46 ON THE STUDY OF LATIN. 



accompanied with the manifestation of a high endowment of these 

 intellectual faculties. Should it even, in fine, be conceded that the 

 difficulties which after mature age, occur in examining the forehead 

 were insurmountable, the fact would no more go to overturn the 

 system of phrenological organology, than the insurmountable difii- 

 culties which still retain trisection of an angle, and quadrature of 

 the circle, among the desiderates of science, go to demolish the cer- 

 tain principles of geometry. 



J. K. 



ON THE STUDY OF LATIN, MORE ESPECIALLY AS 

 REGARDS THE MEDICAL PROFESSION. 



A KNOWLEDGE of the ancient languages, especially of Latin, is 

 generally supposed to be necessary for those who are to enter the 

 medical profession.* For this notion we shall presently find that 

 there is little or no foundation. The advocates of a " sound classi- 

 cal education," as it is erroneously termed, are daily decreasing ; 

 another generation is springing up, unshackled by the antiquated 

 prejudices of their forefathers, and free to judge for themselves, and 

 decide on the side of reason. Indeed, such is the altered state of 

 public opinion, that it is now scarcely possible to open any book on 

 education without finding a chapter dedicated to exposing the folly 

 of the system which makes the dead languages the chief object of 

 education, and the absurdity of calling a man learned for his know- 

 ledge of words, no matter how ignorant he may be of matters of far 

 greater importance. In the minds of such persons the ancients ex- 

 celled us in every particular. Orators ! who have we now to be 

 compared to Demosthenes ?t Physicians ! where is the Galen of 



• A *' sound classical education" — I should call it a very unsound education 

 — is thought necessary for every gentleman ; I shall, however, chiefly confine 

 my remarks to a classical education as regards medical men. 



+ The task of Demosthenes was very easy, as he worked only upon the 

 animal passions of a nation of brutes^ as Johnson calls them. 



