102 THE NEW PHYSIOLOGY. 



and the system adopted by some of the leaders in 

 American surgery and medicine of only carrying on 

 private practice in hospitals so organised and staffed 

 that patients could be thoroughly examined, skilfully 

 tended and observed, and placed in the best conditions 

 for successful treatment. I returned home with the 

 strong conviction that we shall soon be left behind in 

 the medical sciences unless we can introduce radical 

 reforms. It was largely this feeling that led me to 

 venture to open the present discussion with the some- 

 what iconoclastic views and proposals which I have 

 now laid before you. 



Let me add some concluding words. A human being 

 is far more than the mere organism with which medicine 

 and surgery are immediately concerned. To a good 

 doctor his patients, as fellow-men, have a value which 

 cannot be measured ; and he has constantly to deal with 

 them on the human side, and adapt his treatment to it. 

 If he fails to do so, he emphatically fails in his duty. 

 In thinking of the scientific side of medical education 

 we are sometimes apt to let the human side slip, and 

 forget that an essential part of medical education con- 

 sists of those subtle influences, exercised mainly by ex- 

 ample, though partly also by special instruction, which 

 teach sympathy with and understanding of human 

 personality. If, therefore, medicine is to have more 

 science and less rule of thumb, let us see to it also that 

 with the science goes more humanity, and, where pos- 

 sible, a broader general education, not in the mere dry 

 bones of the humanities, but on living humanistic lines. 



