On medical education. 11 



best; but in the meanwhile, both in teaching and in examinations, the 

 subject ought to be shorn of its preposterous proportions, and reduced 

 to its legitimate level. Materia medica is to pharmacology and thera- 

 peutics as anatomy to physiology and pathology, but it is of even less 

 relative importance. 



Let us next consider the manner in which the second year of the 

 medical quadrennium may be filled up. Again, the greater part must 

 be given up to physiology and anatomy. During the second winter is 

 the time when the more recondite principles and facts of physiology 

 may best be followed. To facilitate this, not only should the teaching 

 be illustrated experimentally in every possible way, but it should be 

 accompanied also by practical work of a more advanced character than 

 that which I have supposed to occupy the first winter. In the event 

 of any student showing a special desire and aptitude for scientific work, 

 an original research of a simple kind might be undertaken under the 

 direction of a demonstrator. 



Certainly not less than half the student's time during this session 

 ought to be spent in the physiological laboratory; the rest can be 

 retained for anatomy. It is as much as he can be expected to do to 

 obtain adequate knowledge on these two important subjects by the 

 end of the second winter session, even if the sciences of biology, che- 

 mistry, and physics have been relegated to a preliminary year; it is 

 more than can be done if they are to be allowed to take up a part 

 of the time which is needed for anatomy and physiology. 



Assuming that his time has been employed in the manner here 

 indicated, the student ought to be ready to begin attendance in the 

 outpatient department and in the wards of a hospital by the commen- 

 cement of his second summer session. There are many who advise 

 that be should begin to attend the hospital from the time that he 

 enters as a medical student. I would not have him enter the door of 

 a hospital until he should have completed his anatomical and physio- 

 logical training. How it can possibly advantage him to see operations 

 which he cannot understand, to listen to lectures which are absolute 

 Greek to him, to watch the progress of cases regarding the nature 

 and pathology of which he must remain absolutely ignorant, I am at 

 a loss to comprehend. On the other hand, while his visits to the 



