TRUTH, PATHOLOGY, AND PUBLIC. 149 



without studying morbid conditions after death. 

 That is to you self-evident ; but the general public 

 have never caught hold of the idea properly, or 

 they would take more care that the greatest possi- 

 ble facilities should be given for the prosecution of 

 inquiries on which their own health ultimately de- 

 pends. But let the public listen to this further 

 statement, which you will all recognize as true, 

 though some of you will forget it as time rolls on 

 that the practice of each individual practitioner is 

 trustworthy only when he makes use of frequent op- 

 portunities of examining after death to verify and 

 supplement his judgments where they have been 

 right, to test his guesses and his suppositions that 

 he may see how far they have accorded with fact, 

 and most of all to correct the numerous errors into 

 which the wisest and the most experienced continu- 

 ally fall. 



We talk of the progress of medicine ; but what 

 an enormous amount of distress might be alleviated 

 if that which is known could be brought to bear in 

 every instance in which it is applicable, or even in 

 the majority of instances. To this end continued 

 pathological observation must be conducted by 

 every practitioner ; and it is because the blame of 

 the neglect of this lies much more with the public 

 than with the profession that I venture to point out 



