218 INTERNAL MEDICINE 



the study of which, useful as it may be from a standpoint of general 

 mental training, is believed by many to be time wasted in the edu- 

 cation of the student destined for a scientific career. 



But there are not wanting voices which question the wisdom of the 

 full extent of some modern tendencies. May the affectation of too 

 strict an objectivity bred though it may be of a wholesome skep- 

 ticism, the more general cultivation of the natural sciences to the 

 exclusion of the humanities, the search for facts and facts alone, 

 circumscribe the powers of synthetical reasoning without which the 

 true meaning of many an important problem might pass unnoticed? 

 May they perhaps tend to smother the development of minds capable 

 of grasping large general problems? Do the tendencies of the times 

 justify the epigrammatic observation of a recent French author: 

 "Autrefois on gene"ralisait avec peu de faits et beaucoup d'idees; 

 maintenant on generalise avec beaucoup de faits et peu d'idees " ? l 



That the cultivation of a strict objectivity in research has ma- 

 terially impaired our powers of reason - - that the exact methods, 

 which are largely responsible for the enormous advances of the last 

 fifty years in all branches of medicine, have bred a paucity of ideas, 

 I am not inclined to believe, despite the seductive formula of our 

 Gallic colleague. But that when in the period of so-called secondary 

 education it is proposed to substitute the study of the natural sciences 

 for a good training in the humanities, there is danger of drying-up 

 some of the sources from which this very scientific expansion has 

 sprung, seems to me by no means impossible. The study of the 

 classics, an acquaintance with the thoughts and the philosophies 

 of past ages, gives to the student a certain breadth of conception, 

 a stability of mind which is difficult to obtain in another way. A 

 familiarity with Greek and Latin literature is an accomplishment 

 which means much to the man who would devote himself to any 

 branch of art or science or history. One may search long among the 

 truly great names in medicine for one whose training has been de- 

 void of this vital link between the far-reaching radicles of the past 

 and what we are pleased to regard as the flowering branches of to-day. 

 Greek and Latin are far from dead languages to the Continental 

 student. They are dead to us because they are taught us as dead. 

 With methods of teaching in our secondary schools equal to those 

 prevailing in England and the Continent, it would be an easy matter 

 in a materially shorter period, to give our boys an infinitely broader 

 education than they now receive. There should be much less com- 

 plaint of time wasted, much less ground for suggesting the abandon- 

 ment of the study of branches which are invaluable to any scholarly- 

 minded man. 



The assertion that the time spent in the study of the humanities 

 1 Eymin, Mcdecins et Philosophes, 8, Lyon, 1903-4. no 4 



