the less place in our Lodges. 
Every Mason knows well the pure and sacred ties which bind 
him to defend and protect the wife and daughter, the sister and 
the mother of his brother-how tender and how holy a place 
they hold in the thoughts and affections-how watchful and 
considerate in their behalf we are ever taught to be! I am not 
saying too much when I assert, that the place which woman 
holds in our structure is of such a nature, so essential to the 12 
preservation and perpetuation of our Order, as a bond of uni- 
versal brotherhood, that were not special provision made for her, 
the whole fabric would crumble into dust." 
And I say to you, in unison, that Masonry, the time-honored 
institution, dating from before the building of King Solomon's 
Temple, and now flourishing beyond precedent, although abso- 
lutely excluding woman from its rites, could not exist for one 
moment without a full and complete recognition of her social 
status, or assisting and protecting her in her efforts to maintain 
the purity of society. So we may say of her with us. There 
is a sacred niche for her in our Temple ; with us she is honor- 
able and honored. She should be familiar with the laws of 
health, so that she may be enabled to preserve her own health 
and that of her children, to tvard off disease by proper care, and 
thus preserve the integrity of physical and moral nature. She 
must really be the help-meet for man, as her noiseless footfall, her 
tender hand, her subdued tones, her pleasant words, her sym- 
pathizing glances, her anxious care, her heroic self-sacrifices 
have proved her to be. She needs no other patent of nobility 
than these. By these she has ennobled herself 
No man could take her place if he tvould. Here every 
physician loves and respects her, and acknowledges freely, 
without mental reservation or purpose of evasion, that in this 
sphere she is supreme. Who can forget the unfaltering devo- 
tion of a mother, alive to the weakest moan of distress-heb 
night-long watchings-her frequent smoothings of the rumpled 
pillow-her frequent bathings of the burning brow-her oft- 
presented fever-drink, or her final, fervently expressed thank 
God! he is better ? Who can forget the gentle sister, vieing 
with that mother in her care, while between them-all is well ? 
No! Woman can never be forgotten here, in her appropri- 
ate sphere, whether in the chamber of the rich, the hovel of 
the poor, or in the hospital. 
" Lo ! in that house of misery 
A lady with a lamp I see 
Pass through the glimmering gloom 
And flit from room to room. 13 
And slow, as in a dream of bliss, 
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss 
Her shadow as it falls 
Upon the darkening walls. 
As if a door in Heaven should be 
Opened, and then closed suddenly. 
A lady with a lamp shall stand 
In the great history of the land, 
A noble type of good 
Heroic womanhood." 
Would you willingly permit Woman to leave her throne to 
wear, to her, the galling shackles which she now imagines to 
be diamond bracelets ? I think not. Some may aid and abet 
this unnatural movement; I never will. 
The Science and the Art of Medicine are clearly consigned 
to the keeping of man, both on physical and mental grounds; 
by him (and not by women breveted men) they have been 
and will be advanced. 
The Heroism of the Physician is real beyond peradventure. 
We could, but we need not, go further than oui' own country, 
nor further back than recent times, when unarmed men, exposed 
alike with their armed countrymen to shot and shell, in close 
proximity, performed their saving duties, fearlessly staunching 
blood upon ball-furrowed fields, or binding up wounds in exposed 
barn-hospitals, regardless of any immediate interest but that of 
the sufferer, were he friend or foe, upheld by their firm faith 
in legitimate medicine and the legitimacy of their calling, once 
worthily a part and parcel of the ancient priesthood. But this 
is not all of the heroism of the Physician; perhaps it is the 
smallest part of it. There are quiet, unobtrusive men in our 
ranks who, although they do not court the dangers of battle- 
fields, are certainly as heroic as those who do (though these 
are not less heroic than they, as they are always ready to share 
the common risk). Did you ever hear of a true Physician 
who shrank from Yellow Fever, Cholera, Typhus, or Plague? 
Never, I think. 
This is the undying record of our profession, that profession 14 
which you aspire to enter. It is one of benevolence and benefi- 
cence. In it you will be called to the rich, to the moderately 
circumstanced, and to the poor, as all who have gone before us 
have been. But those who have been greatest in success have 
never forgotten the very poor, or passed them unheedingly by; 
they have felt that they had a great matter in hand, a trust, so 
to speak, for humanity at large, and that while those who 
COULD pay, SHOULD pay, there were those into whose wounds 
it was a privilege to pour the healing balm, without money and 
without price. 
The actions of such men have illuminated all time, past and 
present. Insensibly they operate on us now, and you, if true 
partaker in the lot with us, will not prove recreant, but will 
maintain and perpetuate the honor, the tenderness, the humility, 
the glory of our noble calling. You will go, in season and out 
of season, expecting much and gaining little; expecting little, 
but gaining much. 
" 4 Ogg, the son of Beorl,' says my private hagiographer, 
' was a boatman who gained a scanty living by ferrying pas- 
sengers across the river Floss. And it came to pass one even- 
ing, when the winds were high, that there sat moaning by the 
brink of the river a woman with a child in her arms ; and she 
was clad in rags, and had a worn and withered look, and she 
craved to be rowed across the river. And the men thereabout 
questioned her, and said, " Wherefore dost thou desire to cross 
the river? Tarry till the morning, and take shelter here for 
the night; so shalt thou be wise, and not foolish." Still she 
went on to mourn and crave. But Ogg, the son of Beorl, 
came up and said, 111 will ferry thee across; it is enough that 
thy heart needs it." And he ferried her across. And it came 
to pass, when she stepped ashore, that her rags were turned 
into robes of flowing white, and her face became bright with 
exceeding beauty, and there was a glory around it, so that she 
shed a light on the water like the moon in its brightness. And 
she said, " Ogg, the son of Beorl, thou art blessed in that thou 
didst not question and wrangle with the heart's need, but least 15 
smitten ivith pity, and didst straightway relieve the same. And 
from henceforth, whoso steps into thy boat shall be in no peril 
from the storm; and whenever it putteth forth to the rescue it 
shall save."And when the floods came, many were 
saved by reason of that blessing on the boat. But when Ogg, 
the son of Beorl, died, behold, in the parting of his soul, the 
boat loosed itself from its moorings, and was floated with the 
ebbing tide in great swiftness to the ocean, and was seen no 
more. Yet it was witnessed in the floods of after-time, that 
at the coming-on of even, Ogg, the son of Beorl, was always 
seen with his boat upon the wide-spreading waters, and the 
Blessed Virgin sat in the prow, shedding a light around as of 
the moon in its brightness, so that the rowers in the gathering 
darkness took heart and pulled anew.' " 
Let this, the Legend of St. Ogg, be a guide and rule 
for you. 
II. I shall now remark concerning the opportunities which 
are afforded to enable you to gratify the laudable ambition to 
enter the profession of which I have just been speaking. 
Office instruction has long and justly been considered the 
basis of medical education. For if the practitioner who re- 
ceives a student, does his full duty, he not only directs his 
studies generally, but he shows him patients, requires him to 
examine carefully such as his progression may warrant, and 
then expounds the laws of medicine as applicable to the cases, 
questioning the student on all points which bear upon them; 
finally requiring him to record their history and treatment for 
reference. 
But time has long since shown that advances in medicine 
have been so rapid, and the field has become so broad, that one 
man can not fully instruct his apprentice; hence SCHOOLS were 
established, where the students of many practitioners, assem- 
bling at stated periods, could receive information in a systematic 
manner, as classified general principles, which they might apply 
on returning to their office duties. These schools are provided 16 
with several professors, each teaching a different branch or sub- 
division of the science, for each by devoting attention especially 
to his branch, and expending his means for its particular illus- 
tration, it is plain that he must become authoritative therein, 
and a combination of such men must be powerful indeed for the 
advancement of the tyro. 
The subject of Medical Education has of late years at- 
tracted the attention of many minds in our profession. Prac- 
tical and theoretical men have discussed the matter. Result-a 
muddle. It appears that the point, at present at issue, is, 
whether teaching should be repetitive or progressive. That is to 
say, whether we should go on, as it is claimed we have done 
heretofore, in repeating the same lectures every session; and 
demanding, for the purpose of inculcation, (incalcitration, tramp- 
ing in by the heel,) that each student should listen to precisely 
the same demonstrations and elucidations tivice before applying 
for a degree, Or whether by an arrangement of studies, so that 
the primary branches should be thoroughly mastered in one 
session, and the higher branches in a second and third, the 
student should be brought progressively to the termination of 
his pupilage. 
As in all questions, there are two sides to this. There are 
advantages in both methods. We know how very beneficial 
the repetitive method is, from long usage; but I unhesitatingly 
deny, for myself, that any course on Anatomy which I have 
ever delivered, is an exact counterpart of the preceding-the 
general facts are the same, it is true, but the illustrations are 
improved or increased; new thoughts are ever evolved; ad- 
vances in science are marked and commented upon-mere 
routine holds no place. My observation of the courses of my 
colleagues shows me that wre are alike both in principle and in 
practice. Therefore, if a modified repetitive method, as we have 
it now, has virtues, they are to be found here, as well as else- 
where. 
I will, however, concede that the progressive method has 
inherent merits, and that a judiciozis movement in this way 17 
is a step in the right direction; but as medical schools are 
organized in America, the change can not be made in one 
step. 
I have often asked myself, in traveling through the country, 
why it was that in the clearing of land, the farmers cut off 
the trees, and left the straggling stumps in the ground, when it 
seemed so comparatively easy to uproot them, and thus give 
more space for seeding; for years I have puzzled myself with 
this question, and the idea of waste worried me; but I thus 
figured out the problem, and I am informed that my conclu- 
sion is correct-should the roots be torn up bodily, so much 
subsoil and gravel would be thrown upon the adjacent surface, 
as to destroy the usefulness of much already available, adding 
nothing to, but rather diminishing the value of the farm- 
better let the stumps gradually decay, and by their decadence 
add richness to the soil. 
So in OUR changes we must be gradual, not violent. The 
body of teachers must carefully study, still further, their sur- 
roundings, and as judicious and earnest men gradually approach 
to an universally accepted repeteto-progressive system of in- 
struction. As a present step in this direction, this Faculty have 
been increasing their professorships, so that in number they 
accord with the recommendation of the recent Convention of 
Medical Teachers. 
The division of labor in instruction is based upon the fol- 
lowing rational propositions: Anatomy is the foundation of the 
whole, to which Chemistry, inorganic and organic being added, 
(an important condition not generally recognized by students,) 
leads directly to Physiology, more extensively designated as the 
Institutes of Medicine. The student being properly grounded 
in these branches may advantageously study Materia Medica 
and Therapeutics, when he will be fully fitted to receive with 
profit, information in Surgery, Theory and Practice of Medicine, 
(in which Pathology is included though not expressed,) and in 
Obstetrics. Subdivisions of these important final branches have 
given us two teachers of specialities; namely, Ophthalmology 18 
and Affections of the Ear, and Medical and Surgical diseases of 
Women, each of which extracts something from each of the 
three branches just named. 
This schedule is presented for your consideration, and on 
this plan we propose at present to instruct. The method is 
distinctly repetitive, though in a manner progressive; but we 
shall ever be on the alert to make all practicable alterations in 
accordance with the spirit of the age. 
These branches are taught, for the most part, in two 
ways: 
1. Didactically, or Preceptively, "line upon line, precept 
upon precept," in the lecture-room. 
2. Practically, when the principles taught are applied. 
Practical Anatomy is pursued in the Dissector's room, where 
each student examines for himself the parts spoken of, familiar- 
izing himself by repeated efforts With the various members of 
the wonderful machine which he proposes to keep in working 
order. I hope to live to see the time when the Chemical 
department will have its working laboratory and a Demonstra- 
tor of Physics and Chemistry will, if no other plan can be 
devised, divide the hours of evening study with the Demon- 
strator of Anatomy. 
Clinical, or bedside Medicine, Surgery, and Obstetrics are 
grand points in instruction. In the Wards of the Hospitals the 
teachers who have spoken preceptively, will illustrate by pre- 
sented cases the principles which they have enunciated in 
the lecture-room, thus benefiting not only the student, but 
the patient, and all communities present or distant. Such 
arrangements have been made for the ensuing session that the 
student will receive not only full didactic instruction, but 
Operative Surgery, Practical Obstetrics, and Practical Medi- 
cine, with several important specialities included in these 
branches, will be presented to the class in the most available 
form in Hospital and Dispensary. These are the opportunities 
which are afforded to enable you to enter the ranks of our 
profession. And this brings me to speak, 19 
III. Of the manner in which you should deport yourselves 
while embracing these opportunities. 
Gentlemen, I trust that not one of you came here with the 
idea that your visit to a great city is a mere trip after long- 
looked-for amusement. The attractions and temptations of a 
great city are great in proportion to the magnitude of the city; 
and this life may be new to some; its novelty may have charms 
which tend imperceptibly to lead astray. But you must not 
lose sight of the fact that you are now here to fit yourselves 
for the serious duties of life, that you are to obtain such infor- 
mation as will enable you to cope with diseases which, by their 
insidious approaches or terrific malignancy, make brave men 
tremble at the mere thought of them; that you must learn how 
to treat the results of fearful accidents, the very sight of which 
causes the strong to shudder; that the principles of the prac- 
tice among children, the future men and women of our country, 
are to be committed to your care. Therefore fully appreciate 
the fact that you have a great and serious work before you ; 
one worthy of the full energies of the most powerful minds; 
one which will permit no trifling. 
I do not mean to imply by these remarks that there should 
be before you an unbroken round of monotonous work. This 
you can not find in the study of our science, for as you advance 
the information gained expands the mind of the ardent seeker 
after knowledge to such an unthought extent that labor is no 
longer work but pleasure, great pleasure. There are times 
when you can well afford to relax, and, going into the outside 
world for a little, will return to your studies with redoubled 
zest. Let this expenditure of time be judicious and held at 
its true value-minor in importance. 
The period, I am glad to say, has long gone by when the 
distinguishing characteristic of a Medical student was held to 
be his irrepressible disposition to find himself at the bottom of 
all mischief in a new place; when the community were ready 
to charge every unexplained evil to his account, just as Coroner's 
juries were, in the absence of satisfactory evidence of the cause 20 
of death, in the habit of sapiently charging the same in due 
and legal form to a Visitation of God. 
It behooves you to act in such a manner that the respect 
now generally accorded to Medical students shall be unimpaired, 
so that the annual advent of yourselves and your successors in 
the city will be hailed with satisfaction by our community, and 
regret only felt and expressed when you leave it. This is the 
time for you to work with an energy like to the Village 
Blacksmith: 
"Under a spreading chestnut-tree 
The village smithy stands; 
The smith, a mighty man is he, 
With large and sinewy hands, 
And the muscles of his brawny arms 
Are strong as iron bands. 
Toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing, 
Onward through life he goes; 
Each morning sees some task begin, 
Each evening sees it close; 
Something attempted, something done, 
Has earned a night's repose. 
Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend, 
For the lesson thou hast taught! 
Thus at the flaming forge of life 
Our fortunes must be wrought; 
Thus on the sounding anvil shaped 
Each burning deed and thought."