EDITORIAL OBjSERVAT10N3. 
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and the sufferings of humanity entirely subservient to the attainment of 
wealth and worldly distinction. Above all. “seek ye first the kingdom of 
God and His righteousness,” and, be assured, “all these things shall be 
added unto you.” Dr. Murchison was loudly cheered at the close of his 
address. A conversazione afterwards took place. 
Dr. Henley, at University College, discussed the progress of medical 
science :—There were many things in nature which they could not explain 
—there were many things in medicine which they did not comprehend—but 
lie had no sympathy with those who preferred to impose upon the reason 
visionary agents, rather than feel that Nature’s works were too great for 
them to understand. However much they had yet to learn, he believed that 
the intellect of man would yet solve the problem of organization, and that 
the practice of medicine would, ere long, rival any of the exact sciences of 
our times. Let them look for a moment at what recent physiology had 
done. Had it not given them a clearer, he might say a simpler, idea of what 
life was than they previously possessed? Had it not shown them, for 
example, that their limbs moved in obedience to mechanics, that the crys¬ 
talline lens acted according to the law of optics, that their heart’s action was 
within the comprehension of hydraulics, and that respiration, digestion, and 
absorption were performed on purely chemical and physical principles ? In 
a word, recent physiology had pointed out to them that the phenomena of 
life were the effects of a combination of the natural laws which governed the 
universe at large. It had shown them that every organism in the possession 
of life, no matter whether it were at the bottom of the vegetable or at the 
top of the animal scale, was undergoing never-ceasing change, and that, not¬ 
withstanding the apparent stability of its frame, every particle comprising 
it was transient in the truest sense of the word. The appearance of identity 
which the living organism presented was an illusion; for every day, every 
hour, every moment, its parts were wearing away. No movement could be 
made, no function performed, without a destruction of matter. Every 
breath he drew, every word he uttered, every thought, was accompanied by 
a metamorphosis of material. Well might they exclaim, “How wonderfully, 
how fearfully are we made !” Life was one perpetual state of death, and if 
to live was to die, so to die was to live, not only in a spiritual but in a 
physical sense. . . . The physicians of to-day were neither conceited 
theorists nor proud empiricists, but humble seekers after truth, and ill lid 
they merit the ignominious title of unbelievers which ignorance occasionally 
hurled at them. Were they irreligious because they read the book of nature, 
and believed in astronomy, which told them that the sun did not move; 
geography, that the earth was not four-cornered; geology, that the world Avas 
not created in six days ? Surely not! Was a machine less perfect because 
they understood its construction ? Was man less the work of his Creator 
because they comprehended his organization ? On the contrary, far from 
destroying their feelings of veneration, a knowledge of nature’s laws but 
rendered them more acute, by unfolding to them the immeasurable distance 
that separated the feeble works of man from the mighty works of God. He 
concluded his address with some admirable advice to the students, pointing 
out to them the necessity of nurturing a spirit of religion, and that their 
success in after life would depend as much upon their moral as upon their 
mental qualifications. (Loud cheers.) 
Professor Bentley summed up a practical address at King’s College by 
recommending the students to be regular in their attendance in the College 
chapel, remembering that the motto of their college was “ Sancte et Sapi- 
ente.” They had a noble calling, and it was their bounden duty to ask. 
God’s blessing on their undertaking, so that they might receive reward n 
the world and unspeakable joy hereafter, when time itself should be no 
more. 
XXXIV. 
50 
