INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 
649 
leisure time for study, or, at any rate, not so much as you 
will find you need. If you miss the present opportunity, it 
will never return; you will also have lost the desire for 
study, and perhaps the power, and will then look back with 
regret that the period of your pupilage was not better spent. 
Then you will say to yourself “ How short is life, how 
valuable is time !” Gentlemen, you have no leisure, in the 
sense usually understood, nor have any of us; and re¬ 
member, “the used key is always bright,” and that “it is 
better to wear out than rust out/” 
Should the mind become wearied with the study of medical 
books, lay them down for a time, and seek relaxation in 
the perusal of such as have been the delight and solace 
of good and great men in all ages ; such works are those 
of history, philosophy, biography, natural history, &c. But 
do not be induced by any one, however plausible their 
arguments may be, to read novels. I mean during your 
pupilage ; and if not read at all throughout life, so much the 
better. You may depend upon it, that time so spent is 
lost; and time is valuable. And, however much you may 
admire a play or a concert, make up your minds to keep away 
from them. One night at a theatre will often displace 
from the tablet of the memory the product of a week’s hard 
study, to make up which you must work twice as hard as 
you need otherwise do. It is in this way that the brain 
becomes taxed to an extent it ought not to be; the excite¬ 
ment of the play, and the intensity of study to make up lost 
time, impose a double duty on this organ, and, in addition, 
there is the danger of gradually, if not suddenly, sliding, as 
it were, into extreme folly, and, perhaps, what is worse, into 
vice. A mind preoccupied by what is really useful and 
good is, with a very great many, the only safeguard against 
these quicicsands. I do not say that a proper amount of 
recreation and congenial conversation with friends is not 
beneficial and proper. I feel that it is so ; nevertheless, great 
care must be taken to avoid those who might lead you from 
the paths of rectitude. 
It is usual on occasions like this to allude to such works 
as are thought advisable for you to read, but at the present 
time these are so numerous that it is difficult to say which 
you ought to select. During your pupilage I think it would 
be unwise to encumber yourselves with too many, especially 
those on the same subject. I should advise you never to 
keep by you for reading more than two, and, on some sub¬ 
jects, not more than one book. 
