454 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIV. No. 015. 



demand on the intelligence and devotion of 

 its members. 



The recent liberal endowment of the 

 Harvard Medical School by private persons 

 is an indication that the more intelligent 

 and public-spirited portion of the Amer- 

 ican people is beginning to understand that 

 most diseases would be preventable, if only 

 mankind had acquired the knowledge need- 

 ed to prevent them. The urgent duty of 

 society to-day is to spend the money needed 

 to get that knowledge. How to spend it 

 we have learned — witness the admirable 

 work of the Massachusetts Board of Health 

 for thirty years past, aggressive work both 

 defensive and offensive ; witness also the 

 remarkable results of the medical institutes 

 both in this country and in Europe. 



The medical profession of the future will 

 have the satisfaction not only of ameliora- 

 ting the condition or prolonging the life of 

 the suffering individual, but also of ex- 

 terminating or closely limiting the prevent- 

 able diseases. Charles W. Eliot. 



THE UNITY OF THE MEDICAL SCIENCES.'' 

 The dedication of the new buildings of 

 the Harvard Medical School is an occa- 

 sion for rejoicing, not to Harvard Univer- 

 sity alone, but to all in this country and 

 elsewhere interested in the progress of 

 medical education and of medical science, 

 and in behalf of all such I beg to offer to 

 this university hearty congratulations upon 

 this magnificent addition to its resources 

 for medical teaching and study. Medicine 

 everywhere and especially in America has 

 reason to be profoundly grateful to the 

 generous and public-spirited donors who 

 have made possible the construction of this 

 group of buildings, unsurpassed in the im- 



^ An address delivered by William H. Welch, 

 M.D., LL.D., professor of pathology, Johns Hop- 

 kins University, on September 26, 1906, at Harvard 

 University, at the dedication of the new build- 

 ings of the Harvard Medical School. 



posing beauty and harmony of their archi- 

 tectural design and in their ample, internal 

 arrangements. This design is adapted 

 from the Greek, and it is peculiarly fitting 

 that the medical sciences should be housed 

 in a style which suggests the spirit of an- 

 cient Greece, where first flowed the springs 

 of medical science and art, living springs 

 even to this day. In the singular harmony 

 of the architecture of the group of build- 

 ings devoted to the various medical sciences 

 are typified the unity of purpose of these 

 sciences and their combination into the one 

 great science of medicine. What I shall 

 have to say on this occasion is suggested in 

 part by this thought of the 'Unity of Med- 

 ical Science.' 



The good fortune of the Harvard Med- 

 ical School in coming into possession of the 

 splendid laboratories now formally dedi- 

 cated is well merited by the leading posi- 

 tion which this institution has held in 

 this country since its foundation, by its 

 union with Harvard University and by the 

 assurance that the greatly enlarged oppor- 

 tunities will here be used to the highest 

 advantage. Since the appointment in 1782 

 of its first professors, John Warren and 

 Benjamin Waterhouse, of enduring fame, 

 this school has had a long line of honored 

 names upon its roll of teachers, lustrous 

 not only for such single stars as Channing 

 and Ware and Holmes and Ellis and 

 Cheever, but especially for its clustered 

 stars, the Warrens, the Jacksons, the Bige- 

 lows, the Shattucks, the Wymans, the 

 Bowditchs, the Minots; and it will not be 

 deemed invidious on this occasion to men- 

 tion of the latter group the names of two 

 members of the present distinguished fac- 

 ulty to whose services this school is so 

 largely indebted for securing the funds 

 for the new buildings, Professor Henry P. 

 Bowditch, the eminent leader of American 

 physiologists, and Professor John Collins 



