OH 



THOUGHT IN MEDICINE. 



An Address delivered August 2, 1877, on the Anniversary of 



the Foundation of the Institute for the Education of 



Army Surgeons. 



ir is now thirty-five years since, on the 2nd August, I 

 stood on the rostrum in the Hall of this Institute, before 

 another such audience as this, and read a paper on 

 the operation of Venal Tumours. I was then a pupil of 

 this Institution, and was just at the end of my studies. 

 I had never seen a tumour cut, and the subject-matter 

 of my lecture was merely compiled from books ; but 

 book knowledge played at that time a far wider and 

 a far more influential part in medicine than we are at 

 present disposed to assign to it. It was a period of 

 fermentation, of the fight between learned tradition and 

 the new spirit of natural science, which would have 

 no more of tradition, but wished to depend upon 

 individual experience. The authorities at that time 



