October io, 1912] 



NATURE 



167 



concerned with the National Insurance Act. He 

 put clearly and well the reasons why the doctors 

 cannot and will not work under the Act as it 

 stands at present ; and the doctors will be glad 

 that he reminded them of that delightful fable 

 of the elephant and the partridge's nest. 



At the Middlesex Hospital, Dr. Lazarus-Barlow 

 chose a very different theme-^the genius of the 

 infinitely little. Why genius? Whatever attri- 

 butes we may be able to assign in our imagination 

 to the infinitely little, genius is not one of them. 

 He ought to have said the kingdom, or the work, 

 of the infinitely little. But he gave an admirable 

 address. It was Pasteur, of course, of whom it 

 was said that he had discovered the kingdom of 

 the infinitely little. But, as Dr. Lazarus-Barlow 

 told his audience, beyond the kingdom of the 

 bacteria there is the kingdom of the radium emana- 

 tions, which are infinitely littler; and beyond the 

 kingdom of the radium emanations there is the 

 kingdom of the enzymes, which are infinitely 

 littlest. Not thought, but wonder alone, is 

 possible in the presence of the facts of these king- 

 doms. It takes a very metaphysical mind to be 

 near them. 



With a sort of shock we come to Dr. Jane 

 Walker's address to the London School of 

 Medicine for Women. Her theme was common 

 sense. It is a fertile subject for a medical address, 

 and she treated it with delightful simplicity and 

 directness. She began with those two prophets 

 without honour in their own country, MacCorxiiac 

 of Belfast, and Boddington of Sutton Coldfield, 

 who advocated the open-air treatment of consump- 

 tion when as yet there was no clear understanding 

 as to the cause and the nature of that disease. 

 Next she praised, for the splendour of their 

 common sense, St. Francis, Ambroise Par^, and 

 Dr. Johnson. We think that St. Francis would 

 rather be excused; and Dr. Johnson, like the 

 doctors in the line "Who shall decide where 

 doctors disagree?" was not a medical doctor; 

 but Ambroise Par^ is all right ; his common sense 

 is magnificent and unfailing. Dr. Walker gave 

 many other pleasant and memorable examples of 

 the sovereignty of common sense in the wisdom 

 of life. It may be permitted to quote one out of 

 many. 



Take the case of the " mentally defective " problem. 

 Are we not just a little lacking in common sense in our 

 dealing- with that? Surely our attention ought to be 

 more earnestly directed to the so-called normal people, 

 that they do not tempt their feebler brothers and 

 sisters, who, left alone, would do them little harm. 

 When one reads the flood of literature that is con- 

 stantly being poured out about the " menace of the 

 feeble-minded," one is tempted to feel that a good 

 deal of it is mere nonsense. 



Indeed, we hope that all the women students 

 who heard Dr. Walker's lecture viill follow her 

 good advice ; and it is a good thing for our lady 

 doctors in this country that they have this keen 

 eye for the importance of common sense in medical 

 and surgical practice. 



Dr. Humphrey Rolleston's address at Man- 



No. 2241, VOL. go] 



Chester University is perhaps the best of all in 

 regard to thoroughness and careful weighing of 

 his words. He took for his subject " Universities 

 and Medical Education." As a Cambridge man, 

 who is likewise an examiner in Manchester 

 University, he was able to speak with authority 

 of the complex and ever-shifting relations between 

 all that is called Literae Humaniores, the medical 

 sciences, and medical and surgical practice. It 

 would be hard to beat his ideal of the first years 

 of medical education. 



The education best suited for a medical student 

 before beginning his professional subjects should be 

 on the following lines. The subjects ordinarily taught 

 in schools, including Latin and Greek, should be 

 pursued until the age of about 155 years, when the 

 student's proficiency should be tested by an examina- 

 tion, the resvdts of which should count at the univer- 

 sity matriculation. After passing this examination the 

 student should spend the next 2 — 2n years in obtaining 

 a sound knowledge of French and German, literature, 

 English composition, physics, and chemistry, and the 

 necessary mathematics. At the end of this time, when 

 he is from 175 to 18 years of age, he should be able 

 to pass an examination on these subjects, and then 

 begin the study of biology and of anatomy and physio- 

 logy. This compromise would ensure general culture 

 with a modicum of classical training, and a knowledge 

 of French and German at a time when it can be 

 readily acquired, and yet would not encroach unduly 

 on the time necessary for strictly professional in- 

 struction. This education, which is somewhat on the 

 lines provided on the modern side, would be far better 

 than that given on the classical side at public schools, 

 and by providing a good basis of physics and chem- 

 istry would do much to remedy the prevailing difficulty 

 of the early science examinations in the medical 

 curriculum. 



While introductory addresses remain as good as 

 these four, it would certainly be a pity to desert 

 this way of observing the opening of our medical 

 schools. 



THE CHURCH CONGRESS AT 

 MIDDLESBROUGH. 



D LURING the week ending on Saturday, 

 October 5, the Church Congress has been 

 holding its annual gathering at Middlesbrough, 

 the great industrial centre of population which 

 has grown up at the mouth of the Tees. The 

 choice of such a meeting-place is at once a declara- 

 tion and a challenge — a declaration that the 

 Church considers the problems of industrialism 

 to be also the problems of religion, and a challenge 

 to those people who would solve the riddles of 

 capital and labour without reference to a spiritual 

 basis for the aspirations of both parties in the 

 conflict. It is well that any body of men and 

 women joined together to discuss the outstanding 

 difficulties of a common faith should feel able at 

 times to dispense with the inspiration of mediaeval 

 architecture and academic hall and should go forth 

 boldly to conduct their deliberations on the edge 

 of a populous and rapidly depleting coal-field, 

 illuminated with the glare of titanic blast furnaces. 

 On the whole, the choice of subjects and their 

 treatment by the selected speakers has justified 



