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DR. BRAINARD'S ADDRESS
CANDIDATES
DEGREES AND  LICENSES,
MEDICAL INSTITUTION OF YALE COLLEGE,
JANUARY 21, 1840.
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ANNUAL  ADDRESS




          TO THE




     CANDIDATES
DEGREES  AND LICENSES,
MEDICAL INSTITUTION OF YALE COLLEGE,




           JANUARY 21, 1840.



                       V
       BY  DYAR T. BRAINAR-D, M. D.

          MEMBER OP THE BOARD OP EXAMINATION.
PUBLISHED AT THE REQUEST OF THE CLASS.  ^
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PRINTED BY B. L. HAMLEN.



        1840. 
 
ADDRESS.
   No aphorism is perhaps better established than this, that
 " art is long and life is short;" and of all arts, that of reliev-
 ing human suffering and prolonging human life is probably
 the longest;  and any arts or sciences that will  effect either
 or both of these objects,  must commend themselves to every
 man of feeling and judgment.
   There are  many  sciences, and some of them  immediately
 auxiliary to the science  of medicine, that may be pursued
 with  perfect certainty of correct  results.  In  short, every
 science can be, where the ground we start from is fully known
 and all its minutiae  are embraced in our view.  Hence arises
 the accuracy of mathematical reasoning—every arc, every
 line, every angle,  is perfectly definite;  every increment or
 decrement is governed  by some known and fixed ratio, and
 all its data are as fully within the grasp of the mathemati-
 cian's mind  as the compasses are in his hand.  It is true,
 with all his means he must exercise intense application ; all
 his ideas which  he may  have occasion  for must be kept in
 perfect order, and in this way he arrives from one truth to
 another to a true conclusion.
  Medicine, however, is a different science.  Here  we have
 not always those accurate definitions which at once embrace
the whole object and exclude every other.  Even man that
we operate upon, and for whose good we pursue our science,
 we are unable to define to our satisfaction, and  his diseases
 refuse, in many instances, to  be bounded and hedged in by
such walls  and barriers as nosologists have attempted to es-
tablish.   The merest tyro can tell  you what is a circle, but
learned physicians  dispute about the definition of a fever.
It is our province to examine  and investigate the laws of ani-
mal life,  and still we have difficulty in defining an animal. 
4
Nature presents herself to our view,  and at first all appears
plain and simple ; but a closer inspection at once satisfies us
that much is concealed from our sight—bounds are set to our
researches,  and she says at  once,  "hitherto shalt thou come
but no farther."   All physicians regret that their art is rather
a conjectural than a perfect one, and that a disease  is some-
thing to be cured by probable means, rather than to be sub-
dued  with certainty by the efforts of reason.  We should
however always depend on our  inductions,  whether  they
relate to disease or any thing else,  when the grounds we start
from  are fully known and perfectly understood;  but in nu-
merous diseases there will be many inaccessible points, about
which we are undecided, and here conjecture  must occupy
the place of argument, and probability that of fact.
  Here the object of the physician should be to discover as
much  truth in relation to the case as possible ;  and for  this
purpose he should not reason like  one who has an opponent,
and endeavor to  gain a victory at  the expense of truth ;  nei-
ther should he reason like one who has none,  endeavoring to
make that very plausible to himself which is  not so satisfac-
tory to others; but he  should impartially exercise his whole
mind,  give every fact its due  consideration,  examine  thor-
oughly the grounds of his conclusions,  and  be satisfied as
far as possible.  In some respects  his task is like the mathe-
matician's, and were his starting points always as well estab-
lished, his results would  be equally conclusive.   Some phy-
sicians have written on metaphysics, and more have resorted
to that science in their ordinary communications  and inter-
course with each other; but I would  say with  deference,
for my means  of knowledge on that point have been limited,
that very few  have distinguished  themselves  in that depart-
ment.   Our field is in the natural sciences ; and if we seek
for distinguished authors in any of them we shall find them
among our medical brethren.   We have nothing  to do with
metaphysical subtleties. Obscurities thrown over some points,
and all the light of our  minds drawn to a focus on others,
will not aid us, when facts rather than  arguments stand in 
5
our way.  If a man argues for victory,  (and this is almost
invariably the case when two argue together,) the whole ar-
mament  of  logic is called in requisition; syllogism meets
syllogism—the horns of one dilemma are locked in those of
another,  and arguments on the  shoulders of demonstration
meet each other with all the impetus and momentum of ap-
proaching locomotives.  Of disputations of this kind, I must
confess that physicians have had their share ; and I think I
may say, that  from the time of Hippocrates to the present,
the disciples of different schools, and the advocates of differ-
ent theories have been constantly coming into collision.  I
would not here, even were it in my power,  attempt to enu-
merate the  different medical  theories which  from time to
time have been offered to the world, or even state the grounds
on which some of  them have been founded.   Many were
highly extravagant,  and still, there are but few from which
important materials for a correct system of physic have not
been derived.  I need but refer you to the Galenists and the
Chemists, the  Dogmatists  and  the Empirics,  the humoral
pathologists and their  adversaries, and  then to call to your
minds our present theory of physic.   In seeking for vegeta-
ble remedies,  Medea, in her dragon car, did not visit places
more remote,  mountains more  rough, and  plains more vast
and solitary, than  are many  of  those regions which furnish
a large portion of our vegetable remedies;  and Paracelsus
himself  would feel  as though he had been for  a long time a
truant from  his own school,  were he to see  but half of the
chemical medicines in our present Pharmacopoeia.   The
truth is,  in  our days chemistry and botany  have  united to-
gether, and giants  are their progeny.  At  this  age of the
world, if we are satisfied from frequent observation, that any
given remedy will with certainty relieve a  particular symp-
tom, or cure a particular disorder, we do not enter into all the
whys and wherefores of its modus operandi, we do not first
endeavor to bend it to some cherished  theory of our own;
we may and  should inquire  whether particular  symptoms
should be arrested,  and whether worse ones will not follow. 
6
In short, we should know exactly what we want to do, and
if this remedy will do it we use it at once.  We rejoice that
there are some specifics, and we wish there were more ; but
it unfortunately happens, that  for  the majority of diseases
there are none ; here we  resort to all the  remote  and proxi-
mate causes ; here anatomy and physiology direct us to all
the organs and  their functions to see the  nature and charac-
ter of the difficulty—where the  seat of the trouble is, and
where  the danger is the  greatest,  and there we apply our
force.  To the humoral pathologists we are also indebted for
a portion of  our present medical notions.   It is  true we do
not adopt any of their  extravagant ideas ; we do not speak
of the fluids as being either acid or alkaline ; we do not wait
in a violent fever for fermentation and concoction, and then
proceed to discharge  the peccant  matter;  but I believe most
physicians, under one pretense or another, do and will have
regard to the state of the fluids.  The late  Dr. Hosack, in the
treatment of fever, lays it down as one of the most impor-
tant  indications, to  obviate any tendency to putrefaction in
the fluids.  From those who  adopted the expectant system,
and maintained that  nature effected the cure—who advoca-
ted the doctrine of an efficient vis medicatrix naturae, we
have derived some   useful information.  This is  probably
more manifest in  our  present treatment of wounds,  where
we discard all stimulating balsams and  salves,  and do noth-
ing but remove all impediments and keep the parts in conti-
guity.   And here  I would remark, that it is astonishing the
medical faculty should  have been so long in establishing the
present method of treating wounds.
   Ambrose Pare,  the inventor of the  ligature, accidentally
found out that stimulating balsams, heat hot and poured into
gun-shot wounds, might safely be omitted, and that under a
more feeble  plan of medication,  the wounded would be ea-
sier and recover sooner.  About his time,  too, a very valua-
ble sympathetic salve was  discovered,  which  was applied,
not to the wound, but to  the instrument which made it, and
if you only cleansed the wound, stopped the hemorrhage, 
7
and kept the sides in contact, it worked wonders, in incised
wounds, especially if you did not from day to day examine
with a probe to see how it progressed.   But this plan was too
superstitious, and  was accordingly rejected by the learned
until the time of John Bell, who adopted all of it except the
salve, which he probably had forgotten.
   But besides wounds, we sometimes see disorders that are
best cured by being let alone, or at any rate by giving advice
rather than medicine. Cases of dyspepsia are not un frequent,
where abstinence from excessive  eating  and drinking, will
effect a cure with more certainty than emetics and cathartics,
followed by tonics and stimulants; and in the convalescence
from many diseases, we occasionally do harm by attempting
to accelerate the salutary operations of nature.
   There was a time when it was considered philosophical to
explain unintelligible things in unintelligible language,  but
this method of philosophizing was set at  naught by Bacon.
He drove the learned back to their first principles; he taught
philosophical builders to look  to  their foundations, and in
rearing their edifice, to place no  stones except on  such as
were permanent and solid.  Boerhaave was a disciple of his
school, and he formed his system  of physic, from such  frag-
ments of others, as would answer a builder's  use.  Much of
his material was taken from Hippocrates and Sydenham, and
if it be said he too much favored  the humoral pathology, he
only used it as a cement to consolidate  his  materials.  At
that period,  the structure  was not completed,  and to  this
time it remains unfinished.   Dr. Cullen, whose descriptions
of diseases will forever  remain as a monument to  his  well
earned fame,  it is true, added  but little to the theory of
physic, but he abstracted much that could be safely omitted.
His critical  eye detected much  which was  defective, and
much which from its weight produced weakness rather  than
strength.  He seized the Materia Medica  and  wrung it like
a sponge—he entered the hall of the  apothecary and swept
it as with a  besom.  Every thing which  former experience
had established he left—every thing useless or doubtful was 
8
thrown among the rubbish.   Can  it be wondered at, that
some  things  valuable and precious were also thrown out ?
These things we are now seeking  and daily find.   When
Cullen was in his zenith, Brown appeared in the firmament,
and disregarding all orbits but his own,  he shone for a time
like a splendid meteor, and when he set, he left  behind him
a train of light, which still continues to illuminate the med-
ical horizon.
  His theory is remarkably well calculated to  satisfy those
who study physic only as a  science,  but  unfortunately, it
does not afford so much aid to those who  practice  it as it
promises.  Its influence  however is great,  and it  has pro-
duced important changes in the treatment of many diseases.
The lancet and other depleting and evacuating remedies, are
not now used to that  extent as formerly, and we now  be-
lieve  there are some diseases which do not require a very
decided antiphlogistic  course.   There have  been a  number,
who since the time of Brown  have attempted to modify, im-
prove or entirely change previously established medical prin-
ciples, and I believe we  may ultimately derive some good
effects from their labors;—time, however, must determine.
  The profession, ever anxious to benefit their  fellow men,
will avail themselves of  all facts, which may be the  results
of the experiments of  the bold and adventurous, and of all
sound reasoning  which the zealous  and sanguine  may em-
ploy in support of their views.
  I have thus endeavored to give you a faint outline  of  the
present state of medicine, and the proper theory, if such it
may be called, (selected as it is from portions and fragments
of others,) which I think may be safely pursued.  It makes
no pretensions, it claims no infallibility.  If some of its parts
are defective, its conservative plan will  produce a remedy ;
and if there is any where a deficiency, its tendency is to sup-
ply itself, even from its enemies.   There is, I agree, an eclec-
tic character about it, and there are many who would not be
so catholic  or tolerant in their views.  It  is however  the
plan which on reflection I choose, and  I must  believe that 
                            9

all  those  who would adopt the shortest, the easiest, and the
most certain means of accomplishing their ends, will agree
with me.
  The profession, gentlemen, which you have chosen, is one
of  very great responsibility, and  it imposes on  you great
anxiety and great labor, both mental and  bodily.   Hence-
forward, if you continue in it, most of your time must be de-
voted to study and contemplation.   With  distressing  scenes
you will have to become familiar—disease  will baffle your
best laid plans of action, and pestilence which walketh in
darkness will set you at defiance.  You are doomed  to see
pain and  anguish, misery and death, without the power of
affording relief.   There is,  however, another and more pleas-
ant view of the  picture, which will reconcile you to all you
may have to encounter.   The  resources of medicine  are
great, and you  will have  the pleasure of  seeing numerous
diseases submit to your skill.   You will enter dwellings
where you will  see pain and distress,  fear  and apprehension,
and will  convert all  into ease and  happiness,—tears  into
smiles,  fear into hope, pain and agony  into health  and
strength.   These are the  rich rewards for your hard  toils
and troubles, and they can be gathered in as  great abund-
ance from the humblest cot,  as from the most splendid man-
sion.   The consciousness of having relieved pain and distress,
of  having averted imminent danger,  and  of having cured
threatening  and violent disease,  by prudent and judicious
means,  is a compensation greater  than the opulent can  be-
stow.   For this  reward, how many  do you see, the most
eminent in our profession, laboring with the most persevering
zeal and the most untiring industry.   Their labors, it is true,
are for the most part required by the wealthy,  but let them
get once engaged, and wealth and poverty are immediately
forgotten—gold in all its forms loses its power.  It can neither
advance nor retard them in their pursuit.  In this  enterprise
the young physician can always  engage to  advantage.  In
all  large towns the poor  are  his first  patients; but  let not
the proud and haughty sneer.  His diligence and attention
                            2 
10
are more than an equivalent for the  extra  skill  and limited
attendance, which his more experienced brother could bestow,
and his labor will surely meet with its reward.
  Minor  troubles you are destined to encounter, and smaller
compensation you are destined  to receive.  You will some-
times be  censured when  you do right and applauded when
you are entitled to no praise.  You will find the majority of
mankind not always the best judges of medical ability, and
hence  it is, that  so many pretenders gain reputation and
wealth by their cunning and address.  This cannot be easily
avoided or very cheerfully submitted to j but the best con-
solation for you will be always so to act, as to be fairly enti-
tled to your own commendation.   But however easy this may
seem at first view, it will take much exertion on  your part
to effect it.  And the first requisite I shall  mention is indus-
try, which will  do more for the  advancement of any person,
than the  young and inexperienced will  believe.   This is a
subject,  as we  all know, which is always held up to them,
and for the most part it makes an impression in proportion to
their ages, and the older they grow, the firmer will be their
belief  in it, which is sometimes not fully established,  until
increased years have rendered its truth of but  little conse-
quence to  them.   All  I can say is,  the sooner a young man
believes it the better.
   The effect of this truth has been so great, that many dis-
tinguished for high talents and extensive acquirements, have
doubted  the advantage  of genius.  Well they may, if they
see it go  hand in hand with indolence.   But industry to pro-
duce  its  best effect, should  be properly directed.  The read-
ing of one medical book and then another, in the shortest pos-
sible space of time, without regard to system or some definite
object, is not the  best way of  gaining the reward  of your
labors.   A better method is, to take up a subject and read the
best authors, and compare them.  Never be in a hurry, but
always be attentive, and always have the object of pursuit in
view. 
11
  In attendance on your patients,  endeavor to  understand
their disorders fully.   Make such examinations as will afford
desirable information, and such inquiries only as will throw
light on the case, and make them in intelligible language and
in some kind of order, so that if you are interrupted  by a long
statement of a case of some one else, (a very frequent sort of
episode by the way, and which requires not a little good na-
ture and patience to endure,) on its conclusion, you can easily
pursue your course.   In the  examination of patients, much
tact and skill are required, and the young physician  will often
be surprised, to see another of more experience than himself,
when  called in consultation, learn some very important fact
in relation to the case, not so much from his superior knowl-
edge, but simply because the elder had made some  examina-
tion or some inquiry, which the younger had omitted.
   Every person who practices medicine,  should  not only
have five senses, but should use them.   If people who have
eyes but see not, and ears but hear not, do not stand high in
morals, their chance for distinction in  physics will be small.
As much can sometimes be learned from the sound of a pa-
tient's voice, as from  the words  he utters,  and the eye can
discover  colors, shapes,  sizes and positions,  which we have
no proper language to describe; but it  is unnecessary for me
to  enumerate  the various powers and capabilities of the
senses.
   Another means of directing your labor to advantage, is to
keep a journal of all important cases, in which all the symp-
toms,  prescriptions and medicines  with their operations,
whether  salutary or  otherwise, should be recorded.   This
you can  easily do at  the commencement  of your practice,
and it will give you more precision in examining  and more
accuracy in prescribing.  You will also derive  great benefit
from it, by comparing the cases recorded,  with such as may
arise.   Besides, it is the  best method of learning,  what the
ancient physicians considered of so much importance, the
Lsedentia and Juvantia.  Never give a new or  original pre-
scription  without taking a copy.  If it succeeds,  it will be 
12
wanted again ; if it does not, you should know it.  It is of
some value to know the inefficiency of some  things;  it is
of more to know when they produce injury.  To err is hu-
man,  but he who learns nothing from  his  own errors,  will
never make a physician.
  This plan is also the best, to gain that very desirable qual-
ification,  experience, or the knowledge of truth from personal
observation.   It is generally thought that those whose prac-
tice has been the most  extensive are experienced  in propor-
tion ;  other things being equal, it is true.  But it is also true,
that one man may gain more experience in  fifty cases, than
another will in a hundred, if  the first resorts to all practica-
ble means of understanding and remembering them and the
other does not.
  Another advantage resulting from this practice, is,  that it
enables you to detect the errors which authors and others oc-
casionally commit.  Do  not, however,  be  too certain  that
your own observation is always correct, when you are disap-
pointed in the effect of an agent recommended by another,
for it may be that he used it  under circumstances which his
eye could detect as most favorable to its beneficial influence.
I believe most physicians who have been long in practice,
have their favorite  medicines, which they will use to better
advantage than they can others equally good, and simply be-
cause they are more accustomed to them.
  But there are some medical men who have written on dis-
orders they never saw, and who have  advised remedies, of
whose action in such cases they were ignorant.  This plan,
I think, will enable you better to distinguish between medi-
cal scholars and medical practitioners; the former of  whom
write too many books, and the latter too few.  Most  of our
standard  authors, however, can be relied on  ; and if all, like
Sydenham,  Cullen, and Heberden, had only  written from
their own personal knowledge and  observation,  the  profes-
sion would have been much benefited.
  While I thus allude to the errors which some medical wri-
ters have committed,  allow  me  to put you on your guard 
13
against like  faults.   Men of  ardent minds—of deep study,
and extensive knowledge—men who would shrink from any
deliberate mis-statements, have  been  so bound  up in their
profession ;  so anxious to establish their views and theories,
because they fully believed them ;  so desirous to gain a high
standing,  as public benefactors, that their eyes have become
dazzled  by  their anticipated  splendor.  They  have seen
either falsely, or through deceptive media, and have reported
accordingly.
   Some practicing  physicians  we occasionally see,  who,
from the same  ardent temperament, are inclined to exagger-
ate.   Listen to them, and you hear tales of terror.  Their
language  puts  all diseases they encounter, in  their worst
forms, and all accidents they are called to, are of the most
penetrating, compound, lacerated,  and contused description.
Their sanguine temperament gives to their narrations a san-
guineous character.   Though  their patients  often recover,
still this disposition  to see things in their worst, and most dan-
gerous forms, will many times do  injury.   Such  physicians,
besides talking to their patients of  slight symptoms, as being
the  harbingers of greater ; of suggesting  to them difficulties
which may arise, and of  directing their minds to particular
organs, which, if deranged,  portend the greatest danger, are
 induced to  resort, without sufficient cause, to the most ener-
 getic and decisive medication.
   It is not too much to say, that such management would be
more apt to make a  well person sick, than a sick person well.
Your course should be different; you should seek after truth,
and on all  proper occasions  communicate it.  If you have
any  disposition to exaggeration, look to it, and be on  your
 guard against it.  In visiting the sick, give them all the en-
 couragement which the facts will warrant, showing them or
 their friends, where there is hope, and explaining to them,
 as far as you can, whatever  is  obscure.   Avoid all mystery,
 and all affectation of gloomy solemnity.   Let  your manner
 be cheerful, composed, and candid.  This alone  will relieve
 much distress.   How many are  the cases of accidents, to
 which a physician is called,  where the  whole house presents 
14
a  scene of confusion and fear! and how  often is it in his
power to establish order, and allay all their  apprehensions at
once, by calmly examining into  the extent of the mischief,
and  showing how easily it may be remedied ;  and doing it
too in such a way, that the very sound of his voice, and ex-
pression of his countenance, will be received as good  indor-
sers for the correctness of his opinions!
   As you are now about to establish yourselves in your pro-
fession, the relation in which you will stand to various mem-
bers of the community, will be a peculiar one.
   Numerous good services are constantly interchanged by all;
but as physicians, your duties  and services will be rendered
when they are  most wanted, and, of course, when they are
most felt.   From time to  time,  one individual  of a family,
and then another, will be sick, and require your attendance.
In the natural course of things, and by judicious manage-
ment, they will recover, or, if  occasionally one dies, and you
have been faithful and attentive, and have done all in your
power to afford relief, you will have father, mother, and chil-
dren, all looking to  you for protection in sickness, and im-
plicitly obeying your directions.  This confidence will be ex-
tended to other things, and you will be their adviser in other
matters, and  will often become acquainted with  their pro-
jects and misfortunes, their failings and their faults.
   But it is when people are reduced by sickness, and  irrita-
ted and almost exhausted by pain, weakened in mind as well
as body, that you will most observe them to say  and do a
thousand  things, of but little consequence in themselves,
which should not be repeated.   It is here, too, where  the
physician  sees and learns many  trifling  incidents,  which, if
generally known, might mortify the inmates of the family.
   He should, therefore, be a man of the strictest  honor and
prudence,  and if affectation be  ever admissible,  he should
pretend  not to  observe  trifles, which, if it was thought he
perceived, might wound the feelings of others.   His position
gives him great opportunities, either accidentally or confiden-
tially, of observing and learning much,  which, under all or-
dinary circumstances, he should keep to himself.   He should 
15
take no advantage of his peculiar situation—he should do no
act but what was consistent with  honor and honesty, and
never charge extravagant fees, because he had a patient who
dreaded his tongue.
   Other things I might say, if time would  allow.  I might
speak  of benevolence  and firmness, and I might  present to
you all the virtues for  your acceptance,  and all the vices for
your rejection.   It is customary, on occasions like this, to in-
troduce and enlarge upon all the rules of policy, and to point
out all the avenues to full practice and  eminence; but this
has been done again and again,  by those who have already
reached the goal.  It is  also customary,  gentlemen, on such
occasions as this, to mention  morality among the  qualifica-
tions necessary to secure to you competence and respectabil-
ity in  your profession.   It is customary to paint her in all her
beauties, to adorn her with all her emblems of power, and to
 display her with all her implements of utility.  It is custom-
 ary to show that her name is wisdom, and  that all her ways
 are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.  In as-
 semblies, whether composed of the young or old, of scholars
 or citizens, among all classes and all denominations, morality
 is held up as the greatest temporal good.
    A high standard of morality is insisted on,  as being abso-
 lutely essential to the proper  exercise  of the most extensive
 acquirements, and the greatest and best of  the mental facul-
 ties.    Without it, knowledge and  learning and  art, quick
 perception, brilliant genius and sound judgment,  would be
 curses to their possessors, and to all within their  influence.
 The least departure  from it,  is marked with  danger; one
 immoral act leads to another, and what  at  first might be re-
 garded as trivial, in the end acquires a force almost irresisti-
 ble.   But on this subject and in this  place, I  should  not
 dwell, for here you have men whose  duty  and pleasure  it is,
 and whose ability is equal to the task of making  such deep
 and lasting impressions as will not be obliterated.   With the
 hands of skillful and practiced masters they delineate morality
 in all her forms, with all her grace and  all  her purity;  they
 contrast her with vice and hold up to view the startling  pic- 
16
ture.   It is from the labors of such men, that so much good
has resulted to the community, and it is from attending to
their kind admonitions and practicing their precepts, that the
inhabitants of this city derive much of their prosperity.  It
is a high standard of morality, which  constitutes  much of
the capital of its citizens.  It is this, so ably taught  and so
generally practiced,  which fills yonder walls,  and attracts
from all points the youth of our country.  Without it, they
would crumble and  decay.   Science and literature  would
turn to marble our Alma Mater, and she would stand like
another Niobe, cold and inanimate, showing to a proud world
what she once had been, and  what she then was.
  Other towns and cities  may boast of their distinguished
individuals, but this city has been, and now is,  ornamented
with men preeminent for  their learning and talents, their
sound morality and their pure religion, which the truly great
and good are proud to imitate.  Here may statesmen, law-
yers and divines, physicians  and  philosophers, mechanists
and mathematicians,  look for those  who have added lustre to
their professions.  Need I mention a Sherman or a Whitney;
need I call to your minds the great luminaries of Yale ; need
I remind you of those eminent physicians and surgeons, now
departed, who have held professorships in this branch of the
institution, or need I refer you  to  those  philosophers and
scholars who have scattered  knowledge and science from
the other ; or shall I  mention  its late venerated head, whose
eloquence reechoes from the shores  of Europe,  whose wis-
dom and learning were the admiration of millions, and whose
piety pointed the path to heaven, and led the way.  But why
should I attempt  his  eulogy?   Thousands there are, who
once filled yonder halls, who sound  his  praises.  Hundreds
there are who shall write,  in indelible characters, the  name
of Dwight  on  the lasting monuments of their country's
fame.  But, gentlemen, although these have passed and gone,
they have gone like the prophet, and each has cast  his man-
tle behind him, which has fallen on  the  worthy who have
arisen to supply their places, and you still have for  your in-
structors, the learned, the great, and the good. 
 
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