jpffl
?d*M
  UBRAUW*

JUNl
             LECTURE

TO THE STUDENTS
IN THE
BY
  A. B. SHIPMAN, M. D.,
Prof, of Surgery in Indiana Med. College.
SESSION 1849 '50
PUBLISHED BY THE CLASS
     LAPORTE, INDIANA:
W. & J. MILLIKAN, PRINTERS.
         1850.


ifX$0L

8318 
1 
              AN




   INTRODUCTORY LECTURE



        TO THE STUDENTS



               IN




THE  INDIANA  MEDICAL  COLLEGE,



               BY



      A. B. SHIPMAN M. D.



          SESSION 1849 'SO.



        -—-*990©^—



          LAPORTE, INDIANA:
     W. & J. MILLIKAN, PRINTERS.
              1850. 
4
 we discover such striking  evidence  of harmonious design; such ample
 proof of a great first cause, which makes so many devotees at her altars.
   It is the most unselfish of studies.   It savors least of the gold and
 dross of nummon, and is thereforo the farthest removed from the busy
 haunts of traffic and commerce.
   I propose in this  Lecture to take a short and  cursory view of some
 of the various occupations which are. followed by tho children of earth,
 as a means of support, and in tho accomulation of wealth, fame, honor
 and distinction.
   The  three Professions, of  Theology,  Law, and Medicine, I propose
 first to  speak of; because they seem to bear a kindred relation to eaob-
 other, in various respects.  Not that I deem them more hononable, or
 respectable than many other employments.  It  is tho manner of cul-
 tivating an occupation, that  renders it either honorable or profitable.
             "Act well your part, there all the  honor lies."
 is aline that contains as much truth as poetry.
   In choosing one or the  other  of these professions, various circum-
 stances generally influence the individual.  A predilection, or a taste
 for one  or the other, generally settles the  question.  The advico  of
 friends; the wishes  of parents and guardians, or the conveniences  of
 acquiring the study and various things of a  kindred nature, point out
 to the young aspirant, the path he is to  travel.
   It is not for a  moment to be supposed, that  each one  takes the best
 and  most appropriate profession which he studies.
   Many we find  struggling on through life,  toiling as it  were, up the
 Bteep and rugged way, beset with difficulties at every step, unsatisfying
 and  unsatisfied;  and finally, late in life, making the grand discovery
 that they have   been, all their lives,  following  a course least of all
 suited to their temperament, taste, and self-interest.  It behooves one,
 therefore, to make it a  matter of serious self-examination, in the choice
 of an occupation, which the individual is to  honor,  or receive distinc-
 tion  and wealth, in  return for the glory  he  sheds on the  profession  of
 his adoption
  The error committed in  the choice, is one cause of the many failures
 experienced in starting in life.  To retrieve this  false step, many for-
sake their first love, and  choose  the  one  inclination dictates.   But
few have become eminent in more than one  pursuit.   Life is too short,
and the growth of true fame a tree of so slow and  gradual growth, that,' 
5
like the Aloe, it blooms not until it has numbered its century of years.
A few men  of extraordinary genius, have become famous  in various
professions, and departments of life; yet  their rise and progress was
more like the fitful meteor, or the erratic comet, than the glowing suu
of true and substantial fame.
   We frequently hear this occupation and that employment cited as
being more  lucrative, or laborious, or honorable,  or respectable, than
others; but  the truth is, the manner of cultivating or following it out,
alone makes the difference.
   Tho  Clergyman has it in his power to make the sacred calling one
of the most glorious  and Heaven-born of occupations.  His mission
is that of all others,  best  calculated to  give peace  and quiet  to the
troubled  soul  in times of calamity  and  affliction—to  pour into tho
wounded breast the balm of comfort and consolation; to still the  fears
of the trembling soul, on the verge of eternity, and point with the fin-
ger of faith, the way to the mansions of endless day.  And  then the
glorious examples in view of those who  have honored their  lives and
their Divine calling, ought, and no doubt have, acted  as incentives to
a lofty and transcendent virtue.   What more gloriouo than to attempt,
humbly and meekly, to imitate the life  of the Redeemer of mankind:
his blameless youth; his charitably virtuous manhood; his sublime, ex-
ample and death.  These are abundant inducements to follow, though
fai behind,  what mortal can ever  fully attain.  And then  those holy
men, the Apostles, with their master's  life and works illuminating and
cheering  them on, though their lives,  like that of their great exam-
 ple, should end in a dungeon, a scourge or  a Crucifixion.
   The Clergyman who fearlessly and  conscientiously pursues the line
of his duty, has no easy pastime,  no flowery pathway; no thornless pil-
low, for his weary head.   The sneers of a wicked world; the cold neg-
lect of society, who fail to appreciate his worth and  talents; the sordid
pittance often doled out from the hand of griping  avarice,  while the
cares and support of a growing family, dependent on him alone for sup-
port; the uncharitable construction of his  words; the hitter  fanaticism,
or the cold sneer of  infidelity, too often wound his  sensitive feelings.
These  are a few of the  trials  which the good Clergyman has to en-
dure; and was  this earth alone,  and the rewards he receives here, all
the  recompense he obtains, poor indeed would be  his  compensation.
But religion, and a conscious feeling of duty, buoys him up, above the 
0
 trials and afflictions of the world; and though all around is stonu and
 tempest, his anchor i- firm and fixed as a rock in the ocean.
                ••As "nine tall chtfiliat lifts its awful form.
                Swells from the vale and midway leave" the storm,
                Though round  its breast the rolling clouds are spread,
                Eternal sunshine  settles on its head."
   The Lawyer is obliged t> spend years of hard and expensive study
 before he can fit and prepare himself to become useful to himself and
 family; and though he has toiled late and early, the harvest  whnli ho
 has expected to reap, as  the fruit of his industry,  is  s'.ow  in ripening,
 and many times has been blighted ere he can gather it in.  Often times
 after finishing his education ere  he is prepared to enter on the business
 of life, some Colossus in the profession overshadows him with a hope-
 loss competition,  or some impudent pettifogger, disgusts him with his
 shameless knavery, until he is almost persuaded to  throw up his  pro-
 fession  in disgust.    He   sees imposture  and knavery thrive   and
 grow fit around him, while moral worth and principle starves; and  it is
 after long years of patient and untiring  industry,  that  his ambition
 meets its reward.  Few men unacquainted with Lawyers, know of the
 thousandpetty annoyances, and troubles they have to encounter. They
 could not, if they would always choose the right side of a cause.   Duty,
 interest, and tho stein demands of inflexible justice,  often compel them
 to shield and defend with their  learning and eloquence,  a cause of
 questionable right.
   They are frequently deceived, misled and perplexed by their clients'
want of integrity and principle.   And when conscious of truth and  jus-
tice <m their  side, the decision  must finally  be subject to the  im-
perfections of human understanding;  often indeed to prejudiced Judg-
es and Jurors   No elass of men feel more keenly, the "glorious uncer-
tainty of the  law," excepting their unfortunate clients.
  If they remain along time  'briefless,' as the younger members fre-
quently do, poverty stares them in the face at every turn.  If eminent
and successful, mental  fatigue,  the wear and tear of bedy and brain,
compelled  to forego the calm and tranquil enjoyment of domestic  life,
and the protracted absence from home, at a time when a growing fam-
ily most require attention.
  These are only a few of the  perplexities and troubles which  annoy
and harrass this class of men, who are looked upon by a  large portion
of society as earning their money, and living  without a corresponding
exertion. 
7
  Many of them enter on the stormy sea of politics,  but the life of a
public officer is not that which is to be envied, however high a position
ho may attain.  Few can appreciate the bitter feeling which has cost
him his election.   The  scathing denunciation  of party strife,  the for-
feiture of private and personal friendship, the assassin-like stabs from
hireling party presses, and even the ruthless invasion of his  domestic
life, are poor and paltry compensation for all this train of annoyances.
Nothing but a conscious rectitude of purpose, and  a pure and lofty
patriotism can sustain one under such trying circumstances.
   But Gentlemen, from a long and intimate acquaintance with many
gentlemen of the legal  profession, I am  disposed to believe they earn
their  money, as a general thing, with as  much fatigue and trouble, as
most  others, and in moral  honesty, will compare  favorably with their
brethren of the other professions.
   A bad man will remain so, in whatever situation in life you may place
him.   Some employments it is true, offer facilities  for dishonesty and
corruption more than others.   A thief, if he has the  opportunity,  will
thrust his hand into the public treasury; His friencs may call it defal-
cation; but an honest man will guard that treasury as though  it was a
sacred trust.   The hypocrite may find  his way  into the church; he
may even preach  the  gospel with  great fervor and zeal.  "He may
steal  the livery of  Heaven to serve the Devil  in," and may ever, cover
the cloven foot for a time with the length of his  priestly  robes,  yei
sooner or later he  will be stripped and stand expesed. a  mass  of cor-
ruption; a "whited sepulchre."
   It  does not follow that because there arc demagogues and peculators,
that the great mass  of political men are dishonest, any more than a
few hypocrites in religion destroy the truths of Revelation.
   If  Quackery prevails in our profession, we are not alone.  Law  and
Divinity have their counterfeits and impostors; and so far from feeling
irritated and annoyed, and disgusted, let \rs rather consider it compli-
mentary that imitators try to  copy and assume, though it  is in an im-
perfect and ridiculous manner.   Gold is not-the less valuable  because
it is sometimes counterfeited; or  the diamond, the  most priceless of
<?ems, held in less  esteom because glass and  pebbles are often called by
its name. True genuine science and worth,  will ever stand at the head
ot every branch of human occupation, as gold and silver arc at the bead
of, and represent the standard, capital and riches of the land. 
s
    Of the advantages which the profession of Medecino offers over thftt
 of Law and Theology, depends mainly on the fitness and adaptation of
 the individual.
    A strong and enthusiastic love of the Natural Sciences, will general-
 ly mark one as a successful student ot Medicine.   That love of nature
 will show itself in a cultivation of Natural Philosophy, a  fondness oi
 investigation of the phenomena of life, under all forms and circumstan-
 ces.  A disposition to search for truth in hidden and obscure subjects.
 A love of Chemistry is generally found in those who have the  most ar-
 dent attachment to medical science.  Almost every Naturalist of any
 distinction is, or has become a Physician.
   There is one thing which I have observed with admiration; it is that
 a  Physician in  whatever  situation you may place him, that ardent love
 for his profession, is the ruling passion of his life.   He may turn  aside
 for a while, for what he may deem a better, and easier, or more lucra-
 tive employment.   He may enter the political arena, and plunge in the
 whirl and excitement of public  or official  life, but sooner or later, he
 is glad to tread his old and  familiar paths, to moor his shattered and
 storm-beaten  bark in  tho peaceful and quiet haven of professional
 and domestic  life.
   A good and conscientious Physician,  has more sources of consola-
 tion in the turmoil of life, than the world is aware of; for conscious of his
 strength and the integrity of his purposes, let the whirlwind  and the
 roar of  elemental strife surround him, yet  calm in  the righteousness
 of his principles, he is as unmoved  as  the eternal  hills.   What is the
 courage of the soldier compared to his?  Led on by  the soul-stirring
 clang of martial music, he marches up to the slumbering battery,  or
 charges the bristling square.  The smoke of battle stirs his blood; 'the
 sight of carnage rouses  higher his animal  hate.  It is brute force, 'such
 as the lion, tho tiger and the panther have, in pursuit of blood—or  such
 as the female of the brute creation  have in defence of their offspring.
   All this is mere  animal courage, stimulated by the force ofcircum.
 stances.   But the conflict is over, the battle is lost  or won, the brave
 soldier is a mere man, the infuriated animal is quieted and harmless
   Now compare the moral  bravery  of the  Physician.  It is a time of
fearful pestilence.   Over the City the Angel of death is hovering-The
 avenger is throwing his unseen but fatal darts, here, there, and  every-
 where.   On the door of almost every mansion, the sable token of death 
9
is hung.   Thfe rumble of the midnight hearse breaks solemnly on the1
ear of the lone  watcher by the couch of the dying.   The hasty rattle
of the Physician's carriage is constantly heard as he hurries from one
house of Borrow to another.   Anxious faces are  hurrying out of town
to escape the unseen foe.  Places of business and pleasure are deserted;
wives are entreating their husbands to fly with them to the woods, the
fields and the country;  anywhere but in the reeking City.
   But who are  those who  walk* about calm and collected;  firm, yet
fearless, while  all around are anxious  and  terrified?   They are the
good Physicians who remain as ministering  spirits,  unharmed, as
though they bore "charmed lives."
   But the secret of their exemption  is  in understanding  the laws of
life and death.   They  know that  fear  invites the fatal shafts; and
that a calm  anftnc'41ected mind renders the body invulnerable to the
attacks of epidemical  disease.   They call  to their aid, the  light of
 science; and it proves adequate to proteet; they take no medicine to
 ward off attacks; they observe  only the simple laws of nature, and
 they escape unharmed.
    But how  is it with the flying throng,  hurrying away from the de-
 stroyer?   By  the way-side,  in the forest and field, on the  mountain's
 top, by the shore of lake and river, in the farmhouse, in the cottage,
 and the stately mansion; in the ship with sails set or flying with  wind
 and tide, on the panting steamer,  and  on  the  car that with arrowy
 speed, is hastening from danger.    The stricken one is soon overta-
 ken by the dire avenger, his fears and'his flight soliciting his destruc-
 tion.
    It is this moral courage, above every other thing, which stamps the
 Physician as  a  superior being, in times of pestilence and National ca-
 lamity.  Without revertitig to ancient times to seek for  examples of
 this transcendent heroism in seasons of pestilence and death,  the annals
 of our science is filled with the deeds of daring and self-sacrificing in-
 stances that would strip the laurel from the brow  of the most fearless
 warrior that ever desolated the earth.
    The fearful pestilence that has recently scourged our land, and car-
 ried mourning and lamentation into the thousand  happy  circles, and
 literally hung the land with  a sable pall, has brought forth  individual
 traits of heroism that we may  well be proud of.
    A City filled  with  happy inhabitants, may lie down to a night of re- 
10
 p.'sc—the morn is ushered in by a sky of cloudless beauty—the airia
 bland, and to all appearances,  laden with  health and happiness—the
 thronging afreets are alive with the gay, the beautiful and the healthy.
 At eve, from the squallid abodes of vice and poverty, goes up the wail
 of the mourner, mingled with  the  hoarse death whisper of  the pesti-
 lence  stricken.   >Soon the foe spreads over the whole town—tho  dwell-
 er in the luxurious mansion is  seized, and the reign of terror and con-
 sternation is complete.   Then  forth from  every avenue pours out the
 rushing throng until the City is half depopulated.  But it is  rare in-
 deed I am proud to say, that tho worthy Physician is  among the hur-
 rying throng.   He is at his post, calm and collected.  Where the  shafts
 fly thickest, there he is to he found.  Where the breaoh is weakest, he
 throws himself into the gap.  Ho may be stricken; he may be compell-
 ed to succumb, but flies he never—Never turns his bjBk on the enemy.
   It is this moral heroism  in times of pestilence, which endears him to
 society— Which extorts the meed of praise,  so generally withheld, to
 the deserving of our profession. •
   The real value of the good Physician has been strikingly tested with-
 in the last year, while Quackery has  sunk correspondingly low.   It is
 in diseases of real malignancy, like Asiatic Cholera, where a true com-
 parison alone can be instituted,  of the value of remedial agents.  In
 several chronic, and a host  of nervous  and  imaginary maladies, the
 Qua:k gains his eclat and his money.
   Iu a vast proportion of these cases, it matters not whether the deluded
 patient swallows the ten-millionth part of a  grain of sugar  of milk or
 moonshine, or takes his cure from the mysterious passes of the Mes-
 merizer.  All that is required is, that his credulity  be capacious, or
 small enough to receive the proper impression.  If a strong appeal is
 made to the fancy, or the imagination  made the vehicle to  carry the
 cure into the  system, why that is all which  is  required.  But  in all
 diseases of real severity, you might  as  well stop a hurricane witn a
 silk handkerchief, or extinguish Vesuvius with a fire engine.   Quacks
 may as well strike their colors to all acute diseases; it is not their  field.
 Some few of them have shrewdness enough to know the fact,  but the
great majority of them, are too ignorant to know this all important truth.
  Allow me, gentlemen, to congratulate ourselves on the glorious age
in  which we live.   On the astonishing improvements that have taken
place, within a short time, in medical and surigcal science.  It is but 
11
about two years since, that I read an article to a class of Medical Stu-
dents here, on an invention in Boston, to do away with the  pain of a
surgical operation.   Yes, gentlemon, it  is less than  two  years since
that time; and so rapid is the advance of science; so thronging on each
other is invention after invention, that  now we regard it as a piece  of
stale news.   It has been put in practice over the whole civilized earth,
in the short period of two years.   Steam and lightning have scattered
it over the world, with a rapidity unparallelled in the history of improve-
ments.   The fabled waters of Lethe have been realized; and although
the elixir, has not yet been found, which confers immortal  youth aud
health on mankind, yet the exemption from pain, in all necessary sur-
 gical operations, is but little less valuable than that long sought for
 Panacea.   The  amount of human suffering, and misery, and anguish,
 which this  one discovery has saved within two years, is beyond all es-
 timation.   And what it is destined io do, with all the reasonable  im-
 provements, in time to come, is inestimable and incalculable.   And
 the sum total of life which it has actually saved, is greater, in my opin-
 ion, than from any other improvement, since the  discovery of the Im-
  mortal  Jenner.
    And yet we hear  many condemning this discovery, as being unsafe
  and dangerous.  This is true, to a  certain extent.   So  are nearly all
  other powerful and useful agents, unless under certain circumstances.
  Opium, for instance, is a highly danger-ous substance to administer im-
  properly, notwithstanding its almost divine powers.  Sois alcohol;  and.
  even cold water,  the universal beverage.  A person predisposed to
   apoplexy, drinks half a pint of brandy, or takes a full dose of opmm-
  h  L-but does it reasonably follow that brandyand  °F™ ™ *
  be prohibited?  An individual drinks a  glass of ice-water, when the
   b dy  s h ated-he falls down and dies-does it follow that no .ore
         ♦   Anil be drank?   A man in attempting to swallow a piece of 
Vi
 improper application.   Caloric,  is an  essential element in all animal
 bodies, yet animal life  is  quickly extinguished by an  excess of this
 Bamo property.
   The use of anesthetic agents frequently renders it safe  to  operata
 when death might follow the shook to tho system.  It renders a pa-
 tient more willing to submit to an operation, than otherwise.
   Within two years I have used Ether or Chloroform,  in  more than
 eighty cases, mostly for the performance of dangerous and painful op-
 erations, and not one out of the  whole  number, have died,  or been in
 the least injured, and I have  had good reason to know that many of
 that number would have fallen victims, had it not been for the admin-
 istration of this valuable agent.   In  the case of a young gentleman
 who had tetanus or lockjaw,  from a wound; he  was on  the point of
 dying, and that, too,  one of the most painful deaths that can  be well
 conceived,  when chloroform was administered, and lo! as  if by magic,
 the horrible spasms relaxed, the distorted limhs and body  came  back
 to their proper places, and he was cured, by this and this aloue, when
 all other remedies had been tried in vain.
  lam not one of those sanguine individuals, who believe  that every
 case of tetanus can be cured  by  these  agents;  but this much do I
 believe; that nearly all can if  properly employed.   That  most  terrific
 of all complaints, the rabies canina, or  hydrophobia,  is said to have
 been cured, in one well authenticated case.
  Anesthesia is yet in its infancy.   Of the prospective benefit to be
 derived from its employment, the most  sanguine results are to  be ap-
 prehended.  Diseases that cannot be cured,  will be mitigated  by its
 use.   And even the pains of dissolution will be soothed and softened
 by what no other means can bring about.  Life is rendered vastly more
 desirable, as well as having it prolonged by this class  of  agents.  In-
 surance companies can afford to issue policies at lower rates, and  with
 less risks, within a few years, than formerly; and as  an evidence of
 the confidence they repose in legitimate medicine and  surgery, ono of
 the questions asked the applicant is,  whether be employs  a regular
 medical man as his physician.  This small matter is more complimen-
 tary  to the profession, than  one at first sight might be disposed to
admit.
  While our own profession has been striding onward with  a rapidity
 unparallelled in the history of science, we  must acknowledge that all 
13
other branches of science  and art are whirling on with a speed truly
astonishing.
  It is less  than a year since, that we began to read  of tho golden
treasures of California, and lo! a mighty army of men have crossed the
continent, and are founding a city on the shores of the Pacific, which
will, in our day, be a great commercial  emporium, filled with the can •
vass of every enterprising nation on the globe;  and soon  the  panting
 of the Locomotive will frighten the wild horses and  buffalo, on the
 great Western Prairies, and echo  through the  gorges of the Rocky
 Mountains, and on through the snowy passes, until the broad Pacific
 shall gleam on the  eye of the traveller, as he beholds the setting sun
 sink into the bosom of this illimitable ocean.
   In a short time we shall be  able to transmit messages across the
 continent, from ocean to ocean, with a speed that will outstrip the Sun,
 in his fiery course.
   It is but a few years since these prairies,  and these lands  were in
 the Far West.   Now they are East of a vast  tract which has been
 reclaimed from savage  man and beast.   Soon a sovereign State will
 be organized in the  great Desert Basin of the Salt  Lake, and Repre-
 sentatives to Congress are now on their way to the seat of our National
 Government.  And the time is near at hand, when we shall have Sen-
 ators and members of the House of Representatives  claiming their
 mileage fee from the Bay of San Francisco, from the  golden sands  of
 the Sacramento, and from the banKs of the Columbia.  Many of you
 gentlemen, will visit those distant lands, brought home to  our  doors,
 by the magic power of steam and Electricity.
    Colleges will  be  founded, magnificent capitals will grow up; the
  hum and buzz of machinery will enlivn  the water courses; the quiet
  hamlet, the fields of waving grain, with the cattle upon a thousand hills,
  shall present such a picture of loveliness and beauty, as to  realize in
  truth, literally, the Golden Age.
    What a glorious destiny awaits this nation!  And you, my friends,
  are to be the actors in the great drama that is  enacting before us.—
  Though you are to  walk  in the quiet and tranquil paths of  literature
  and science, yet the impress of your acts, and  your conduct, wiU flow
  down the stream of time, for good "or for evil, to the latest generations, 
 
c .  I 
w