118 SCIENTIFIC EDUCATION: v 



practice of medicine, from being fully prepared for 

 the study of Nature; and from coming to the 

 medical school, equipped with that preliminary 

 knowledge of the principles of Physics, of Chem- 

 istry and of Biology, upon which he has now to 

 waste one of the precious years, every moment of 

 which ought to be given to those studies which 

 bear directly upon the knowledge of his profes- 

 sion ? 



There is another profession, to the members of 

 which, I think, a certain preliminary knowledge of 

 physical science might be quite as valuable as to 

 the medical man. The practitioner of medicine 

 sets before himself the noble object of taking care 

 of man's bodily welfare; but the members of this 

 other profession undertake to " minister to minds 

 diseased," and, so far as may be, to diminish sin 

 and soften sorrow. Like the medical profession, 

 the clerical, of which I now speak, rests its power 

 to heal upon its knowledge of the order of the 

 universe — upon certain theories of man's relation 

 to that which lies outside him. It is not my 

 business to express any o])inion about these 

 theories. I merely wish to point out that, like all 

 other tlieories, they are professedly based upon 

 matters of fact. Thus the clerical profession has to 

 deal with the facts of Nature from a certain point 

 of view; and hence it comes into contact with that 

 of the man of science, who has to treat the same 

 facts from another point of view. You know how 



