3SJ0 CRITICAL NOTICES OF NEW PUBLICATIONS, 



their education, that the attracting operations for aneurysm, stone in the 

 bladder, excision of the lower jaw, wholly or in part, or for the renewing or 

 re-creation of noses, «&c, though in themselves, doubtless, most worthy of 

 some share of his attention; yet, for once during an entire life of provincial 

 practice, not two, out of three or four hundred surgeons, are called upon to 

 perform such operations. For the minor operations, however, the services 

 of the young practitioner are again and again required. These are under- 

 taken with hesitation, and a fear of being foiled, because of their never hav- 

 ing previously been attended to. How glaring the evils, then, of students, 

 when at college and entered at the hospitals, attending chiefly or exclusively 

 to the great operations ! Many are to be met with, settled for practice, who 

 are ignorant of the proper mode of applying the tactus erudUus, and of the 

 period when the areola should show itself, after vaccinating an infant with 

 effect, and of the accredited characteristic marks of the consequent genuine 

 cicatrix. Not a few may be familiar with the calculations of the occasional 

 anomalous distributions of the arteries, and quite au fait in the successive 

 steps of such capital operations as tying the subclavian and internal iliac 

 arteries, cutting for stone, trepanning the skull, &c., who, nevertheless, are 

 found literally ignorant of the relative and surgical anatomy of the blood- 

 vessels and nerves concerned in the minor operation of venaesection, at the 

 bend of the arm — an operation the performance of which is so frequently re- 

 quired, and during which serious accidents may occur, either immediately or 

 in the course of some hours." — pp. 93 — 95. 



As intimately connected with the interests and prospects of medi- 

 cine in this country, the constitution of the charitable institutions 

 are freely and boldly discussed ; their defects are pointed out, and 

 the right of government interference in their management justly in- 

 sisted on. These charities — whatever may have been their original 

 constitution — ought, as far as is consistent with the interests of the 

 patient, to be accessary to the advancement of science; and we bold- 

 ly assert, that that interest is not incompatible with the most free 

 access of medical men to the bedside. The administration of chari- 

 ty to the healthy or sick poor, is a subject of such extreme nicety, 

 that, involving, as it does materially, the best interest of society in 

 general, we trust that the day is not ver^ remote when all such in- 

 stitutions shall be subjected to one uniform and general regulation, 

 setting aside altogether the theoretic views of the founder, and 

 merely appreciating the motives; which, of course, were the benefit 

 of the community. 



We have thus far had great pleasure in according our meed of ap- 

 probation to the volume under review. But to the presence of the 

 whole of the second Part,* on which Dr. Thorburn has evidently 

 expended a great deal of ingenuity and observation, we object alto- 

 gether, in a work having for its object the introduction of a pupil 

 to a course of clinical observation. We do not at all see the neces- 

 sity of a medical creed on any point, either in the student or the 

 professor. On the contrary, we aie convinced of its extreme im- 

 propriety, and cannot help being^ struck by its inconsistency with 

 the bold vindication of the Baconian philosophy, in the preceding^ 

 part of the volume. Faith in any thing not comprehended — except 



' • The volume consists of four parts^ 



