CALVIN ELLIS. 49 



c 



During his life as a pbysiciau, until disease checked him, he was an 

 active participant in the exercises of the medical societies, and earnest 

 in every good suggestion for elevating the standard of professional at- 

 tainments. He was, indeed, a qu'et but efficient leader amongst us. 



To the local medical societies, and to the Massachusetts Medical 

 Society, of which he was for a long time a Counsellor, he, from time to 

 time, presented more or less elaborately prepared papers, which were 

 subsecpiently published. A list of them is herewith appended. They 

 are forty-one in number, the first having been printed in 1855, the last 

 in 1882. He left, partly finished, a work on "Symptomatology," — 

 still in fragments of manuscript. Some of the papers show great skill 

 in the unravelling of the mysteries of obscure disease ; and all clearly 

 show his love of scientific accuracy, his unwillingness to lay down, as 

 fully demonstrated, any proposition not wholly sustained by an accu- 

 rate examination of every, even the most minute, fact bearing upon 

 the subject under discussion. As clinical teacher and as a writer, 

 instead of boldly announcing as true an opinion for which there might 

 not be sufficient data for a perfect judgment, he was willing to remain 

 in a state of " philosophic doubt," Let it be understood, however, that 

 this state of doubt, as to the precise nature of a case before him, did not 

 prevent him from being as ready promptly to prescribe for severe 

 symptoms ; as all other physicians are at times compelled to do — 

 when they prescribe for symptoms only. 



Let me refer to a few of his publications, etc. 



In 18G0 (Xo. 10 on list) he pi-inted an essay on "Tubercle." It 

 had gained for him the Boylston Medical Prize. After a thorough 

 statement of the various apparently proved facts about tubercle, as 

 given by the ablest pathologists of Europe in their various works, and 

 from his own microscopic and other observations, he arrives at the 

 conclusion that " tubercle " does not really exist as an entity ; but that 

 it is rather a degeneration of the existing tissues, a " want of vitality," 

 or of a " capacity for organization." Koch had not, at that time, dis- 

 covered the Bacillus. 



His introductory lecture before tlie Medical Class in 18G6 (No. 21 

 on list) is admirable. It teaches his hearers that the profession de- 

 mands of every student the sternest loyalty to truth, abnegation and 

 service, and, if need be, self-sacrifice. These qualities, he declares, 

 are not too much to demand "of those who seek to interpret the 

 la^A,-, of nature for the benefit of mankind." He refers to the many 

 adv^^ntages derived from modern scientific, methods, and to the cIosq 

 relation of health with disease, — the one running into the other in 



