34 MEMOIR OF 



glory. He made the former subservient to the latter ; but 

 the objects of his ambition were teaching and writing, 

 not the practice of his profession. Perhaps, indeed, he 

 adapted the aims of his ambition to his taste. He relished 

 reading, writing, and lecturing, more than the practice 

 of medicine; and sought to derive from them, that emo- 

 lument, which, in this country, they seldom afford, and 

 which can much more certainly be drawn from a close 

 attention to the practical duties of the profession. Had 

 he possessed a patrimony, this course would have been 

 unexceptionable ; without such a reliance, no young phy- 

 sician should neglect the means of acquiring professional 

 business, at the outset of his career. 



Dr. Godman was, without doubt, a man of genius ; but 

 he was not, perhaps, so much the expositor, as the histo- 

 rian of nature. Observing, imaginative, fluent, and gra- 

 phical, he abounded less in deep and original analysis 

 than vivid and accurate delineations. Thus his mind, 

 like that of Lucretius, Darwin, and Good, was poetical 

 and philosophical ; and he left behind him several fugitive 

 pieces, written chiefly in his last illness, which prove that 

 he might have shone as the poet of nature, not less than 

 her historian, had circumstances awakened his powers. 



He possessed uncommon abilities for dissection, and 

 was accustomed, in the presence of his class, to disen- 

 tangle the structures intended for exhibition ; thus show- 

 ing their connections and dependences, while he de- 

 scribed them with that clearness, animation, and elo- 



