SHEFFIELD SCHOOL OF MEDICINE.

of the noblest callings of man; for, not only did its pursuit demand ample stores of preliminary knowledge-not only did it embrace a competent acquaintance with many natural sciences-a consummate familarity of several, all of them impressed with the hand of the Creator; but what transcended even this, the final goal to which all these becks of science conveyed, was the relief of suffering humanity, of which great aim and end a Pagan writer had said, that no other thing brought men nearer to the Gods! But to aim thus wisely and well demanded much and earnest prefatory toil. There was no royal road to this fount of science (he would not degrade it by the term Art) any more than to knowledge in general, and he who would drink of its waters, in their fullness and purity, must be content to take his staff, follow in the footsteps of his guides, and ascend the hill with slow, steady, firm, and consecutive steps. Viewed from the foot, the ascent might seem to the novice smooth and uniform. Could he not take the hill by assault, and so gain the summit in one breath ? As he toils on, he perceives that what had seemed an unbroken ascent, is in truth a succession of distinct cones or pinnacles, and that as he surmounts each in turn, he is handed over to a new and faithful guide. These cones are the several auxiliary sciences, without a due knowledge of which all legitimate medicine must remain to the aspirant a sealed book. There were other parallel cones or pinnacles which would have to be taken into account for the sake of their reflected light; and these were the collateral sciences. These could, however, only be glanced at on the present occasion, in order that attention might not be too much diverted from the main supports upon which pi-actical medicine must needs rest. These supports, the main SHEFFIELD SCHOOL OF MEDICINE. auxiliary sciences, were then adverted to in succession, and in MR. HERBERT J. WALKER’S INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS. the order in which the student would do well to make them THE introductory lecture at this school was delivered by Mr. his study. Dr. Swaine first adverted to anatomy, to the paraH. J. Walker, on Wednesday, the 1st instant. The lecturer, mount importance of acquiring an entire familiarity with its after alluding to the mutual dependence of the various branches intricate systems, not from books or plates. These were useful only for repetition of that which the student had preof science, and to the fact that the study of medicine arose, not viously, and at every opportunity, bent over and scrutinized from the imperfect original creation of man, but from causes of in flesh and blood, and again in some well-constructed prepahis own creating, proceeded to inquire into what were the ration in the museum. Students must repeat their anatomical original objects of science. The objects of science were two- lessons as often as boys their multiplication tables; and as they fold : first, the nature, differences, and distinctions of the cannot at all times have the parts before them, either in substance or in effigy, they must manage by degrees to get thesevarious forms of animate and inanimate matter; and, secondly, parts so photographed in their minds that the seemingly sensethe different forces or stimuli which promote vitality in the less name shall recall instantly to their minds the image of one, and effect a change in the condition of the other. The what it is intended to designate. Thus, by patience and perlecturer strongly condemned the inquiry into the primitive severance, they would eventually succeed in making the science their own, or would they again readily forget what their origin of the earth,as opposed to philosophy and all doctrines minds had so long and laboriously dwelt on. " It is not," said of theology. He then remarked on the three worlds-the late admired preacher, " by a passing glance that things beanimal, the vegetable, and the mineral, the defining of the dis- acome rivetted in the memory. It is by forcing the memory to tinction of which was the aim of certain branches of science. " While the elementary substances, which with their combina- call them up again and again in our leisure hours." Taken tions form the crust of the earth, and all the various structures singly, however, anatomy was but a dead letter; it was only of the mineral and vegetable world, are reckoned at 55, only 18 in its relation to the living being that it became clothed in its full dignity and interest. It would, indeed, divest the science or 19 enter into the composition of the animal world, while of much of its dryness, if the student would try, from the first, many of the others are inimical to life. The theory of spontaneous generation was treated at great length, and very ably, to attach some physiological meaning to his investigations of and the conclusion arrived at was, that the spontaneous theory the dead body. As for physiology, in its higher character, it was only after anatomy had been to a certain extent mastered, was entirely fallacious. To make good the distinction between the two kingdoms of animated nature, though of special interest that it could be duly apprehended and appreciated. Physioto the scientific mind, was held to be impracticable. In the logy had, of late years, and step by step, (for in science as in was done by leaps,) made a great and imporpresent state of our knowledge, it is impossible to give a com- Nature nothingmore advance, especially through the aid of chemistry plete and perfect definition of what is to be considered an tant and the Still, much that concerned germination, in contradistinction to what is to be looked as a microscope. animal, upon and growth, remained to us all a strange mysplant. Various stimuli which exist in the world, such as heat, development, He instanced the egg, of which a late eminent physiolight, and electricity, were briefly alluded to in transitu. The tery. had well said, that the life within was asleep." What called all logist in to conclusion, earnestly lecturer, upon pursue scientific researches with diligence, patience, and perseverance. was there in the constituents of this egg that should lead us, He looked upon the medical profession as one of the most high a priori, to suspect its seemingly inert mass of albumen, oil, to be able of any ulterior change, save that of and noble to which man can apply himself, but nevertheless it sulphur, &c., became degraded unless its members looked to relieve the decomposition, to which it was notoriously so prone ? And a day or two of incubation suffices for the incipient prosufferings of humanity as their great end and aim. The lec- yet duction in its depth of bloodvessels, a few days more for that turer was very warmly applauded. of a palpitating vascular system, and a few weeks for the development of a living creature, marvellously perfect after its YORK HOSPITAL SCHOOL OF MEDICINE. kind. Could the re-arrangement of cells and their conversion into fibre serve to explain all these wondrous phenomena ? INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS BY DR. SWAINE. The lecturer then proceeded to advert generally to the cell THE lecturer commenced his address by returning thanks, theory, and its bearing, not on physiology alone, but upon on his own behalf, and especially of that of the students, who every pathological change of structure-forming the closest connecting link between pathology and its confederate science. were more numerous than for many years past, for the encousought to define the utility of chemistry and of botany Having of their himself at seniors. He addressed then raging presence to the successful study of medicine, Dr. Swaine concluded once to the former class, affirming that, viewed in its loftier thus :-Lastly, all these natural sciences, to be effectually sense, the profession which they had chosen for their own was taught, require a rigid classification; and hereby, again, their but t
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