246 ADDRESS ON UNIVERSITY EDUCATION ix 



and is daily receiving a greater and greater ex- 

 perimental development. 



The third great fact which is to be taken into 

 consideration in dealing with medical education, 

 is that the practical necessities of life do not, as 

 a rule, allow aspirants to medical practice to give 

 more than three, or it may be four years to their 

 studies. Let us put it at four years, and then 

 reflect that, in the course of this time, a young 

 man fresh from school has to acquaint himself 

 with medicine, surgery, obstetrics, therapeutics, 

 pathology, hygiene, as well as with the anatomy 

 and the physiology of the human body ; and that 

 his knowledge should be of such a character that 

 it can be relied upon in any emergency, and 

 always ready for practical application. Consider, 

 in addition, that the medical practitioner may be 

 called upon, at any moment, to give evidence in a 

 court of justice in a criminal case ; and that it is 

 therefore well that he should know something of 

 the laws of evidence, and of what we call medical 

 jurisprudence. On a medical certificate, a man 

 may be taken from his home and from his busi- 

 ness and confined in a lunatic asylum ; surely, 

 therefore, it is desirable that the medical practi- 

 tioner should have some rational and clear con- 

 ceptions as to the nature and symptoms of mental 

 disease. Bearing in mind all these requirements 

 of medical education, you will admit that the 

 burden on the young aspirant for the medical 



