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institutions in the United States during the year. Noticing also 

 4th, the requirements of the United States army and Navy Boards 

 of Medical Examiners; 5th, the legal requirements exacted of medi- 

 cal practitioners in our several states, and 6th, all such measures, 

 prospective or established, in reference to medical education and the 

 reputable standing of the profession, as may be deemed worthy of 

 special consideration." 



1. The committee are not prepared to give a detailed exposition 

 of the state of medical education in foreign countries, nor do they 

 think that such an account is now necessary. It is sufficient for the 

 present purposes of the Association, to know, that in all the most 

 enlightened nations of Europe, the standard of qualifications essen- 

 tial to the attainment of the doctorate of medicine, is far higher than 

 it is in the United States. The preliminary education is broader 

 and more thorough ; the term of medical study is from one to two 

 years longer, the curriculum includes a greater diversity of subjects, 

 the series of lectures are more prolonged and the examinations more 

 elaborate, searching, and practical. But beyond all this, there is 

 one feature in the medical schools of Europe which stands in marked 

 contrast with many of those in the United States. At Paris, at 

 Strasbourg, at Montpelier, at Vienna, at St. Petersburgh, at Berlin, 

 at Edinburgh, at Dublin, at London, a great hospital forms a part 

 of the scene, and furnishes an essential constituent of the material 

 of instruction. In the United States alone, is continued an obsolete 

 system of teaching demonstrative science by description, of teaching 

 the manipulations of surgery, and the art of recognizing and healing 

 diseases without exhibiting the practice of cither, and of explaining 

 the movements and changes of living bodies to those who are igno- 

 rant of the laws which govern inert matter. Thus far, the foreign 

 schools may, with propriety, be adopted as models in this country, 

 but farther than this, it is questionable whether we could imitate 

 them in their general details. They differ in these respects in dif- 

 ferent countries, and in each country they are modified from time 

 to time. Besides this, the European governments, their institutions, 

 and the genius of the people arc different from those of the United 

 States. Political ethics, and the control and direction of instruction 

 are there vested in the same hands. This hitherto has obtained espe- 

 cially in France, whose medical schools have been adduced as pat- 

 terns for our imitation. Those institutions are under the direction 

 of the National Government, and the emolument of their professors 



