professional connections, he should recommend the physician whom he conscientiously believes, all circumstances considered, to be best qualified to accomplish the recovery of the patient.

In the county of Norfolk, and in the city of London, benevolent institutions have been lately formed, for providing funds to relieve the widows and children of apothecaries, and occasionally also members of the profession, who become indigent. Such schemes merit the sanction and encouragement of every liberal physician and surgeon. And were they thus extended, their usefulness would be greatly increased, and their permanency almost with certainty secured. Medical subscribers, from every part of Great Britain, should be admitted, if they offer satisfactory testimonials of their qualifications. One comprehensive establishment seems to be more eligible than many on a smaller scale. For it would be conducted with superior dignity, regularity, and efficiency; with fewer obstacles from interest, prejudice, or rivalship; with considerable saving in the aggregate of time, trouble, and expence; with more accuracy in the calculations, relative to its funds; and, consequently, with the utmost practicable extension of its dividends. Dr. Percival recommends the formation of district dispensaries, and, in an excellent pamphlet on the Farming of Parishes by surgeons, a practicable plan, now acted on in Warwickshire, for superseding that wretched mockery of medical aid, called "Parish Doctoring," by District Infirmaries, is suggested by Mr. H. L. Smith.

Mr. Phelan, of Clonmell, proposes to establish district infirmaries and dispensaries in Ireland, in the proportion of one to every 40,000 inhabitants, and that each ought to be attended by a physician, surgeon, and resident apothecary, as in the English hospitals and dispensaries. (On the Medical Charities of Ireland, 1835.)

The Commissioners of the New Poor Law Act of 1834, have divided several parishes into unions, and appoint the lowest medical bidders, however young and inexperienced, as medical officers. The average pay allowed is half-a-crown a head; but in cases of cholera, or other epidemics, the pay is only allowed for a certain number of sick, and the rest are to be attended for nothing! This Act must be amended speedily, as it is most injurious to the sick poor.

CHAPTER V.

AMERICAN MEDICAL ETHICS.

Professional Reputation.

The following description of professional reputation was published by Dr. Godman, Professor of Anatomy and Physiology in Rutger's Medical College in 1829, and is so graphic and admirable, that I am induced to copy it. This essay was read, by appointment, before the Philadelphia Medical Society, Feb. 8, 1826, and is extracted from a volume, intitled, "Addresses delivered on Various Oecasions. By John D. Godman, M. D., &c.," and politely sent to me. It affords me much pleasure to place American Medical Ethics before British readers.

Our profession is coeval with the distresses and sufferings of the human race, and its respectability is as universal as the benefits it is capable of conferring, when rightly administered -those engaged in the discharge of its duties having always been tacitly considered by their fellow-men, as beings peculiarly set apart from the rest of mankind, and worthy of an estimation, not conceded to persons employed in merely secular affairs.* The real excellence and usefulness of our art-when worthily practised-has always tended to increase the confidence and admiration of the public; and, if medicine have not attained a degree of perfection and immunity from censure, equal to its venerable age and importance to society, this results from circumstances, which, however they may have injured, are entirely extrinsic to the profession.

* “El medico, en fin, que es medico, es digno de grande estimacion, porque es el conducto por donde Dios embia à los enfermos vn bien tan precioso como la salud: es el instrumento de que vsa la mano de Dios para hazer el mayor de los bienes corporales, y es en la tierra como vha cosa soberana, que se anda haziendo vidas." Don Iuan de Zabaleta.

Yet our useful and excellent science presents a great number of obstacles and difficulties to her votaries, which are only to be surmounted by well-directed and most persevering efforts. A mistake made in the outset, may exert its prejudicial influence on the whole of your subsequent course; therefore it is desirable, that your principles and views should be both early and correctly formed.

The members of our profession are subjected to many temptations from ambition, which are scarcely to be resisted. Few, perhaps none of us, are willing to look upon our art as a mere mode of obtaining subsistence, whatever be our situations. We hope to gain a reputation, or fame, by the exercise or improvement of it; and this is the unseen, but ever operative cause, which urges us forward in our variously deviating careers. This desire of fame-this hungering after the approbation of the wise and good of our species—this wish to be singled out and placed above the great mass of our fellow-creatures-is a perfectly natural feeling, and of kin to immortality. To this cause we are indebted for the noblest exertions of human genius; it was this feeling which incited all the great of former days to the actions which still live on the page of history;-and the same breath will continue to enkindle from their ashes, fires which shall warm, cherish, and enlighten, universal society.

There are two kinds of fame, between which it is necessary for you to know the distinctions. The first, and only excellent, is that which tempts the wise and good man to become great; whose influence is not only felt during the existence of the possessor, but leaves behind it a holy light, undimmed and undiminished by the lapse of ages. This fame is built upon the solid basis of usefulness, genuine worth, and high desert. Its growth is not rapid, but its maturity is perfect; at first, it is the applause of those who are emphatically called "the few;" it is not gained until many privations and toils have been endured; yet, like the ascending sun, it surely attains a meridian altitude, and disperses by the potency of its irradiations, all clouds which would obscure or intercept its brightness.

The other kind of fame, is "base, common, and popular."

It is never the result of great intellectual exertion-often it is produced by accident, and it frequently is awarded to great vice. At first, it may appear bright and dazzling; but this light is the phosphorescent gleam hovering over putrefying substances, compared with the intense, steady, and sun-like ray of that first mentioned. This second fame, is the clamorous plaudit of the deceived or ignorant crowd; it is sustained solely by the breath of the vulgar herd, and would sink for ever in a purer atmosphere.

The fame that you should desire to win, is that which rewards the exertions of generous and virtuous minds. But, you should not only feel the proper emulation-you must be aware of the best mode of attaining your object. Let the intellectual capacity be what it may, or the impulse of ambition never so strong, much time may be wasted in ill-directed and desultory efforts, without the proper training and preparation; even giant strength may be rendered worse than useless, for want of skill to direct its exertions.

A first requisite to your success, is a good education, concerning the best mode of gaining which, wise men have differed in opinion. As the great object is to enlarge the mind, stock it with images, and train it to habits of investigation and sound reasoning, "a classical education" may be stated, as of the various modes, one of the best adapted for the discipline and developement of the intellectual powers Of this education we consider the study of those languages, whence not only our technical phrases, but our mother tongue itself are derived, as a most essential and vitally important part.

In speaking thus, we are conscious of advancing an opinion directly opposed to notions which, of late, are becoming very general and fashionable. It is easier, however, to declaim against the ancient languages, than to learn and employ them; as to the indolent, it is far more agreeable to demolish a noble edifice, than to erect even a comfortable shed.

The correctness of the opinion we have advanced, is not supported by assertion merely: it will bear close examination --and equally resist the subtilties of sophistry, or the ruder shocks of ignorance. Other preparatory branches of educa

tion have their specific value: by the aid of mathematics, the mind is sobered, sharpened, subtilized-taught to abstract itself and become concentrated on a point: to reach out and grasp the almost inconceivable combinations of numbers, or the ineffable extensions of space. But it is with man that physicians have to do-in all his varieties-his excellence, his errors, and his sufferings; it is with the hidden springs of the passions and emotions of our race that we wish to become acquainted; it is with the defaced, not destroyed, image of the Creator, that we are to be continually engaged. We cannot comprehend man better, than by understanding the manner in which he communicates his sensations and wishes to those around him; learning from the context of his thoughts and modes of expression, the nature of the mind whence they spring; and having gained thus much, become better able to make ourselves and our profession more useful and acceptable.

We can neither acquire nor impart knowledge, without the use of words. These, however imperfect, are the signs of our ideas; hence, he who is acquiring a language-if taught aright-is, at the same time, accumulating a vast store of objects for the future exercise of his intellect, and is also forming habits of reflection and discrimination rarely to be attained in any other way.

Independent of other advantages, the language of Judea, Greece, and Rome, are particularly worthy of regard, as containing the most sublime exertions of genius-the most valuable body of truth-and, moreover, as being the fountains, whence the now widely flowing streams of knowledge gushed forth to animate and adorn the world, after the prolonged and dreary periods of its cheerless gloom. In the tongue first mentioned, we see language in its ancient and original form, venerable alike for its simplicity and force. By it are we instructed of the origin of our race, and the commencement of human society. In the Greek, we see language refined to the highest degree, and are furnished, through it, with models in almost every exercise of human intellect. It is not only the tongue by which the invaluable observations of the primitive father of our science are preserved; but we have also