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A  REPORT
THE LEGISLATURE  OF'KENTUCKY,
ON THE
     MEDICAL DEPARTMENT


          /    «»
         /
        /
      V.
TRANSYLVANIA  UNIVERSITY,


        FEBRUARY, 15TH, 1836.


 s*j|BY CHARLES CALDWELL, M. D.
               ***
      *
   LEXINGTON:
J. CLARKE & CO. PRINTERS.
       1836, 
w
                   House or Representatives,  Feb.  17.
Dear Sir:
  If you will furnish for publication a copy of the able Re-
port and eloquent Address you delivered on  the  evening  of
the 15th, in the Representative Hall, you will confer an obli-
gation on the Committee and the Public.
                      Yours, with great respect,
                                 W. T. WILLIS,
                   Chairman of the Comm. of the Senate.
                              F. W. TRAPNALL,
                Chairman of the Comm. of the H. of Rep.
Dr. Charles Caldwell. 
ADDRESS.
 Gentlemen:
   In obedience to the call of your Honorable Body, I rise to
 submit to you a few thoughts, in the form of an official report,
 on  the  Medical  Department  of  Transylvania  University.
 And I beg  to be understood as speaking in the name,  and
 by  the  appointment, of the Medical Faculty.  In the  per-
 formance of  this  duty, of whose importance,  and of the re-
 sponsibility  it imposes on me, I am duly  sensible,  a  refer-
 ence will be  necessarily made  to the origin and  progress of
 the institution, the means it has  received in furtherance of its
 operations, the services it has rendered, its present condition,
 including what it wants,  as  well  as what it  possesses,  and
 somewhat of its prospects and  designs for  the future.  It is
 obvious, therefore, that, to do justice to the subject, the Report
 must be of considerable length.   The patience and kind  for-
 bearance, then, of your Honorable Body is  respectfully soli-
 cited.  Before proceeding however, to the exposition intend-
 ed, let me ask your  indulgence  in offering to you a few pre-
 liminary remarks, not  altogether,  I trust, irrelevant to  the
 occasion.
   This is trie  second time I have had the honour of appearing
 before the Legislature of Kentucky, in my present capacity.
 Sixteen  years ago,  I was  deputed by  my colleagues of  the
 Medical School, to report to your Honorable Predecessors  on
the same subject which now claims my own attention, and to
which I respectfully solicit  the attention of the House.   To
some  portions, at least in substance, of the Report which was
then submitted, I shall find it requisite to refer in the course of
my observations. 
4
  Far different, at the period  alluded to, were the aspect and
condition  of the subject reported on, from those which will
now be  presented to  you.   And equally different were the
prospects  of usefulness connected with it, the expectations it
awakened, and the hopes it inspired.  To  complete the dis-
similarity  of the pictures, no less different were  my own feel-
ings and relations, while engaged in the performance of the
duty intrusted to me.   For such feelings in myself, moreover,
and such  prospects in respect to the school, there were sub-
stantial reasons.
  I had no claim on  the people  of Kentucky, en account of
any thing done or even attempted by me, in  promotion of their
interests;  and the institution I represented had nothing but a
bare existence and a name.  It  was an  infant of feeble pro-
mise, and / a stranger, embarked in an  untried  experiment,
which most persons  deemed of  very doubtful success.  Nor
had my colleagues as yet  attained the standing and distinc-
tion which they now possess, in consideration of their public
services.   They now hold solid and lasting reputation in hand)
which they then had only in prospect and hope.
   Such, at the date referred to, was the condition of the Med-
ical Department of Transylvania, and  of  those to whom  its
administration was  confided.   The issue of the attempt to
erect and sustain a school of this  kind was enveloped in a
cloud  of  disheartening uncertainty, which neither foresight
could penetrate, nor  enthusiasm dispel.   Though no one  ac-
 tually  despaired of it, because no  effort in its favor hrd been
 made  and defeated, yet so numerous and weigl^ were  the
 obstacles presented, that few had the  firmness tow)pe in  op-
 position to them.
    Under the influence of circumstances  so inauspicious  and
 unpromising, had your Honorable Predecessors listened eddly
 and withheld their patronage, especially as that patronage in-
 volved a  draught on the treasury of the Commonwenlth, whose
 funds at  the time were discouragingly limited, the event would
 not have been surprising.   On the contrary, it would probably
 have been deemed by many, discreet and natural—particular- 
b
ly by cautious and calculating State economists, who too  of tea
shrink from wise and advantageous public expenditures, lest a
possible failure might affect their popularity and standing with
their constituents.  Such, however,  were* neither the feelings
nor the conduct of the gentlemen who composed the Legisla-
ture of Kentucky.   They listened kindly to the representa-
tion made, and the petition preferred to them, and generously
aided  the  enterprize contemplated.   And I trust to make  it
appear to the entire satisfaction of your Honorable Body, that,
in the measure thus adopted, they  were no less  guided by
wisdom and sagacity, than actuated by motives of liberal pat-
riotism and public spirit.  If the high value of the iss- e of an
experiment prove the wisdom of the views that  led it, the
measure referred to  was unquestionably  wise.  But however
just in itself, and  gratifying to my own feelings this humble
tribute of respect, commendation, and gratitude, to the magna-
nimity and sound judgment of your Honorable  Predecessors
may  be, I must indulge in it no further, but must enter imme-
diately on the duty assigned me.
   The Medical Department of Transylvania was  organized
in 1819, and commenced its operations, in the form of lectures,
in November of the same year.  Tne Chairs were then six
in number: namely, of
       Anatomy ami Surgery,
       The Institutes of Medicine,
       The Theory and Practice of  Medicine,
       Materia Medica and Medical Botany,
       Chemistry, and
       Midwifery.
Of these Chairs five only were then filled.   That of Materia
Medica  and Medical  Botany being vacant, the duties of it
were  performed, during four Sessions, by the individual who
now addresses you, without any additional charge  on the pu-
pils.   To  the  Chair of the Institutes of Medicine  were soon
afterwards at! ached the duties of a Chair of Clinical Practice,
without the actual erection of such a Chair, or any increase of
the fees for instruction; and, at a subsequent period, Anatomy 
6
 and Surgery were separated, and formed into two Chairs, botk
 of which were filled then, and still continue to be filled, by the
 same person.  In  October  last a Chair of Medical Jurispru-
 dence was created by the Trustees, it being deemed advisable,
 if not necessary, that pupils should have an opportunity of ac-
 quiring a knowledge of that important branch of the profes-
 sion.  That  Chair is filled by the individual who occupies the
 Chair of the Institutes; but an attendance on it is  not  made
 essential to a degree in medicine. The fee is light, and pupils
 attend the lectures from it,  or not, at pleasure.
   The  School, at present, then, consists of eight Chairs, and
 six  Professors,  with two Assistants;  one  Assistant in the
 Chairs of Anatomy and Surgery; and another in the Chair of
 Chemistry.  The Assistants receive  no remuneration from the
 pupils, for their public services.  Each of  them,  however, in-
 structs a  private class, for  a moderate fee;  but pupils enter
 those classes, or decline them, at option.  A Librarian, who
 is usually a graduate of the institution, completes the number
 of school-officers.
   The Sessions of the School  open on the  first Monday  of
 November of every year,  and close on  the first of March.
 Daring that period, each Professor lectures generally six times
 i week, the Professors of Anatomy  and Surgery, and of the
 Institutes of Medicine  and  Medical  Jurisprudence excepted.
 Each of these lectures from nine to ten times a week.   Though
 the School contains no Chair of Mineralogy or Natural His-
 tory, instruction in those  branches is given by the Professors
 of Chemistry and Materia Medica.                 .
  Such  is the present organization of the School; and it is be-
 lieved to be equal to the organization of any other in the Uni-
 ted States.  It embraces a provision  for the teaching of every
 thing requisite to a liberal  education in medicine.
  The whole expense to a pupil, for  an attendance on every
chair necessary to  a degree in his profession, js one hundred
 and ten dollars, for each session.  To be entitled to become
a candidate for a degree, the pupil must attend two full courses
of lectures in Transylvania, unless he has already  attended 
7
 •ne full course  in some other School  well organised and  of
 acknowledged reputation, or been a  regular and respectable
 practitioner of medicine, for the term of four years.  In either
 of the two latter cases, he may offer himself as a candidate,
 after attending  one full  course in Transylvania.  The fee for
 graduation is  twenty dollars.   This is an additional charge on
 the pupil's last  session in the  School.   Those  who have at-
 tended two full courses of  lectures,  are  accounted perpetual
 pupils, and may attend subsequent courses free of expense.
   Examinations for  degrees, which commence as soon as the
 lectures close, are held in the presence of the professors, as a
 Faculty, and are very strict—as much so certainly, as in any
 other  School in  the United States.  A diploma, therefore, from
 Transylvania is the well earned reward of professional know-
 ledge.  Nor is  this all.  To guard the Profession as much  as
 possible against vice, as well  as  ignorance, measures are also
 adopted for the moral and religious instruction of the classes.
 As means toward this end, sermons and  suitable lectures are
 delivered by the clergy  of Lexington, at  convenient hours,  to
 which the  classes are specially invited.  The Rev. Dr. Coit,
 President of the University, is at this time engaged in a course
 of Sunday-evening lectures, on  the  necessity and uses of a
 Divine Revelation, and the evidences  of Christianity, designed
 in particular for the benefit of the students of Medicine, Law,
 and Theology.
   I have been thus circumstantial in this  part of my Report,
 that your Honorable  body may be the better prepared to judge
 of the organization,  exercises, expenses, and entire adminis-
 tration and economy of  the institution.   This step is deemed
 the more  necessary, because unfounded representations on the
 subject have  not only  gone abroad, but been industriously
 propagated, for unworthy  purposes.   And  to present the
 School to  you in  its whole compass and character, that you
 may see it as it  is, a variety of matter not unimportant is yet
 to be added.  To this end, it is requisite that you be informed,
as already intimated, not merely what the institution is, and 
8
how it is now acting, but also what it has done, and the meani
it has received in aid of its action.  To these points, then,
permit me to solicit the favour of your attention.
  As heretofore mentioned, the School commenced its opera-
tions in November, 1819, and the numbers of its classes and
graduates, from that period to the present, have been as fol-
lows:
Years.	No. of each class.	No. of g
1819-20	37	7
1820-1	93	13
1821-2	138	37
1822-3	171	51
1823-4	200	47
1824-5	234	57
1825-6	281	65
1826-7	190	53
1827-8	152	53
1828-9	206	40
1829-30	199	81
1830-1	210	52
1831-2	215	74
1832-3	222	69
1833-4	262	66
1834-5	259	83
1835-6	261	75
	3330	923
  This statement discloses two facts  worthy  of  a place in
this report, and not, I trust,  unworthy of the notice of your
Honorable Body.  The Medical Department of Transylvania
has educated  three  thousand  three  hundred   and  thirty
pupils, of whom  eight hundred and forty-eight have already
received the highest honors of the profession, and seventy-six
more will  probably receive the same next  spring; the num-
ber of graduates  amounting then to nine hundred and twenty-
three;  and her annual classes,  compared with those of other
institutions,  show her to have been,  for the last twelve or
thirteen years, the second Medical School, in numbers, in the
United  States.   The  Medical  Department of the University
of Pennsylvania, an institution whose  age is near  a century, 
9
 and which stands in the midst of a dense and wealthy popula-
 tion, has alone surpassed her.  All others have fallen far be-
 low her.—The means she has received from the State of Ken-
 tucky, in aid of her operations, and the uses she has made of
 them, shall next be communicated to you.
   It  doubtless appears  on the journals of the Legislature of
 that  date, that, in the year 1820, your Honorable Predeces-
 sors granted to the Medical Department of Transylvania five
 thousand dollars, the  currency at the time being  in a depre-
 ciated condition—about one  third,  I think,  below  par; and
 that was the only pecuniary benefaction  conferred on  it by
 the Commonwealth.   And I do not despair of making it satis-
 factorily appear, that the Commonwealth  has already receiv-
 ed in return, by the operations of the School, several hundred
 fold the  amount of money thus bestowed  on it.  In plainer
 terms; I shall respectfully contend, and, if I  mistake not,
 conclusively show, that, even in a pecuniary point of view,
 the State is deeply indebted to the School.  And the benefits
 she has experienced from it, in other  respects, cannot be cal-
 culated  in dollars and cents.  They are of an order and an
 amount,  which throw all money valuation immeasurably below
 them.  To speak of nothing  else, in  this  place, the lives of
 thousands of her citizens have been saved  by it;  and they are
 beyond price.
   With  the sum  thus  received, and funds derived from other
 sources,  one of the professors  proceeded  to Europe,  at  his
 own expense, in  1821, procured the best chemical and  other
 apparatus, on the best terms, and, by fortunate  purchases of
 books, laid the foundation of an excellent library.   By further
 funds, arising from the matriculation and  library  fees of the
 institution, the collection of books has been  annually increased,
 until it amounts at present to  upwards of four thousand vol-
 umes, most of them standard works, and some  of them of
great value, and exceedingly  costly.   It is  believed that  no
other  medical library in  the United States, of the same size,
contains  an equal number of productions of as high authority
and unquestioned merit—especially of the productions of the 
10
fathers of medicine.  The Professor of Chemistry has added
materially to the apparatus of his laboratory, from his private
resources;  and by the assiduity  and skill of the Professor of
Anatomy and Surgery, and his able assistant, the Anatomical
Museum is rising into great  respectability  and usefulness.
Under the auspices of the School, especially  by the  industry
and  enterprise of the gifted and  excellent assistant  of the
Professor of Chemistry, some progress has  been made in the
formation of  a cabinet of Natural History.
   All these means of instruction  have been  already seen by
sundry members of your Honorable  Body;  and it will be
peculiarly gratifying to the Board of Trustees, and the Faculty
of Medicine, to exhibit them to  such committees cf  the Leg-
islature as may be appointed at any time to visit the institu-
tion.  It may be finally added, that the edifices for the accom-
modation of the school, in all  its departments, though not
showy, are spacious,  substantial,  and sufficiently neat, and
among the most commodious in the  United States. The lecture
rooms are large enough to accommodate a class of from three
to four hundred pupils. The buildings were  erected  by the
professors  themselves, partly from their own resources, and
in part by  a stock-fund, on which they pay an interest.
   Such, in form and  substance, arrangement and  means, is
 the  Medical  Department of Transylvania  University; and
 such in part the work it has done.    But its entire story is not
 yet told.   If I do not judge of it too partially, there  are many
 other considerations which  recommend it to the favor of the
 State of Kentucky,  as well as to that of  the people of the
 West.  Let me hope for your continued indulgence,  therefore,
 in making it the subject of farther remarks.   And here an in-
 quiry of peculiar importance to it  naturally presents itself.
   What relation  does the School now bear, in what it has
 already done, and in its present  standing and character, to
 the expectations  that were formed of it sixteen  years ago?
 Whether has it disappointed those  expectations, simply fulfilled
 them, or greatly  surpassed  them?   Answers  to  these  ques-
 tions involve a knowledge of the amount of  expectation 
11
formed  of the  institution,  at the  time of its  establishment.
And I have already intimated to you, that that amount was ex-
tremely limited.  In proof of this, the views of the future use-
fulness, standing, and general destinies of the School, contain-
ed in the report presented to  your Honorable Predecessors,
in 1820, were  deemed  by almost every one extravagant and
visionary—and therefore  impracticable.  I know this  to  be
true*; because the views were presented by myself; and I was
considered, on  account of  them,a sort of dreaming enthusiast,
if not an actual castle-builder.  The report having been print-
ed, by order of the Legislature,  those views are on record,
and therefore accessible.   And the chief of them are, in sub-
stance, as follows, and may be compared with the  realities
which have since occurred, and which are now in existence.
  I. The School  being established in the great Western Valley,
will throw much new and important light on the diseases of that
Valley, which must lead to a more rational and successful treat-
ment of them
  This view,  which was  but prophesy when  presented, and
which few received with entire favor or credit, is history now.
In evidence of  its correctness, the  pupils of Transylvania are,
as a very general rule, the ablest  and most successful practi-
tioners of  their age, both in medicine and surgery, in the Mis-
sissippi Valley.  However unacceptable and perhaps displeas-
ing to some this assertion may prove, experience and observa-
tion testify to its truth.  Though I make it therefore fearless-
ly ;  yet, in doing so, I mean neither offence, condemnation,  nor
disparagement  toward any physician, or any school.  My ob-
ject is to state  what I know to be true.  The statement, more-
over, is but a tribute of justice to the sons of Transylvania, for
their devotedness to their profession, the high standing they
maintain in it,  the benefits they confer on their fellow-men in
the practice  of it, and  the credit they reflect  on their  Alma
Mater.  And I glory in awarding it.  Having first by  perse-
vering industry as pupils,  rendered themselves competent to
their professional duties, they  are now faithfully performing
them as practitioners.   A knowledge of this  induces their 
13
fellow-citizens to confide  in them and employ them.  Hence
the ascendency they so usually attain.   Another leading cause
of this result is plain.   The professors of Transylvania being
familiar with the nature and treatment of western complaints,
can best communicate a knowledge  of them to their pupils.
For this reason alone, the School is worthy of every form and
degree of patronage the public can bestow.
  Apart  moreover  from all other considerations, the period
has arrived, and seems to be mature, when the western people
should patronize  and  encourage western institutions alone.
In no other way can such institutions  be brought to the  per-
fection they are destined to attain.  Nor  can they become
otherwise productive  of the full amount of  usefulness, for
which they are intended,  and to which they can  be made
competent.   To say  nothing then of western pride, which
should prompt the desire to become less dependent on eastern
resources, the measure is called for  by the  interest of the
West.  The valley of the  Mississippi  is believed to contain
between four and five  millions of inhabitants, and is increasing
in wealth, population, and  power, with a rapidity  undreamt
of in  any other  section  of the Union.   It is but manly in  it
then to throw off its minority, proclaim its literary and scien-
tific independence,  and set up for  itself. And I  confidently
trust that the day  is  near  at  hand,  when  the proclamation
will be issued, and carried into effect.  The enterprise is easy;
and, I repeat, that the  GREAT WESTERN COMMUNITY
owes it alike to its interest and its honour.   Within less  than
half a century, the preponderance  of power in the Union
will be in the Mississippi Valley.  Nature herself, by the un-
rivalled magnificence  of her western  works, proclaims the
"coming event," which already begins  to "throw its shadow
before."   Let the people of the valley  then, by providing for
every form  of mental cultivation, prepare themselves  for the
wise  and virtuous  exercise of this  power, when  in time it
shall become  theirs!   In this way alone can they  discharge
their duty to themselves  and their country, their contempora-
ries and posterity! 
13
   II. The School will so far reduce the expenses of Medical
 Education in the West, that persons in moderate circumstances,
 no less than the wealthy, may easily attain it.
   The  accomplishment  of this view nobody questions.   To
 the youths of Kentucky, and of the States still farther to the
 West and South, the expenses of a medical education in Phil-
 adelphia, compared to the expenses  of it in Lexington,  are
 necessarily about zsjiveio three; but commonlynot less than as
 two  to one.  Five  hundred dollars in the former case will be
 as certainly expended, as three hundred in the latter.  Indeed
 five hundred dollars a session in Philadelphia, travelling and
 incidental expenses included, is a moderate allowance; while
 three hundred  in Lexington is an ample one.  Two hundred
 and fifty  dollars, in the latter place, even tolerably economiz-
 ed, is an abundant  supply.   I have repeatedly known  two
 hundred made  to meet  all demands—and in some cases less.
 In this statement I am  fully sustained, by the experience of
 those who have attended a session in each of the schools.  I
 make it moreover from personal knowledge.
   III. A  Western School of  Medicine will promote inquiries
 into the character and effects of the western  climate,  especially
 its influence in producing peculiar  diseases, and in modifying
 common ones, and also into the nature, variety, and uses of the
 animals, vegetables, and minerals of the West.
  In no inconsiderable degree, this prediction has been already
 verified.   On the several points just enumerated,  as well as on
 western  topography, five-fold more is known now,  than was
 sixteen  years ago.   Inquiries respecting them are  extensive
 and active;  many important facts relating to them have been
 discovered, and valuable papers on them written  and publish-
 ed.  In confirmation of this, the Lexington "Journal of Medi-
 cine and the Associate Sciences," furnishes of itself  abundant
 testimony.  That work,  which was established, and, directly
and indirectly, supported chiefly by the School of Transylva-
nia, has reached its  eighth volume, and contains many able
and excellent  articles on the  climate,  weather,  topography,
and diseases, as well as on the animals, vegetables, and mine- 
u
rals of the Mississippi Valley.   On these points it abounds in
original matter.  In addition to  the papers  written by  the
Professors and  Alumni of Transylvania, gentlemen of talents
and standing, educated in other Schools, but  long resident in
the West, have been induced to communicate to  the Journal
the fruit of thier experience and observation for years, accom-
panied by their reflections, which they would not have com-
municated to the Periodicals of the east.  This  latter  event
was also predicted, in the  Report made to  your Honorable
Predecessors.  Though  no full western Treatises in medical
and physical science have yet been produced, the elements of
such  works are daily  developing—a sufficient guaranty, that
the works themselves will ultimately appear.
   My worthy and distinguished colleague,  the  Professor of
Materia Medica and  Medical  Botany, is indefatigable in ex-
ploring and  describing  our  rich and magnificent  vegetable
kingdom.  In proof of his strenuous and successful exertions,
he has collected already  and now possesses, a more extensive
and valuable Herbarium, than any other individual Botanist
in North America.  The fruit of his labours will  no  doubt ap-
pear hereafter, in a style worthy of the splendour of their sub-
ject, and will perpetuate the name of their author among those
of the benefactors of the West, and of the ornaments  of our
country, when his dust shall be reposing in  the  midst of the
beautiful Flora he shall have depicted.  It need hardly  be ad-
ded, that, had  there been no medical institution  in the West,
these numerous and valuable contributions to western science
would  not have been made—certainly not so extensively, or
at so early a period.   Though the School of Transylvania has
not been the  only labourer in this great and glorious cause,
she has been the most active and  powerful  co-operator, and
has excited, by precept and example, hundreds of others to
 embark in the  enterprize.  She has been a leaven to awaken
 the mass to action.
   One of the most abundant and valuable sources of informa-
 tion respecting the history and diseases of the West and South,
 is yet to be mentioned.   I  allude to seven  or eight hundred 
15
Inaugural Dissertations, written by the Medical graduates of
Transylvania.  These are bound up  in manuscript  volumes,
containing in the whole perhaps Jive and twenty thousand pages,
(possibly more)  and carefully preserved in the library of the
institution.  Many of them are productions of peculiar merit;
and, united, they embody  a much greater amount of historical
and philosophical intelligence respecting the Valley of the Mis-
sissippi, than is any where else  to be found.   To the future
historian of Medicine in the West, they  will serve as  docu-
ments of unequalled value.  I need not add, that  they are the
product of the Medical Department of Transylvania.
  IV.  The School will benefit the West, by retaining at home
large sums of money, which would be otherwise expended  on the
education of western youth, in the Schools of the east.
  In her fulfilment of this prediction, the School of Transyl-
vania has surpassed immeasurably all anticipation that reason
seemed to warrant, or hope  to inspire.  A brief exposition
will prove this.
  Since the  commencement  of her operations, in 1819, the
institution has  educated  thirteen hundred and  seventy-one
pupils from the  State of Kentucky.  Had all  these repaired
for education to the School of Philadelphia, attended two full
courses of lectures, and graduated there, each must  have car-
ried with him at least a thousand dollars, (many would have car-
ried much more) all of which would have been lost to the  State.
For, of all  the money  that passes the mountains, and  makes
its way to the eastern capitals,  very  little returns.  A  thous-
and dollars multiplied into thirteen hundred and  seventy-one,
gives a product of one million, three hundred and seventy-one
thousand dollars, of which the State of Kentucky would have
been drained, through the channel of eastern education.   Sup-
pose the pupils to have attended but  one course of lectures in
Philadelphia, and not graduated, the sum they would have ta-
ken from their native State, and bestowed on another,  would
have been six hundred  and eighty-five thousand, five hundred
dollars.   Admit that one third of them only had attended two
courses of lectures and graduated, which is perhaps a fair esti- 
16
 mate; in that case Kentucky would have lost, by the measure,
 about a million of dollars.  So much  then  has  the School of
 Transylvania saved already to her parent State.
   Shall 1 be told that, had not the School of  Transylvania
 been erected, half the number of thirteen hundred and seventy-
 one Kentuckians would not have devoted themselves to medi-
 cine? and that therefore the sum specified would not have been
 thus  transported to the east?   Be it so.  The  alternative is
 the greater evil of the two.  If Kentucky had not been drain-
 ed of her money by eastern schools, her young men would
 have remained uneducated.  Comparative ignorance therefore
 would have  accompanied her saving of wealth.   And  that ig-
 norance would have been  more discreditable to her present
 and  future generations, than the hoarding  of ten millions of
 dollars could compensate.  Nor would it have discredited her
 only—it would have deeply injured her.  She must have had
 physicians of some kind.   These then  would necessarily  have
 been either unlettered and many of them unprincipled empirics,
 or eastern young men, educated in eastern Schools, where a
 competent knowledge of western complaints could not be im-
 parted to them.   The consequence is plain.  Lamentable un-
 skilfulness in practice must have prevailed for a time with eve-
 ry new-come physician from the Atlantic Schools,  and abun-
 dant suffering and mortality have been the issue.
   But the School of Transylvania has not merely saved money
 to the State  of Kentucky;  she has also brought into it a  very
 large amount, which  would  not  otherwise have reached it.
 She has educated from the surrounding States (several eastern
 States included)  nineteen hundred  and fifty-seven pupils. Of
 these, a great number have attended two and some three
 courses of lectures; and not a few of them have resided in the
 State, from eighteen months to two or three years.  On an av-
 erage, therefore, they must have expended in the State at least
 five hundred dollars a piece—I doubt not considerably more.
 Five hundred multiplied into nineteen hundred and fifty-seven,
gives nine hundred and seventy-eight thousand,  five-hundred.
 So many dollars  then has the  School of Transylvania brought 
17
into Kentucky, which would not have been received through
any other channel.   This sum, added  to the million  saved,
makes a grand total of one million nine hundred and seventy-
eight thousand five hundred dollars, with which the institution
has enriched the Commonwealth—a most  munificent  return
for Jive thousand dollars, bestowed on  her fifteen years ago.
   Nor is  this the only return, nor even the most valuable one
the School  has made.   Far  from  it.   When properly esti-
mated, the professional and scientific character it has confer-
red on the State,  is worth five-fold the  sum.   I should rather
say, that, as  far as money is concerned, it is beyondprice.  To
compare the  wealth  of  the mind with that of the purse,  be-
trays equal ignorance and tastelessness in him who makes  the
comparison,  and is a wrong if not an insult to education and
knowledge.   The  thirty-three  hundred  and   thirty phy-
sicians, whom Transylvania has educated, and who are plant-
ed and flourishing in  fourteen or fifteen States, and in all the
Territories of the Union, have given to Kentucky more stand-
ing and consideration, than would  thirty-three millions of dol-
lars have done, in whatever  way she  might  have  expended
them.  While other and wealthier States boast of  their gold
and their diamonds, Kentucky, like the Roman  matron, may
point to brighter and more inestimable jewels, in her glorious.
family of educated sons.
   V. The School will elevate in the West, the standing and dig-
nity of the medical profession, and give  it mote weight and in-
fluence in effecting its benevolent and praiseworthy purposes.
   This  prediction also has been  amply fulfilled.   Twenty
western pupils are now ambitious to attain, and do  attain, the
highest honours of their profession, where one entertained that
ambition sixteen years ago.  At that  period, but few physi-
cians in  the western  States were  graduates  in medicine.
 Nor was the want of a degree either  mortifying or discredi-
 table to them.   The reason is  plain.  It was so  common a
 want, that few noticed it, and none complained  of  it.  At
 present the case is altogether different.  Without'a degree, no
 physician ranks high in his profession, whatever may be the 
18
 extent of his business, and the success of his practice.   He
 does not, I mean, bear a high rank in professional honours and
 consideration.  He feels  moreover that he  is an unfinished
 character—an  officer without his commission—or a column
 without  the  grace  and ornament of its  capital.  In  conse-
 quence  of this dissatisfactory  consciousness, more than  fifty
 practitioners in reputable business, some of them considera-
 bly advanced in life, have left  their families, homes  and pro-
 fessional engagements for four or five  months, repaired to
 Transylvania, attended lectures with great assiduity, submit-
 ted to an examination, received their degrees, and returned to
 their calling with a  self-satisfaction, and a pride of character,
 which they had never felt before.  And this is the product of
 the labours of our School.  She instituted the measure at an
 early period,  and has persevered in it no less to the benefit than
 to the credit of medicine, in the Mississippi Valley.   She  has
 also conferred a number of honorary degrees, as tokens  and
 rewards of professional distinction in those who have received
 them; and as incentives to the attainment of distinction by
 others.   By  such  means, I say, she has elevated professional
 rank.  In fine;  in 1819, she found the standard  of medicine
 comparatively low in the Mississippi Valley; and  she has been
 the chief instrument in raising it to as high a  point of consid-
 eration and influence here,  as it has attained in any other part
 of the Union.   These  remarks are  made  from no  feeling of
 disrespect towards the physicians who  migrated, at  an early
 period, to the  western  country.  Far from it.  Many of them
 were men of excellent minds,  great personal worth, and  no
 small share of professional skill—the latter acquired by exten-
 sive and correct observation, and sound  experience.   They
 do not appear, however, to have claimed for their calling that
 rank and dignity, to which, as one of the  learned and liberal
 professions,  it  is justly entitled.   In  point of standing and
 merited influence,  they did not  appreciate justly either  them-
 selves or their vocation.
  The last but not perhaps the lightest evidence  I shall offer
of the influence of Transylvania in conferring rank on  medi- 
19
 cine, is the recent  establishment of a College of Physicians
 and Surgeons  in the city of Lexington.  That institution is
 intended,  and I trust also destined,  to improve the science
 and add to the weight and dignity of the profession.  And it
 owes its existence  in part at least to the School  of  Transyl-
 vania.
   There is yet another mode of testing the  rank and useful-
 ness of the School of Medicine I have the honour to represent.
 It is that of comparing it with other Schools, erected and con-
 ducted under similar circumstances.  As the most suitable in-
 stitution, with which to make such comparison, I  shall select
 the Medical College of Ohio, which was established about the
 same time, with the School of Transylvania.
   I well know that  comparisons of this sort are deemed ex-
 ceptionable.  And I readily acknowledge that, usually, they
 are so.  Instances may occur, however, where they are per-
 fectly  admissible.   And, if I mistake not, the present case is
 a striking one.   The reason is plain and easily rendered.  In
 her circulars, advertisements, and other official publications,
 the college of Ohio has never  been either "delicate or scrupu-
 lous  in comparisons  and contrasts—especially  where  she
 fancied she had  any thing  to  gain by them.  And she  has
 never, I think, failed  to  include in them, in some  way,  the
 Medical  School of  Transylvania.   Certainly  she has often
 and  unceremoniously included her.  Having repeatedly  set
 the example, therefore, for the  express purpose,  as  there is
 reason to  believe,  of benefitting herself at the  expense of
 Transylvania,  she   will  have no  just  ground of complaint,
 should that example be followed for once, though but little to
 either her gratification or credit.
  The College of Ohio  went  into operation  in 1820, since
 which time it has received from the State of Ohio near forty
 thousand dollars, and is still  receiving sixteen hundred dollars
a year.   Yet, notwithstanding that munificent endowment, it
appears from  the report of a committee of  inquiry, that in
March,  1834, it was in debt to the amount  of two thousand 
20
four hundred dollars, and had a library of only sixteen hundred
and eighty-four volumes!  Compare  this with the  economy,
condition, and means of instruction of the School of Transyl-
vania.   She received  from the State  of Kentucky on\y Jive
thousand dollars in depreciated  money, is free from debt, has
at command the library and matriculation fund of the present
session, and possesses, as already stated, a choice library of
between four and Jive thousand volumes!
   Nor  are these the  only points, in which  she is  strikingly
superior to the College of Ohio.  A fair contrast of what the
two institutions have  done for medicine, in  the education of
pupils, during  the last fifteen years,  speaks on this topic in a
tone, and with a decisiveness, which need no comment.  The
following are the numbers respectively of their annual classes.
	School of Transylvania		College of Ohio	
Years.	No.	of Pupils.	No.	of Pupils.
1820-1		93		25
1821-2		138		30
1822-3		171		18
1823-4		200		00
1824-5		234		15
1825-6		281		30
1826-7		190		80
1827-8		152		101
1828-9		206		101
1829-30		199		107
1830-1		210		124
1831-2		215		131
1832-3		222		72
1833-4		262		102
1834-5		259		83
1835-6		261 By	report 125	
		3292		1144
  Of the pupils of the College of Ohio  nearly one hundred
have been beneficiaries, receiving their instruction free of ex-
pense—a circumstance which never fails to swell the classes of
an institution beyond the limits they would otheiwise attain. 
21
Without this aid,  her  total number of pupils may  be esti-
mated at about one thousand and fifty or sixty—less than one-
third of the number of the pupils of the  institution I repre-
sent.
  Such is the sketch of the abstract condition and services of
the School of Transylvania, and such the differences between it
and the Ohio School.  Nor will it be  denied that those differ-
ences are surprisingly  great.   A few remarks more, and my
report shall be closed.
  Having  finished my account,  as far perhaps as it may be
requisite to carry it,  of what the  Medical School of Tran-
sylvania has done,  permit me now to offer an assurance to
your Honorable Body, that that institution feels a much higher
gratification and pride in  the course  of action, by which she
has been thus successful in her efforts, than in the character
and amount of her success  itself.  And your approval of the
former, should it  meet your approbation, will be much more
flattering to her than your approval of the latter.   The reason
is obvious.  The one  involves moral, the other only intellec-
tual considerations.  And  as far as morality transcends mere
intellect, in usefulness  and worth, so far  does  even failure
in a moral course of action, transcend, in a court of honour
and conscience, the highest success that intrigue and chicanery
can ever achieve.
   Without consuming the time  of your  Honorable Body, by
a circumstantial  recital of the line  of  conduct,  which the
School of  Transylvania has  uniformly pursued,  I assert it to
have been such, as she can look back on without a blush, or a
feeling of  self reproach.   No artifice has been  practised  by
her, for the accomplishment of her purposes.   She has never
 attempted by open parade, or secret machinations, to attract
 public notice; nor  has  she interfered in any shape with the
 interests and designs of contemporary institutions.  She has
 simply made  known to the public, through newspapers and
 other periodicals, the time of the commencement of her lec-
 tures  in the Autumn, practised  industry during the Summer,
  to be in readiness for her classes, and  laboured during  the 
22
 Winter, to impart to them such  knowledge  as  she  had pre-
 viously laid up.  In a word; while she has  endeavoured to
 act on such principles, and  to regulate her own conduct by
 such rules, as might meet the approval of honorable men, she
 has felt indignant at certain designing measures of other insti-
 tutions that might be easily named, which tend to the inevita-
 ble degradation of the profession she is endeavouring to sus-
 tain, and to the prevention  of that harmonious co-operation,
 and respect for each  other, which schools of medicine should
 earnestly cultivate.
   As a subject of great importance in itself, and deeply inte-
 resting at this time to the community you represent,  let me
 solicit the attention of your Honorable  Body to a few remarks
 on general education.
   In proportion to her wealth, population and present prospe-
 rous  condition, Kentucky  is doing less, much less for  educa-
 tion,  especially for  the higher branches of it,  than any other
 State in  the Union.   To make this remark is painful to me,
 and I do it with reluctance.   It is painful, however, only be-
 cause it is true.  In fact, while the subject excites an intense
 and still increasing interest,  accompanied by vigorous  action
 elsewhere, Kentucky, with  her  pecuniary  means,  is  doing
 nothing  for education, either as a body politic, or a popula-
 tion of seven hundred thousand individuals, almost all of them
 comfortable and independent, and many of them opulent.  I
 mean that she is doing nothing for education, as a source of
 real science and elegant  literature.
   True,  she is  at present appropriating her means with wis-
 dom and liberality, to some of the great interests  of internal
 improvement.  In works of this description no little has been
 already effected, and much  more is  held in  contemplation.
 But what other form of improvement is comparable to that of
the improvement  of the mind?  None, certainly, can  for a
moment  compete  with it.   Mental improvement, which is
but another name for the fruits of education, is the source of
every other kind of improvement,  as certainly as the sun is
the source of light, and the fountain, the parent of the stream 
23
 which it emits.   All other kinds but follow it, as the shadow
 does the substance, and attain perfection, as it is made perfect.
 Wherefore, is it then, that, in her catalogue of improvements,
 Kentucky has not included the first and most important one?
 And how injurious and humiliating is the condition which this
 neglect  imposes on her?   Let me ask your  honorable body
 briefly, but calmly, to contemplate this subject?
   As respects  her internal  improvements,  the interests  of
 Kentucky are dependent chiefly on the construction of roads
 and canals, the  improvement of the navigation of her creeks
 and rivers, and  the exploration and development of her mine-
 ral wealth, including the character and  capabilities of her
 various soils, and the forms  of agriculture most suitable  to
 them.  To the  proper accomplishment  of these objects,  so
 vital in their influence on the prosperity of the commonwealth,
 extensive and accurate examinations  and  surveys, scientific
 as well as practical, are essentially necessary.  And  I ask
 you, where  is  the individual,  educated in  Kentucky,  who  is
 qualified to make  them?  If one such exist, I have no knowl-
 edge of him.
   Do you  want an accomplished engineer for a rail-road, or a
 canal, or to make a thorough and practical survey  of your
 water courses?  You  must bring him from a distance.  Do
 you wish to know what your hills, cliffs,  and mountains yield
 of iron, coal, zinc, gypsum, and other valuable  mineral pro-
 ductions'  Where is the native Kentuckian, possessing noth-
 ing but a home education, capable of informing you?   No one,
 I believe, can reply to this question,  otherwise than in the
 mortifying  terms, "I do not know!"  Assuredly no other form
 of reply can be  rendered by me.
   Do you want  a presiding officer of a literary and scientific
 institution?   He too must be imported, not selected from the
 growth of the State.  Of professors and competent tutors in
 your colleges the same is true.  When you want  them you
must look abroad for them; because literature and science are
not sufficiently encouraged in the State to induce Kentuckians
to qualify themselves for such stations.  And were they ambi- 
24
tious thus to qualify themselves, they must repair for the pur-
pose to distant institutions.   Your own are incompetent.  Most
even of your common school teachers, and I believe by far the
best qualified of them, are the product of other regions.  Such is
our crude and humiliating condition—the fruit of our culpable
neglect of education!   Nor  are  we doing aught to redeem
ourselves from this comparative dependence  and actual degra-
dation.
  For such redemption, common school education is wholly
insufficient.  It was a conviction to this effect that induced
Mr. Jefferson to labour most ardently during nearly a quarter
of his long and illustrious life, for the establishment of the
University of Virginia, and to account the completion of the
enterprise one of his greatest and most glorious achievements.
As proof that he did so account it, he made the record of it a
part of his epitaph, in common with his authorship of  the De-
claration of Independence.  He saw with the mortification of a
patriot, and the grief of a  philanthropist, the sun of Virginia
influence in the Union fast  descending, with the disappearance
of  her highly educated men. He saw, moreover, that this
light and  glory were about to be obscured, not merely for a
 season, but that they would depart  from her  forever, unless
they were restored and brightened by  the beams of education,
 encouraged and conducted within her own borders.  The faint
 and  almost expiring lustre of education derived from other
 States, was  comparatively useless.   He therefore erected  a
 great centre light  near his own  dwelling, which, for ages to
 come, will shed its radiance through Virginia, and restore to
 her, I doubt not, even more than her former splendour, which
 she  never could  have regained  through any  other  agency.
 The individual who would do for this commonwealth  (and the
 enterprise is perfectly practicable) what Mr. Jefferson thus did
 for his native State, besides bestowing on the community in-
 calculable blessings, would- immortalize  himself,  and  have his
 name hereafter emblazoned on the same tablet with that of the
 "Father of the University of Virginia,  and the Author of
  the Declaration of Independence," 
25
  On this point of such deep and vital interest to her, compare
Kentucky with some  of the States of the east, and mark and
seriously ponder the difference.
  One hundred and fifty thousand dollars have been recently
appropriated to the establishment of an University  in West-
ern New York, a region which, long after Kentucky had been
erected into a State, was a fruitless wilderness, roamed by the
savage in quest of his  game.  In New Jersey, a State far be-
hind Kentucky in population and wealth, an arrangement  is
made to raise one hundred thousand dollars, for the improve-
ment of education in  the college at Princeton.  For the old
and rich University of Pennsylvania, an equal sum has been
recently provided.   Virginia, South Carolina, and, I believe,
also Georgia, are regulai and bounteous in their annual  sup-
plies to  their  Colleges and  Universities.  And toward many
of their literary institutions, the  States and people of New
England are still more  munificent.  Let the consequence be
noted  and seriously reflected on.  At the  commencement of
the  present term of Yale College, in the small State of Con-
necticut, one hundred  and thirty-six students entered the
Freshman class—a greater number than belongs to the four
classes of any  college within the limits of our commonwealth.
And in the State of Rhode  Island, which is not much  larger
than one of our counties, stands Brown University, liberally
endowed and in a flourishing condition.
   Respecting this subject, so absorbing elsewhere, and so im-
portant everywhere,  Kentucky almost alone is supine and in-
active.  Within her domain there is not a well endowed and
well patronized  institution.  And  the  result  of this  neglect
and want of patronage is most pernicious.   Our higher seats
of learning  are in a miserable  condition.  Neither the college
department of our university, nor  any of  our  other colleges
draw pupils from either of  the surrounding States.   On the
contrary, many  of our youths resort  to  the  institutions  of
other States for the procurement of an ordinary college edu-
cation.
                       4 
26
    Thus is Kentucky, the  elder  sister State of the West, de-
 pendent on some of the younger ones for science and letters—
 the possession which, beyond all others, gives lasting greatness
 and splendour to communities.   Were  we  dependent for beef,
 pork, and  bread-corn, or  other sorts of food for the body,
 the State  would be in a ferment, until the dependence were
 removed.   But, under the more humili .ting  dependence for
 mental food, we are not only content with our degradation,
 but seem to be enamoured of it.  It would be scarcely un-
 founded or extravagant to say, that, in that respect,  we hug
 our chains, and aid in rivetting them more hopelessly  around
 us!  Unquestionably we do not proudly fling them from us,
 as we ought to do, and might do, were  we only to determine,
 with a becoming resolution, on State  independence.  We  all
 pride ourselves  on  the Independence of the Union, and boast
 of it as loudly and earnestly as the people of any other State.
 But where, let me ask you, in a literary and scientific point of
 view—where is  the  proud  and maniy spirit of Kentucky- in-
 dependence?  To my own question I reply with a blush, stat
 nominis umbra—the spirit of Kentucky independence is no
 where to be found—it is but an empty form  of words!—the
 representative of a  feeling, which, in her capacity as a State,
 Kentucky does  not practically recognize.   In fine; such, in
 relation to science and letters, is our dependent condition as a
 community, that were we cut off from all intercourse with the
 other States of  the  Union, we would  be unable  to proceed
 with our internal improvements—unless  we could procure aid
 from beyond the Atlantic.   Yet are we either callous  or con-
 tented  under our humiliating lot, and make no suitable efforts
 to improve it!
   Respecting one of our college establishments, a gentleman
 of high distinction,  both in rank and intellect, said to me the
 other day,  "It must do s mething for itself, before the State
of Kentucky will be justified  in  doing  any thing  for  it."  I
confess the sentiment  surprised me.   A college do some-
thing,  before  it  has either the  ability or the means!—be-
fore it has either funds to furnish salaries to its officers, or a 
87
  library and an apparatus for those officers to work with!  As
  well may  you  proclaim, that an infant must plant corn  and
  bake bread, before it shall be permitted to eat!  or that a sol-
  dier must vanquish his foe, before he is armed and provided for
  the combat!  No; if you demand work from your  colleges,
  you must  fit them  for  that  work.   You must  give  them
  strength and the means that are rehired.  No  high  skat
  of learning has ever flourished without an endowing id.  If the
  endowment has not  been received from a Nation, a State, or
  a City, it has been conferred by individuals, or by religious de-
  nominations;  or it  has  come from  some  other  source of
  liberality and wealth.  This  is true of all institutions of the
  kind that have  ever  been prosperous; and those of Kentucky
  w ill never prove exceptions to the general  rule.   As soon shall
  you find a ponderous body moving spontaneously from the
  centre of gravity instead of towards it!
   In her common college establishments,  the State of Ohio is
 greatly in  advance  of us, because she extends  to  them  the
 kind and fostering hand of a parent.  Even Indiana and  Illi-
 nois, which, in their  capacity of States, are but the creations
 of yesterday, are fast taking  the  lead of us in. the career of
 education.  And  the evil  so pernicious and  mortifying in its
 effects on us, will  necessarily increase, unless Kentucky arouse
 from her apathy, become true to herself and her  high-gifted
 youth, and support,  as  she  should do,  from her  abundant
 means, her  seats  of  education.  In a word; if she does not
 change her  policy on this point, it  requires neither a snge nor
 a seer, to foretel the  consequence.   And it  will be equally  dis-
 astrous and discreditable to her.   She will  become  intellec-
 tually degraded, and will lose her standing and  influence in
 the Union,  as certainly and necessarily, as day follows  the
 rising, and night the setting of the sun; or as any other effect
 follows its natural cause.  In strength and excellence of na-
 tive intellect, the sons of Kentucky are  unsurjitrsscd, if not
 themselves  surpassing.   Unless that  intellect,  however,  be
duly cultivated,  it  will be impossible for it to contend  success-
fully, either  in public  or private, with the disciplined intellect 
28
of other portions of the Union.  The issue of such a contest
will be that of untrained militia contending in the field against
veterans in arms.
   On this subject I shall only  add, that through the munifi-
cence of the late Colonel Morrison,  Transylvania possesses
by far the  most splendid college edifice west of the mountains,
if not the most splendid in the United Slates.  She  has also
now a  presiding officer distinguished alike  for talents and
learning.   Nor is he less distinguished by his fitness to instruct
and govern, and his devotedness to the high duties of his sta-
tion.  Let him be sustained  with a liberality corresponding to
his merit and the objects of  his ambition, and he will give emi-
nence to the institution, and confer by it on the State incalcu-
lable benefits.   But he cannot be expected to labour in vain.
If the State therefore continue to  withhold  her patronage, it
can hardly be doubted that he will retire  from office, and
leave the college department as he found it—a literary ruin!
   I shall only add, that there appears to be, among the people
of Kentucky, a disposition  to begin Education, if they begin
 it at all, at the wrong end.   The loudest if not the only call is
for Common School  education.  How, I ask, can that be oh
tained, and diffused through the Commonwealth, without com-
petent teachers, in numbers  sufficient  to supply the demand?
And where  can they be formed,  but in the higher  seats  of
learning?  I say, "competent teachers;" for if they be  incom-
petent, they are an evil rather than a good, and should  be treat-
ed accordingly.   Kentucky must either form able  teachers
herself, or procure ordinary  ones from other States.  Accom-
plished instructors will be retained elsewhere, where  they are
more esteemed, and better paid. In a word, colleges and other
high seats of learning are as essential to the establishment and
 maintenance of common schools  of the proper caste, as the
 sun is to the diffusion  of light, or the cloud to the rain that
falls from it.   Let  Kentucky then encourage to the requisite
 extent, college and academical education, and valuable com-
 mon schools will be one of its products.  The colleges and
 academies will supply the common schools with good  teachers; 
29
and common schools will supply them in return with well in-
structed  pupils.   And thus will the general  and great  enter-
prise go  gloriously on!   Well prepared teachers are the only
instruments by which good common schools can be conducted;
and I need hardly add, that without suitable  instruments, no
valuable  work can be accomplished, and no  end of high and
permanent usefulness achieved.—To return from this digres-
sion.
  Though Committees of sundry Legislatures of Kentucky have
repeatedly visited the Medical School of Transylvania, and
expressed their approbation of her, in very flattering terms;
though Chief Magistrates of the  Commonwealth have  done
the same; and though the people of the West very generally
have signified their approbation, by their liberal and continued
patronage of her—notwithstanding these and  other marks of
satisfaction and approval from distinguished  sources, I am au-
thorized  to  say  that the  School is not satisfied with herself.
She is ambitious to do more than she has yet been able to do,
and to reach a higher point in usefulness and public esteem,
than she has yet attained.  In a special manner, she is anxious
to become more creditable to the Commonwealth  that has
created her, by rendering herself an object of stronger attrac-
tion and higher regard to  the  western community  at large.
But she wants the means to gratify these wishes, by compass-
ing the objects  of them.  Her library and apparatus, though
choice and valuable, far beyond any others west of the moun-
tains, are still defective.   And ampler funds, than she can
command from her own resources, are indispensable to their
augmentation.  And such  augmentation  is  again indispensa-
ble, to enable her to accomplish the  good she has  in view.
The entire funds that she has been able to raise by her fiscal
operations, and to save by her economy, she has faithfully ap-
plied to the  increase of her library, and her other means of in-
struction.  To aid her  in this, the  Professors have borrowed
money on their own responsibility, and extinguished the debt
again, as means were received. But all that has been done,
or that ever can be done, in this way, is inadequate to the end 
30
 so desirable in itself, and so earnestly  aimed at.   Something
 further, therefore, must be effected,  else praiseworthy views
 and  wishes will  be  frustrated, and  important  interests  will
 ultimately suffer.
   The Medical  School of Transylvania is the daughter of
 Kentucky.  I trust I may call her a favorite  daughter, be-
 cause she has been a dutiful, a useful, and  an honorable one.
 And though she was not sent into the world, to seek her  for-
 tune, altogether penniless, it must be acknowledged  that her
 patrimony  has  been exceedingly small—far, very far below
 what has been bestowed on  any other State-medical School
 in the Union.  As heretofore represented, the Medical College
 of Ohio has already received from  the State  of  Ohio near
 forty  thousand  dollars,  and  is still in  the  receipt of sixteen
 hundred dollars a  year,  while its return for  such munificence
 has been dissatisfactory to the donor.   But, while  the Legis-
 lature of Ohio has rebuked that  School for its comparative
 inefficiency, it has still sustained it  out of the funds of the
 State.  The Medical Department  of the  University of Vir-
 ginia,  though its classes are very small, has also received, in
 annual appropriations, from its commencement,  a liberal sup-
 port from the public purse.   So have  the  Schools of South
 Carolina, New York, and Massachusetts, and of other States
 that might be readily named.   The School of Kentucky alone
 has been flattered and  encouraged from year to year, with
 expressions of kindness  and  approval—I might  almost say of
 exultation, from  her parent—but, from  the  time of her first
 slender endowment, fifteen years ago, has received not a cent
 from the treasury  of the Commonwealth.
  Considering then what she has already done,  and what  she
 earnestly wishes and  purposes to do, provided she be enabled
 to accomplish her  designs, is not the Medical School of Tran-
 sylvania entitled to  ask for  a further supply?  This her se-
 cond application, I say,  is to the source  of her existence; and
 she cannot be accused  of  having  been hasty in  making  it.
Fifteen years, I repeat, have  elapsed, since she  received her
portion; and you are already apprised that she did not, like a 
31
 prodigal daughter, squander it uselessly, or, like  an indolent
 and a thriftless one, bury it in the earth.   No; she faithfully
 improved it, and rendered it fruitful;  and several  members of
 your Honorable Body have witnessed  the product, and  ex-
 pressed  their admiration of it.  Nor did she dream  of ask-
 ing for more, until years  of trial had clearly shown, that, from
 the profitable employment of the boon already received, she is
 not unworthy of more.  And  had she,  from her own faulti-
 ness, been unable to make this commendatory demonstration
 of her stewardship, she would have been silent on the score of
 additional favours—most assuredly the same lips that solicited
 her first endowment, would  never have been the organs to sue
 for a second.
   As matters stand, however, I confess that I feel emboldened
 to ask for a further donation to the School, because I consci-
 entiously think that she is worthy of it—in plainer terms, that
 she has richly earned  it by her services to the State.  When
 bestowed it will  be only an equitable reward for the  good
 she has already done, and an  encouragement and ability wisely
 given to her for future exertions, superior in vigour and more
 productive in effect.   Funds are granted  annually, liberally,
 and praiseworthilyr  to the Lunatic Asylum at Lexington, to
 the Hospitals  at Louisville and Smithland,  and to  other  insti-
 tutions, which, however valuable and deserving, have not con-
 ferred on the  State an hundredth part of either the credit or
 benefit, that has accrued to it, from the Medical Department of
 Transylvania.   Place at the  disposal of the latter institution,
 then, but a small portion—a mere fraction of the interest of the
 money she has already saved and made to Kentucky,  and she
 will be satisfied, and will  proceed with renovated confidence,
 hope, and energy, in  the  making and saving of more, and in
 performing further important  services to the West.
   Is Kentucky far richer  and more prosperous now, than she
 was in  1820?   Have  one or two millions of her additional
 wealth been virtually made to her by the School of Transyl-
vania?  Is that School, which, in  1820, was nothing but a
name, now the second School,  in numbers, in the Union, and
one of the proudest boasts and ornaments of the State?  And 
32
did Kentucky, in her then comparatively impoverished condi-
tion, grant to that mere "shadow of a shade" Jive thousand dol-
lars?  She did;  and each of the other questions just proposed,
must receive, in like manner, an affirmative reply.
  Under existing circumstances, then,  contrasted with the
past, is it unreasonable, or  in any  way unbecoming in the
School, to solicit a  donation of ten thousand dollars?   That
sum  is small, compared to the five thousand, which were grant-
ed by your  Honorable Predecessors.  To you as  Legislators
of Kentucky, a grant of twenty or even fifty thousand dollars
now would be much lighter,  than one of five thousand was to
them, under the heavy and disheartening pressure of the  time.
Besides; their donation was  in all respects a boon, unmerited
by the  receiver, who  had then rendered no services to the
community.  And though I will not repeat, that your endow-
ment now would be but the  payment of a just debt; yet, if I
were to do so, to refute me,  on the ground of equity and con-
science, would be no easy task.  Nor is this all.   Your Pred-
ecessors of  1820 had  no guaranty, that  the money bestowed
would be judiciously expended, and the proceeds of it wisely
and  usefully employed.   For aught they knew,  it might be
thoughtlessly squandered,  and no valuable return  made  for it
either in credit or profit.  On these points,  on the contrary,
your guaranty is ample.  An institution  that has  acquitted
itself to entire satisfaction, for sixteen years, and  done more,
much more, on five thousand dollars, than  any other similar
School in the Union has done on seven-fold the sum, (and it is
fearlessly asserted that this  is true of the School  of  Transyl-
vania)—it is scarcely possible—assuredly it is in the highest
degree  improbable, that such an institution  will fail to appro-
priate to valuable purposes, a farther donation.  To make a
specific proposition.
   Should the donation be granted, one of the Medical Profes-
sors will proceed to  Europe, early in the Spring, make the
necessary purchases, and return with them, for the uses of the
School, before the meeting of her next classes.
   Such, in brief, is the scheme contemplated; and so impor-
tant and  worthy of patronage does it  appear to  myself, that 
33
nothing short of a refusal to grant the means shall persuade
me, that it can be differently  judged of by  the Legislature of
the State.
  Thus far  have I endeavoured to report to the judgment
and sense of interest—I was near saying the sense of justice,
of your Honorable  Body.  Did I deem  it requisite,  I would
now address myself to your personal feelings, of another but not
a  less laudable class—to  your ambition  and your  pride—
your ambition  and  pride as men,  and as inhabitants of the
West, but more especially  as citizens  of Kentucky.   For,
apart from reasons and motives of mere convenience, pecu-
niary interest, and otherlike advantages, it is surely a matter
of  becoming pride and ambition to us, to be so far indepen-
dent of the east, as  to have  a great institution for the  Mis;
sissippi Valley.  And Kentucky, as the  elder of the  western
sister States, should be ambitious to be its parent.  She should
be peculiarly ambitious moreover to be the parent of an  insti-
tution, equal in all respects, to the most distinguished in the
Union.   These are views which reason sanctions, and which
State pride and honour should unyieldingly cling to, and surren-
der only when no longer tenable.  A remark or  two in con-
formity to them may not be out of  place.
   As  respects these  considerations, then, what, let me ask,
 are  the  bearing  and influence  of  the   School, in whose
 behalf I have ventured to address  you?  At the risk  of being
 deemed perhaps presumptuous and vain, I fearlessly reply that
 it is all important to  them.  That  School is one of the bright-
 est spots, if not  itself the brightest, on the escutcheon of the
 Commonwealth, and should  be  maintained  in its splendour at
 any practicable expense.  It is the only School that has the
 slightest  claim to the glorious  title (for it is glorious) of the
 Institution  of the West !—and to that title its  claim  is un-
 deniable.
    From  every State and Territory of the  West and South,
 the School of Transylvania draws pupils,  educates them in
 Kentucky, and more or less attaches them to her.   In every
 State and Territory of the  West, therefore, it  renders  Ken- 
34
 tucky venerable and influential—gives  to her a stamp and a
 standing, which could not, in those places, otherwise be hers.
   Permit me to say, though I say it respectfully, that the voice
 of the  Medical Department of Transylvania has penetrated,
 and her  precepts  have been  recorded and remembered  as
 valuable lessons, where the voice  of the statesman and coun-
 sellors of Kentucky has been heard but  faintly, if heard at all,
 and been but slightly regarded.
   Do the youth of  the country assemble annually from every
 direction, and from the  most distant points of this great Afal-
 ley, to admire eloquence,  and  learn wisdow and law, within
 the walls of your Capitol,  or elsewhere in  the  State?  No,
 they do not.   Their assemblages for such purposes are com-
 paratively limited.   But they do thus  assemble, to listen  to
 plain professional lessons, in the Halls of the Medical Depart-
 ment of Transylvania.   And  they return  to  their  homes,
 many of them decorated with the honours of the institution,
 and all of them remembering, with more or less gratitude and
 filial regard, the State which gave existence and affords pro
 tection to their  Alma Mater.   Thus does Kentucky,  I  say,
 gain by the School  in rank and reputation, both  at home and
 at a distance, as well as in wealth. Independently then  of
 all other considerations, a sentiment, I repeat, of State pride
 should induce her to patronize  and foster,  to  the  necessary
 extent, that institution, which contributes most effectually  to
 maintain her distinction, and extend and mature her influence,
 among her sister States.
  Let her be sustained then, I say, by competent endowments,
 as such institutions  in other States are  sustained;  and ages
 hence, when the lips that now appeal to you in her  behalf
 shall be silent and forgotten, and the hand that penned the ap-
 peal shall be dust, the Medical Department of Transylvania will
 continue to flourish in usefulness  and renown,the pride of Ken
 tucky, the School of the West, and a blessing to  posterity !
  With thanks for the kindness and courtesy, with which it
has  been listened to, and  an  assurance of my entire  confi-
 dence that it will be liberally considered, and fairly decided
 on, this Report is respectfully submitted. 
 

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