SCIENCE 



NEW YORK, FEBRUARY 13, 1893. 



ON THE TEACHING OF ANATOMY TO ADVANCED 

 MEDICAL STUDENTS/ 



The importance of anatomy to the physician and surgeon 

 has caused the method for teaching this science to be largely 

 determined by practitioners. The student is taught the 

 elements of histology, the shapes and numbers of organs, 

 the outlines of regions, and their mutual relations. Other 

 facts than those named belong in a very remote degree to 

 the needs of practice; and when the great number of medical 

 topics is considered, which is of necessity brought to the at- 

 tention of the student, it is no wonder that governing bodies 

 are disposed to disregard all phases of instruction that do 

 not have direct claim upon the physician's time and ser- 

 vice. 



But science is rarely pursued for practical good. The ac- 

 quisition of knowledge for its own sake — the determination 

 of general principles that reveal the existence of law — 

 awakens and maintains pleasures and interests in the mind 

 of the anatomist compared with which the practical uses that 

 he can make of the knowledge appear to be poor and mean. 

 With as much propriety one might say that navigation is the 

 highest use that can be made of the study of astronomy, as 

 to assert that the chief end of the study of anatomy is to 

 apply its tenets to medicine. These statements are made not 

 to lessen the dignity and importance of practical work, but 

 respectfully to claim that such work does not comprise all the 

 value, indeed scarcely more than a small fraction of the value, 

 that pertains to the whole. 



In his "New Atlantis," Lord Bacon says : "We have three 

 of our fellows that bend themselves, looking into the experi- 

 ments of others, and cast about how to draw out of them 

 things of use and practice for man's life, and knowledge, as 

 well for works as for plain demonstration of causes, means 

 of natural divinations, and the easy and clear discovery of 

 the virtues and parts of the bodies. These we call dowry- 

 men or benefactors. Lastly, we have three that raise the 

 former discoveries by experiments into greater observations, 

 axioms, and aphorisms. These we call the interpreters of 

 nature." 



I hear a response to the foregoing statement that the struc- 

 ture of animals exhibited on a broad scale is already taught 

 to classes in the scientific schools, and that, in the scheme of 

 a university education, the biological subjects are as well 

 advanced as any others in the curriculum. This is an im- 

 perfect, if not misleading, presentation of the facts. It is 

 true that the rudiments of the structure and functions of 

 animals and plants are taught. But to students already ad- 

 vanced by general training and by preliminary work in 

 natural history, little is presented that prepares them to dis- 

 cuss the more intricate problems. 



To my mind the scheme of university work is unsatisfac- 

 tory until opportunity is afforded to men, who, after com- 

 pleting their biological and medical training, may desire to 



1 Also published In The Medical News, December a6, 1891. 



still further advance. Conceding that the question of main- 

 tenance has been settled, either by the possession of private 

 means or by endowment of fellowships, what courses of in- 

 struction are afforded these advanced men ? As a rule, noth- 

 ing, or next to nothing. It is customary for such novitiates 

 to reside abroad for several years, where, amid numerous 

 centres of learning are found one or more masters, the dis- 

 ciples of whom they become. The advantages of travel being 

 considered, it may be said that with the comparatively easy 

 means of obtaining the best instruction the present scheme 

 is on the whole adequate. With such a conclusion I cannot 

 agree. It it were true, we might in reason have stopped 

 long ago in our lines of university expansion. Independence 

 in intellectual as well as in political life should be the object 

 of American citizenship. 



First, and always, let us remember that medical investi- 

 gators are those it is desired to train. It is for men that are 

 already imbued with the desire to pursue their researches in 

 anatomy that I appeal. They stand in this field with what 

 preparations can be given them for usefulness. They are 

 medical biologists — medical anatomists. They are not re- 

 stricted to the problem of the relief of sutfering, and yet they 

 are occupied with those other problems upon which the true 

 solution of all depends. 



For such instruction I would have a specially-designed 

 museum and a specially-equipped laboratory. It may be 

 assumed that in every great medical school, from among the 

 large number of matriculates (men already trained and of 

 the best quality), two or three of the type described will 

 present themselves for an advanced course in anatomy. I 

 am prepared for the objection that this is too large a num- 

 ber. But, so far as I know, no one has attempted to ascer- 

 tain how many men in each class of graduates would come 

 forward, and my impressions are based upon the number of 

 workers in the general field of biology — some of whom, at 

 least, would have pursued these or similar studies had any 

 systematized course been presented to them. I will, there- 

 fore, begin with three men a year. To this number may be 

 added as many young teachers, tutors, curators, and prosec- 

 tors, who would avail themselves of the instruction. The 

 work might be initiated in either of the halls of biology or of 

 medicine. If the course were well established, it would be 

 well to institute a laboratory and museum distinct from any 

 on the university grounds. I am of the opinion that the 

 administrative success of such separation of collections would 

 be assured. All must approve of the ethnological collection 

 of Harvard being distinct from the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology, and of both in turn being set apart from the 

 museum in the Medical School. In like manner, 1 assume 

 that there is no reason why series of specimens arranged in 

 illustration of principles that are not taught either in the 

 preliminary or in the proper medical courses, should be nec- 

 essarily connected with one or the other museum. The col- 

 lections should be in the main designed to accommodate the 

 preparations that are used in the illustration of general lec- 

 tures. Museums that teach by the specimens being removed 

 from the cases to the lecture halls are radically distinct from 

 museums that teach by the conservation of series that are 



