134 Medical Brotherhood 



to bring these instructive facts to the consciousness of the members 

 of the medical profession, to teil them of their ethically privileged 

 Status. This message is not sent to non-medical men; neither do we 

 mean to say to the non-medical man that we physicians are hoher 

 than thou. We wish only to convey to physicians the message that 

 their profession permits them to remain at all times simultaneously 

 patriotic and humane, and that they should train their character 

 properly so that they could be fit to exercise this high privilege. The 

 nearest and simplest end to be gained from such Information is the 

 consciousness of a sense of higher duties which comes from the 

 knowledge of one's higher moral dignity. 



There is no doubt that the medical profession is a noble calling. 

 Do medical men represent a noble class ? They ought to. There are 

 two good reasons f or such an expectation. " A medical man whose 

 ethical Standard is not above that of the average man is morally 

 below him." His activities are of a most serious nature; they con- 

 cern life; and, furthermore, they can not, as in other callings, be 

 controlled by anybody or anything eise but the physician's own con- 

 science; that conscience therefore must be of a higher type. Then, 

 the physician has constantly to deal with suffering, that of the patient 

 and of those to whom the patient is dear; sympathy, therefore, ought 

 to be an integral part of the make-up of the desirable physician, It 

 is true that the medical calling is at the same time the physician's 

 business by which he makes his livelihood; it is therefore often af- 

 flicted with many of the moral shortcomings which frequently go 

 with money-making occupations. The Medical Brotherhood, how- 

 ever, does not deal, and does not have to deal, with this side of the 

 physician's life. It deals with the physician in his relation to his 

 country, when he acts and has to act as a patriot; or when other 

 countries are at war with one another, when the physician of a 

 neutral country has to act as a humanitarian. Here every physician 

 can afiford to exercise his noble profession in a noble spirit. It is that 

 for which the Medical Brotherhood appeals to all physicians of our 

 country. That alone seems to us to be an object worth while 

 looking for. 



The fact that within only about nine months and without agita- 

 tion and publicity, about fourteen thousand members of the med- 



