216 UNIVERSITIES : ACTUAL AND IDEAL vill 



medical purposes was led to extend his studies to 

 the rest of the animal world. 



Within my recollection, the only way in which a 

 student could obtain anything like a training in 

 Physical Science, was by attending the lectures of 

 the Professors of Physical and Natural Science 

 attached to the Medical Schools. But, in the 

 course of the last thirty years, both foster-mother 

 and child have grown so big, that they threaten 

 not only to crush one another, but to press the 

 very life out of the unhappy student who enters 

 the nursery ; to the great detriment of all three. 



I speak in the presence of those who know 

 practically what medical education is ; for I may 

 assume that a large proportion of my hearers are 

 more or less advanced students of medicine. I 

 appeal to the most industrious and conscientious 

 among you, to those who are most deeply pene- 

 trated with a sense of the extremely serious 

 responsibilities which attach to the calling of a 

 medical practitioner, when I ask whether, out of 

 the four years which you devote to your studies, 

 you ought to spare even so much as an hour for 

 any work which does not tend directly to fit you 

 for your duties ? 



Consider what that work is. Its foundation is a 

 sound and practical acquaintance with the structure 

 of the human organism, and with the modes and 

 conditions of its action in health. I say a sound 

 and practical acquaintance, to guard against the 



