Apbil 22, 1910] 



SCIENCE 



605 



occupation excepting the ministry. His 

 reading is broad, and always dealing with 

 new things, and in this way his interests 

 are continually broadening. 



Another advantage of his profession is 

 his association with all classes of the com- 

 munity, with men, women and children, 

 whereas in other callings his association is 

 chiefly with men. In other words, he is 

 studying humanity instead of pursuing the 

 elusive dollar. 



Mr. Barney, last week, spoke to you of 

 the crowded condition of the profession of 

 the law. The profession of medicine is 

 also crowded. But reviewing the question 

 judicially, so, it seems to me, are all the 

 other professions and callings, this crowd- 

 ing and competition extending into every 

 branch of human activity wherein men and 

 women gain a livelihood. At the present 

 time the only exception to this rule seems 

 to be the general-housework girl ! 



Speaking of the profession of the law, 

 it is customary to point out to aspirants for 

 legal honors the value of a knowledge of 

 law in other departments of human activ- 

 ity, and students are told of the immense 

 collateral value of such a knowledge in 

 politics; in administrative positions; in 

 banking, real estate, insurance and other 

 occupations; and the implication is made 

 that medicine relates only to the simple 

 practise of medicine. Such a conclusion 

 as this is a greatly mistaken one. Medicine 

 in recent years has experienced such a 

 broadening of its field of usefulness as is 

 the case in no other profession. The foun- 

 dation of such institutions, the Rockefeller 

 Institute, etc., has created an entirely new 

 field for the physician in the direction of 

 the research worker. Nearly every hos- 

 pital of note throughout the country has 

 established such laboratories for the study 

 of the causes and prevention af disease, 

 and it is a matter now beginning to be well 



understood that the duty of the hospital is 

 not only to care for the sick, but to study 

 new methods for the cure and prevention 

 of disease among the well. Such positions 

 as these call for highly trained medical 

 men, and it is a field which will soon be 

 greatly enlarged by the establishment of 

 clinical chemical laboratories as well as 

 those for pathological and bacteriological 

 research. 



The great expansion of our life insur- 

 ance companies has necessitated the em- 

 ployment of a greatly increased number 

 of physicians, and the time is not remote 

 when these great institutions will under- 

 stand the benefit which will accrue to them 

 in the establishment of research workers 

 who shall demonstrate lines upon which 

 human life may be prolonged. 



The increase in the size and number of 

 charitable institutions also calls for a 

 largely increased number of medical at- 

 tendants and new necessities caused by our 

 extending civilization are daily springing 

 up— such necessities as the supervision of 

 our water supplies; our drainage disposal; 

 physical culture; quarantine regulations 

 and board of health investigations. In 

 fact all the great economic problems of the 

 day are problems which must be largely 

 decided by physicians; as examples of 

 which attention is directed to the suprem- 

 acy of the Japanese in their struggle 

 against Russia, a supremacy largely due 

 to the health and effectiveness of their 

 troops, as perfected by physicians. And 

 the German exploitation of Africa and the 

 building of our own Panama Canal, were 

 both rendered possible by the conquest of 

 the tropics by the physician. 



And we see the trained physician sought 

 out as a teacher of sociology, of psychol- 

 ogy, of zoology and physiology and in 

 other fields as yet barely touched by the 

 plough of progress. Such teaching posi- 



