A D D111E S S
eta , <6¥^&<?^r*'c&
GRADUATES
genital f ipattrarat rf iBtiitsijliiama Mtgt.
WibMAM-Hr"GOBRECIIT, M. D.,
       professor of anatomy.
$ublisbcb bg i\t Class.
             PHILADELPHIA:
COLLINS,  PRINTER,  705 JAYNE  STREET,
                  1800. 
r 
VALEDICTORY ADDRESS
GRADUATES
MEDICAL  DEPARTMENT
PENNSYLVANIA COLLEGE,
DELIVERED AT THE
Public Commencement, March 3, 1860.
BY
[
WILLIAM H. GOBRECHT, M. D.,
     PROFESSOR OF ANATOMY.
PUBLISHED BY THE CLASS.



    C.'v '■ : ' T1 ', "H*V  is
CMX^
         PHILADELPHIA:
COLLINS, PRINTER, 705 JAYNE STREET.
             1860. 
CORRESPONDENCE.
                          Pennsylvania College, Medical Department,
                                       February 27th, 1860.
Prof. "Wm. H. Gobrecht—
  Dear Sir:  At a meeting of the Graduating Class,  held February  27th, 1860,
T. Clowes Brown, of New Brunswick, was called to the chair, and Bichard
Leffers, of North Carolina, appointed Secretary.   On motion of Wm. E. Carter,
of Virginia, it was unanimously resolved that the Chairman appoint a committee to
solicit,  for publication, a  copy of the Valedictory Address  which you propose to
deliver at the ensuing Commencement.
  In accordance with the above resolution, we were constituted the committee to
announce to you the wish of the Class.  Your compliance with  the request which
it becomes our pleasing duty thus to make known to you, will not only be gratifying
in itself, but will afford us another opportunity of bearing testimony to the faithful-
ness with which you have labored to render us worthy of the professional career on
which we are about to enter.  With warm wishes for your health  and happiness, we
remain                      Very respectfully yours,
    Chas. P. Connell,    N. Brunswick,    Wm. M. Dykes,     Georgia,
    Albert M.  Sigmund,   Pennsylvania,     Jas. M. SrEED,     Alabama,
    Fred. F. Burmeister, California,        Chas. L. Stoddard, N. York,
    S. R. Lewie,          S. Carolina,      J. Elliott Miller, Maryland,
    J. R. Ellis,          N. Carolina,      A. Satterthwaite, N. Jersey,
    Sam'l B. Goodwin,    Virginia,                              Committee.
                          Pennsylvania College, Medical Department,
                                       February 28th, I860.
Gentlemen—
  It affords me sincere pleasure to comply with the request of the Graduating Class,
through you so delicately tendered.  I therefore place the manuscript of my Vale-
dictory Address  at your disposal, regretting that it is not  more worthy of your
acceptance.
  Please convey  to the  Class my acknowledgments of their kind appreciation of my
labors, and assure them that no effort on my part will ever be wanting to maintain
the reputation and dignity of the  School which sends th«m forth.
                            Very respectfully and truly,
                                              Your friend,
                                                    W. H.  GOBRECHT.
To Messrs. Connell, Sigmund, Blrmeister,
          Lewie, and others, Committee. 
VALEDICTORY  ADDRESS.
  Gentlemen :  Graduates in Medicine of the Medical
Department of Pennsylvania College, in behalf of my
colleagues, I  welcome you to the ranks of that great
profession  into which the diploma just  granted  has
gained you admission.
  It is well, perhaps, that those who have so anxiously
labored to impart to you the information necessary for
the successful pursuit of your high and responsible call-
ing, should be the  first to greet  you and congratulate
you on  this first great end attained, not without great
labor, painful thought, harassing cares, and  much ex-
penditure of midnight oil.
  It would seem to us but ill, if stranger voices were
empowered to strike the  chords  which  none but once
familiar spirits should essay to  touch,  and,  therefore,
here to day,  at  this  last  moment, whilst  we give you
freely to the world—as  the great conservators  of its
health and happiness—as the self-sacrificing alleviators
of human suffering, misery, and  distress—as  the deter-
mined enemies of disease and death—we  would detain
you  a little,  ere that parting grasp be  given, ere that
farewell word be uttered, which  shall divide us, never
again to meet, perchance, this  side the  grave, until we
speak  some words  of comfort and encouragement to 
4
sustain and  guide you, in, we trust, your future bright
career.
  I have often asked myself, as I have viewed the stu-
dious class before me in the lecture-room, assembled from
almost every portion of our beautiful and varied conti-
nent—from the snow-clad mountains and the piercing
winds of the far North—from the bracing air of the hills
and valleys  of the East—from the temperate latitude
of our own  immediate regions, and  the  garden of  the
West—from the genial climate of the South—from  the
far-off gold fields of the Pacific coast; and from that sea-
girt isle of many charms which yields us up her choicest
treasures:  what were the motives which  impelled each
one of you  to  enter upon  the study of Medicine 1  to
leave his friends and family and come up to this seat of
learning, to continue that study and prosecute it to this
end 1
  I have pictured to myself the surrounding circum-
stances which  have affected your design—which have
either proved originators of,  or incentives to, action.
  Some of you may have had enough of  the ills of life
to contend with, and, in the honest  struggle for exist-
ence,  have seen  others around  you, engaged  in the
same hand to hand contest, suffering, falling, and dying
by the way,  and you have felt that it were noble to up-
hold the weary hands and strengthen the tottering limbs
of your fellow-workers.  You have looked about you for
your proper field of  labor,  and have felt impelled  to
study Medicine.
  Others have  been nursed in the  lap of luxury.   To
these, occupation  has worn the gentle aspect of a pas- 
5
time.  And what pastime could be nobler than the heal-
ing of the wounds, and the alleviation  of the pains of
suffering humanity'?  Here a wide field of usefulness
has opened to your vision, and you became pilgrims to
that shrine over whose altar the lamp, ever trimmed and
filled, forever sheds its gentle cheering ray.
   Still others,  calmly contemplating a business for life,
have  sought  for that which would insure a moderate
competence, perhaps more, and while so doing, enable
them to confer  the greatest amount of benefit upon their
fellow-men, and, having felt that this occupation would
be the practice of Medicine, have, with deliberate pur-
pose, embarked in the enterprise.
   Now, whatever have been the apparent motives which
have actuated each of you, I hold it certain that Benevo-
lence lies behind  them all; and  that money, however
necessary it  may  be to your existence, has not been
your only object.
   This Benevolence, which  is the main-spring of your
action, is the  great element which will  lead  to your
success;  it is the  underlying current of the whole pro-
fession ;  without it you are unworthy to hold a position
in its ranks.   Impelled by it, you have come up hither,
from  the North—from  the  South—from the East and
from the West, and sat down together upon our benches,
as candidates for the honors, yes!  and for the trials and
difficulties too, of that profession  whose true hearts,
beating in one eternal rhythm,  know no  North, no
South, no  East,  no West, but one  vast, grand and
undivided Republic of Medicine.
   You have found here, perhaps, in entering upon your 
6
curriculum of study, that  the  field was more vast, and
more extended than you had anticipated—that there were
avenues leading out from the main track so long and so
rugged, that the heart sickened in the contemplation of
the exploration.   But, you soon perceived that this ex-
ploration had been reduced to a system—that whilst
there were  rocks which had  to be surmounted by main
force,  yet  there  were  also  gentle  rills,  and purling
brooks, and darkling glades, and flowery borders which
gently wiled  the way—till, by practice and experience
strengthened,  you  have  surmounted  difficulties  far
greater  than  at first you could have hoped to conquer.
This has incited you to redoubled exertions. The result
is shown in your presence  here to-day.
  Gentlemen, you have, as collegiate students, labored
long, untiringly, and well; you have accumulated that
knowledge  which you will use as a basis upon which  to
build your experience.   But your work is not completed;
and this  day, which is  to you the Commencement of a
new life, is  also the commencement of new and exhaust-
ing labor.  " Know you not that it is the very condition
of all great structures  that  the  sound of the hammer
and the clink of the trowel  should be always heard  in
some part of the building 1"   And  thus it is with the
mind.   Forget not then the  habits of study which you
have here formed; they will be more necessary to your
existence than  ever before, since  hereafter you will  be
called to deal with personal  realities; the abstract rea-
sonings and the finely drawn theories of your quietucle
will be transmuted into the  actual as you  grapple with
death in the solemn  stillness of the  chamber of the 
i
sufferer—and you will feel then, if you never felt before,
how great a power you wield, and what a vast store of
knowledge you require to wield that power, and carry
even trivial cases to successful ends.
  Work on, then, work always; for it is only thus you
can be truly great in the profession of Medicine.
  Labor, unreserved and unceasing, is demanded of you.
It is demanded, firstly, by the community which intrusts
the lives and happiness of its members to your watchful
care and keeping, that you may restore them, in time of
need, to usefulness, and ward off pestilence and  death.
It is demanded by the profession whose accumulated
stores of learning have been  showered  upon you, that
you may use  them freely, and thus using, return their
interest to the general stock  for generations yet unborn.
And lastly, it is  demanded  by the school which  sends
you  forth,  that  you  may not place a blot  upon  an
escutcheon which we fain  would see unsullied.
  Unceasing labor, in short, is a permanent  condition
of human existence;  see to  it, that this labor be not in
vain, and that death, which  is inevitable, overtakes you
not ere the task be well begun, nay, nigh accomplished.
  The profession upon which you  have entered will
prove  no sinecure—your beds will  prove no beds  of
roses.  If scientific research were your only occupation,
how swiftly and  delightfully  would the hours of day
pass by, and  how sweetly would  your  nightly visions
usher  in the  breaking morn; how would the  gentle
summer  breezes, rustling  the  papers  in your cool and
cosy sanctum, dispose to  active thought —how would
the winter's crackling fire induce to  long  drawn plea- 
8
surable toil.  But, although study is required of you, it
is at the  bedside  as well as by the book, and the  time
and the circumstances of that study are not always, nay,
are very rarely, under your control, and you yourselves
must make the practical  application  of your mental
labor.  Hence you will frequently find that, on demand,
the cool breezes in the library are replaced by the  blis-
tering rays of a mid-day sun on  a parched road—that
the winter's fire, oh!  so comfortable, is exchanged for
the blinding snow and the fearful  blasts of the midnight
storm, as you wend your weary way, both to study and
to help.
  Your services will be demanded, both  in season and
out of season;  by  night  and by day; in storm and in
sunshine; whether you be sick or well, for the world has
almost come to think that from a moment such as  this,
you and your fellows have put off the garb of mortality,
and feel neither heat nor cold, that you neither hunger
nor thirst, that your  minds  and  bodies  know  neither
fatigue nor exhaustion—in fact,  that an inexhaustible
fountain  of youth, whose  crystal  waters  well up from
some hidden  crypt in  your curious  frames, constantly
replenishes your iron constitutions; that you carry some
potent talisman which ever guards you from disease, no
matter in what fearful form  it meets you.  Would it
were so!    But, alas ! all men are mortal, and  you will
prove no exceptions to the rule.   You must  labor  to
live, and live  to die like all the  world besides, which
world looks to you for very present help in dire distress.
  I trust, however, that you will  not be found wanting
in the time of trial. You have selected your occupation 
9
by your own free will:  be faithful and true.   Consult
the best interests of the community in which  you live,
the best interests of your patients, and, believe me, you
will consult  your own; for notwithstanding  you will
sometimes  suffer reproach and  misrepresentation, and
the withholding of the  just reward  of your labors, yet
you will, as a general rule, find, although the  extent of
your services may not be entirely understood  or recog-
nized, that your patients are not only willing to remu-
nerate you  according to their ability, but do so  with
grateful hearts, whilst their actions prove your presence
to be welcome not only in the house of suffering, but in
the house of joy; and  occasionally you will meet with
some whose appreciation of your value will exceed your
own modest demands, who  will not only cheer you  by
the kindness  and  sympathy which you will  so often
need, but  by substantial and material aid increase your
earthly stores.
   Be encouraged, then.  There  is no business in life
which is devoid of cares, responsibilities, and trials, to
temper the  excitements of its successes, and  none has
more of each of these than yours.  Y^ou are, it is true,
unable to  exhibit the florid eloquence of the clergy, or
the forensic displays of the  bar, by which rapt multi-
tudes are swayed from painful  silence to tumultuous
heavings of ill-suppressed passion, and calmed again in
turn; but you may enter the holy of holies—the  dark
chamber of the sick and dying—where all the  noise,
and turmoil, and strife, and sycophantic adulation of the
treacherous world seem like a fading echo, and, in the
truthful confidences of  those solemn moments, feel that 
10
a bond exists between humanity and you, too strong for
mind to measure—too sacred for its violation—too high,
too deep, too broad, too grand to be compared with all
the fleeting triumphs of the day.
  For this, you can well afford to bear with the incon-
sistencies, the inconsiderate exactions,  yes, even with
the petulancies of your coming friends, for many a heart
will learn to beat responsive  to your falling footsteps,
and many an eye  will  glisten as your cheering voice
strikes on the quickened ear, and many a fervent prayer
invoke the choicest blessings  on the kindest,  dearest,
best of friends.
  Y'ou must, however, have inferred from the remarks
I have already made that something more is needed to
qualify you as practitioners of Medicine than study from
books and at the bedside, themselves so essential indeed
to your success.  You should possess good moral charac-
ter, and should show by your lives that you are virtuous,
not from the fear of the consequences of evil-doing,  but
because virtue in itself is noble, and conduces to your
efficiency and greatest happiness.
  No scientific  attainment, howsoever extended,  can
ever nullify  the  effects  of  immorality.  Reflect  but
for  a moment on  the  great interests confided to your
care;  on the inmost  secrets of  the heart laid  bare
before you in the  weakest moments of human frailty;
on  the implicit  trust  placed in  your  integrity; on
the unequalled privileges of  your  calling,  and on the
sacredness of your mission; and prove, by  example as
well as by precept, that a soul of honor controls your
every action.  And believe with me that he  who prosti- 
11
tutes  his  sacred office to injure  innocence and trample
under foot the holiest  of vows  and tenderest ties of
life is not less criminal than he who  mingles poison
in the sacramental chalice.
   Let your conduct be guided  by a scrupulous regard
for the rights of others:  encourage the weak; support
the faint; look charitably upon the faults of the erring,
and gently guide them  to a safer path.   Thus you will
become not  only "healers of the sick," but  good and
true physicians.
   Acting under  such influences, not the  least part of
your  reward will be  the  approbation of your own con-
science, without which all earthly honors or emoluments
can give but fleeting  pleasures—nay, must prove secret
burdens, too heavy for the stoutest heart to bear.
   With an undoubting faith in your  own integrity of
purpose, many an ill  of life will pass you by unscathed,
malicious shafts fall harmless to  the  mark, and  even
enemies will give you praise.
   You should cultivate agreeable and courteous man-
ners  in your intercourse with others.   Incivility should
not be the badge of authority in Medicine, whilst true
politeness does but add a brighter lustre to your dignity.
In short, do not forget that being physicians, you should
 of necessity be gentlemen.
   Endeavor to obtain  the  entire control of your  emo-
 tions.  I do not say divest yourselves of sensibility.
 No human  being who follows  your pursuit, and  daily
 mingles with the sick in every circumstance of life, and
 heai°s alike the cry of pain go up from the hovel of the
 beo-o-ar and the palace of the millionaire—who listens 
12
to the plaintive wail of the dying infant swathed in the
rags of squalid poverty, or gently soothed  in  arms of
well-born  nurses — who stands a  silent witness of the
agonies of grief,  now too deep for utterance, fearful
from intensity, and then in wildest of excesses bursting
forth with tears and cries and frantic lamentations—can
plead guilty  to the  charge of want of feeling.  Nay!
your tender hearts will often bleed for those  around
you ; but, you must remember that upon your calmness
and self-possession in times of trial and danger, leading
to prompt, cool, deliberate action, will depend  many a
life suspended by a  thread, many an untold interest—
perchance eternal happiness.
  You will school yourselves thus, that your brain may
be clear, your eye steady, and your hand  firm whilst
chaos reigns  around—that you may inspire  that confi-
dence  which leads to your  success, and  that, whilst
alleviating the pangs and  administering to the wants of
suffering humanity, you may unflinchingly perform those
duties for  which you have been fitted.
  Such a  control is not the work of  a  moment; it is
often the work of years.   To attain it, you  must apply
the rule to your  daily life, and endeavor to restrain an
undue  manifestation of feeling concerning affairs which
more immediately affect yourselves.  Learn to meet all
difficulties with a  courageous front, and  though a  blow
should fall with almost power enough to sever soul and
body, be it yours  to pursue the calm and even  tenor of
your way, dispensing pleasant words and kindness even
to the  careless recipients of your favors, should  your
inmost heart  drop blood at every footstep. 
13
  But your relations in society are not only with your
patients  and immediate  friends—you will be thrown
constantly in contact with other physicians who are also
striving to gain the confidence of the community, and
to act for its greatest good; with them you  may agree
in opinion, or may not; your  interests may be mutual
or diverse.   Never forget, however, under such circum-
stances, that differences of opinion are quite compatible
with  friendship,  and diversity of interest with  entire
honesty of  purpose.   Foreseeing these  contingencies,
as a guide to your actions in your intercourse both with
the public and with your own  profession, we have pre-
sented each of you  with the Code of Ethics of the
American  Medical  Association,  the  highest  medical
tribunal of  this country.   If you will profit by its pre-
cepts, I  can assure  you  that  bitterness  of heart and
enmity and sad contentions will  be banished from our
ranks, and  that your paths will be those of pleasantness
and peace.   Keep it forever open on your office table,
but always carry  in your minds its basis—its prevailing
sentiment—its highest aim, and general law—"Do to
others as you would have others do to you."  It is only
the enlargement, the exponent of  this noble rule.
   But, gentlemen, time warns  me to have done; a few
precious grains of golden sand in the unturned glass
alone remain.  I have occupied the fleeting moments
allotted me with  pleasure, yet with sadness, for I know
that ere another hour has  passed the world, like an open
sea, will be before you.  Whither will you steer \  Will
you shake  your  snowy canvas to  the tempting breeze,
and part the crested wave triumphant in the  glorious 
14
sunlight 1   Will the pole-star, high in sparkling firma-
ment, attract your gaze by night, and will the phospho-
rescent spangles of the foaming deep attest your bright
career %   Or, will the rolling thunder and the shrieking
blast shout requiem to your foundering bark 1
  May the brilliant constellations of the deep blue sky,
with grand  effulgence cheer your  onward  way.   We
wish you  bon voyage.  We stand upon the shore, and
wave a last Adieu!
  With faith in God, and trust in his right arm—Adieu! 
GRADUATES.
  At at Public Commencement of the Medical Department of Penn-
sylvania College, held at the Musical Fund Hall, on Saturday, March
3d, 1860, the Degree of Doctor of Medicine was conferred on the
following  gentlemen, on  behalf  of  the  Faculty, by  Rev.  H.  L.
Baugher, D. D., President of Pennsylvania College, Gettysburg.
        NAME.
Bennett, A. D.
Brown, T. Clowes
Burmeister, F. F.

Carter, Wm. E.
Claridge, Wm. R.
Coleman, Amos G.
Connell, Chas. P.
Conrad, Isaac H.
Durham, Isaiah D.
Dykes, Wm. M.

Ellis, J. R.

Finney, Adam B.

Gatchell, Jacob C.
Goodwin, Sam'l B.

Hartz, Jno. K.
Heaney, Patrick
Houghton, Chas. W.
   RESIDENCE.         subject of essay.
Pennsylvania,   Causes of Indigestion.
N. Brunswick, Bronchitis.
California,      Fractures.
Virginia,
Pennsylvania,
Pennsylvania,
N. Brunswick,
Pennsylvania,
N. Carolina,
Georgia,

N. Carolina,

Pennsylvania,

Pennsylvania,
Virginia,

Pennsylvania,
Pennsylvania,
Pennsylvania,
Scarlatina.
Tart. Emet. in Venereal.
Examination of Patient.
Medical Reflections.
Diagnosis of Diseases  of
  the Brain.

Abortion.
Pneumonia.

Typhoid Fever.

Scarlatina.

Dysentery.
Dysentery.

Signs of Pregnancy.
Typhoid Fever.
Mechanism of Labor.
Keir, Wm. Geo.
Pennsylvania,  Dysentery. 
16
NAME.	RESIDENCE.	SUBJECT OF ESSAY.
Leffers, Richard	N. Carolina,	Remittent Fever.
Lewie, S. R.	S. Carolina,	Ligation of Arteries.
Longshore, W. R.	Pennsylvania,	Scarlatina.
Lybrand, Wm. C.	Pennsylvania,	Arachnitis.
McMurtrie, Geo. S.	Pennsylvania,	Water.
Miller, J. Elliott	Maryland,	Cod-liver Oil.
Ricketts, W. Wall	Pennsylvania,	Pathology of Death.
Satterthwaite, A.	New Jersey,	Physical Diagnosis.
Schcener, Adam J.	Pennsylvania,	True Aims of the Physician.
Seitzinger, Franklin S.	Pennsylvania,	Neuralgia.
Shaeffer, J. C.	Pennsylvania,	Variola.
Shoemaker, Charles E.	Pennsylvania,	The Ear.
Sigmund, Albert M.	Pennsylvania,	Rabies Canina.
Speed, Jas. M.	Alabama,	Syphilis.
Stoddard, Chas. L.	New York,	The Heartandits Neuroses.
Thomas, Jesse J.	Pennsylvania,	Typhoid Fever.
Townsend, Stephen	Pennsylvania,	Phthisis Pulmonalis.
Wagenseller, B. F.	Pennsylvania,	Ovariotomy.
White, Wm. H.	Pennsylvania,	Syphilis.
Wolf, Henry	Pennsylvania,	Pneumonia.
 
 
PENNSYLVANIA COLLEGE—MEDICAL DEPAKTMKNT,
            Ninth Street below Locust, Philadelphia.
                      SESSION OF 1860-61.


                     PACUL.TY.
B. HOWARD RAND, M. I)., Professor of  Chemistry.
HENRY HARTSUORNE, M. D., Professor of Practice of Medicine.
LEWIS D.  HARLOW, M. D., Professor of Obstetrics, &c.
WILLIAM  S. HALSEY, M. D., Professor  of Surgery.
WM.  HEMBEL TAGGART,  M. D., Professor of Materia Medica.
JAMES AITKEN MEIGS,  M. D., Professor of Institutes of Medicine.
WM.  H.  GOBRECHT,  M. D., Professor of Anatomy.


       THEODORE A. DEMME, M. D., Demonstrator of Anatomy.


                       HUGH SCOTT, Janitor.

  The Session  of 1860-61  will commence on Monday, 8th.of Octoljcr,
and continue, without intermission, until the first of March.  The Com-
mencement for conferring Degrees will  take place early in March, causing
as little detention of the Graduating Class, after the close of the Lectures,
as possible.
  There will'also be an examination of candidates for graduation on the
1st of July; the Degree, in such cases,  being  conferred at the ensuing
Commencement in March.
  The Rooms for Practical  Anatomy will be open early in September.
  The College Clinic will be conducted on every Wednesday and Saturday
throughout the Session.
  Second Course  Students are furnished with a ticket of admission  to the
Philadelphia  or Pennsylvania Hospital, free of charge.
  The Register of Matriculants will be opened in the  College Building,
early in September.   The Janitor will alway.s be present at the  College, to
give every necessary assistance and information (as regards board, etc.) to
students, on their arrival in  the city.

                             FEES.
       Matriculation (paid once only)                    $5  00
       For each Professor's ticket.....15  00
       Graduation........:j0  00
                          LEWIS  D. HAKLOW,  M. L\, Dean,
                                 No. 1023 Vine below II tit Street.