in.] ON MEDICAL EDUCATION. 59 



I presume that the great majority of those whom I 

 address propose to devote themselves to the profession 

 of medicine ; and I do not doubt, from the evidences of 

 ability which have been given to-day, that I have before 

 me a number of men who will rise to eminence in that 

 profession, and who will exert a great and deserved 

 influence upon its future. That in which I am interested, 

 and about which I wish to speak, is the subject of 

 medical education, and I venture to speak about it for 

 the purpose, if I can, of influencing you, who may have 

 the power of influencing the medical education of the 

 future. You may ask, by what authority do I venture, 

 being a person not concerned in the practice of medicine, 

 to meddle with that subject? I can only tell you it is a 

 fact, of which a number of you I dare say are aware by 

 experience (and I trust the experience has no painful 

 associations), that I have been for a considerable number 

 of years (twelve or thirteen years to the best of my 

 recollection) one of the examiners in the University of 

 London. You are further aware that the men who come 

 up to the University of London are the picked men of 

 the medical schools of London, and therefore such obser 

 vations as I may have to make upon the state of know 

 ledge of these gentlemen, if they be justified, in regard 

 to any faults I may have to find, cannot be held to indi 

 cate defects in the capacity, or in the power of applica 

 tion of those gentlemen, but must be laid, more or less, 

 to the account of the prevalent system of medical edu 

 cation. I will tell you what has struck me but in 

 speaking in this frank way, as one always does about the 

 defects of one s friends, I must beg you to disabuse your 

 minds of the notion that I am alluding to any particular 

 school, or to any particular college, or to any particular 

 person ; and to believe that if I am silent when I should 

 be glad to speak with high praise, it is because that 



