IlfMNOVMI ADDBEBB 
DELIVERED 
BEFORE THE CLASS 
OF THE 
9 <? ~ 
‘ a>' ' ' ' 
On TUESDAY Evening, October 6, 1868, 
BY 
HEOPHILUS JA. D. 
Professor of Medical Diseases of Women. 
CINCINNATI: 
ROBERT CLARKE & CO., Printers, 
1868. INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS 
DELIVERED BEFORE THE 
O L A. S S 
OF THE 
Medical Society of Ohio 
On Tuesday Evening, Oct. 6, 1868. 
BY 
THEOPHILUS PARVIN, M. D., 
PROFESSOR OF MEDICAL DISEASES OF WOMEN. PRESS OP 
jjobert & (fa. 
No. Go West Fourth Street, 
Cincinnati.  
Cincinnati, O., October 28, 1868. 
T. Parvin, M. D., Prof. Medical and Surgical Diseases of 
Women, Medical College of Ohio— 
Sir: 
The Class of 1868—9, Adedical 
College of Ohio, appointed the undersigned a Committee to 
request for publication, a copy of the Salutory delivered by 
you at the beginning of the present session. 
Hoping for a favorable reply, we remain, very respectfully, 
Tours, 
O. H. Saxton, 
W. W. VlNNEDGE, 
P. C. Holland, 
Committee. 
Indianapolis, November 2, 1868. 
Gentlemen : 
Tour kind favor, soliciting a copy 
of the Address delivered to you, has been received. Tour 
request is complied with. With kindest regards, 
I am, yours, /r«/y, 
Theophilus Parvin. 
To Messrs. O. H. Saxton, Z/7. Vinnedge, P. C. 
Holland. THE 
$>itfijectit)e %iii\ix\ of g&e&tcitte. THE 
Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
The flight of migratory birds southward, and the fall 
of sere and yellow leaves earthward, do not more 
clearly proclaim the autumn and predict the winter, 
than the annual assembling of Medical Students in the 
great medical centers. Uniform as the procession of the 
seasons, or the alternations of day and night, regular 
as the rythmic movements of the heart, or as the flow 
and ebb of the sea, do these student waves sweep inward 
to the fountains of professional learning, and thence 
outward a river of health and life, we would hope, to 
humanity. The water from the mountains, flowing 
seaward impregnated with organic and inorganic impu- 
rities, is gathered from the ocean’s expanse into the 
bosom of the clouds, only to fall in fertilizing showers 
upon the thirsty land. And so these medical schools, 
now bustling with activity and thronged with students, 
incapable of creating, can only refine, purify and qual- 
ify such material as is given them, and then distribute 
it for the benefit of man. 
By the voice of my colleagues, and with heartiest The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
8 
pleasure, I welcome the students to-night to the Medi- 
cal College of Ohio. The oldest institution of the kind 
in the great West, she claims to be the peer of the best 
that have sprung up since her foundations were laid ; 
but she disclaims all antagonism toward other colleges 
—let not a word of envious comparison or disparage- 
ment be heard. Nay, let us all, to every well-conducted 
medical college, here or elsewhere, to every competent 
and faithful medical teacher here or elsewhere, let us 
earnestly say God-speed; and let the only rivalry be 
who can do most for the promotion of medical science, 
and for the relief of human suffering. 
By the memory of her long line of illustrious teachers, 
whose fame is her heritage; by the vast army of stu- 
dents that she has nourished and brought up, and sent 
forth for the healing of the people, and whose useful- 
ness, successes, and distinctions redound not a little to 
her glory; by the almost half century of her honored 
life, does the Medical College of Ohio, receiving you 
to-night as her children, pledge herself to be no ungra- 
cious step-mother, but a mother indeed. And I am 
sure 'you will find, on the part of those who are to be 
your teachers, fidelity in their instructions, and the 
warmest sympathy with you in whatever pertains to 
your professional interests. 
On an occasion like this, the celebrated Abernethy 
entered the lecture room of St. Bartholomew’s Hos- 
pital, glanced around the benches crowded with young 
men just commencing their professional studies, and 
then involuntarily exclaimed in an audible tone, “ God The Suhjectice Utility of Medicine. 
9 
pity you all! ” It would seem ungracious to meet you, 
so many being at the threshold of their professional 
studies, when the chords of your hearts are vibrating 
with pleasure at this new life, and when many are look- 
ing at the vista of future years lighted up with ambi- 
tious hopes, with so sad a prayer, to utter a single word 
causing discord to fall upon such music, and darkness 
upon such imagined glory. 
And yet, were one who knows somewhat of the 
mysterious revelations which come from the Delphic 
caves of human life, to forecast your future, he would 
not picture it all song and sunshine; he might tell of 
defeats as well as triumphs—of failures as well as of 
successes—of glooms as well as of glories; while unto 
each one it would be said: Lo, many a hope which 
you entertain shall fail of fruition, while many another, 
now dearly cherished, will, when realized, be but dust 
and ashes on your lips; thornless or fadeless flowers to 
be plucked and fashioned into chaplets for the brow 
are not found; life is no bright summer day in the 
pleasant shade, but often the bleak winter, the starless 
night, the stifling heat and parching thirst of Sahara 
sands, the fierce ocean storm. Kay, doing your best as 
a faithful and successful worker, peradventure you may 
not escape the railing of malicious tongues—your abil- 
ities may be disparaged, your motives misconstrued, 
your reputation maligned, and obstacles and impedi- 
ments may be purposely placed in your way, just as 
cruel savages would impede the progress of their hap- 
less victim when running the gauntlet for dear life. 10 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
Of the hundreds of medical students now assembled in 
the various cities of our country, very few of them will 
ever attain opulence, still fewer fame. And in view of 
the struggles, the difficulties and disappointments, the 
trials and sufferings in mind, body, and estate, which 
are the almost inevitable lot of those who engage in the 
practice of medicine, may we not say in all truth and 
reverence, God pity you all! 
And now does any one tell me, you have sadly 
darkened my ideal of professional life, and crushed the 
hopes that were throbbing in my bosom. If so, it was 
to have him turn unto a higher and purer ideal 
which no earth-clouds can permanently obscure, and 
to seek a faithful .hope which shall be an anchor to the 
soul, holding it fixed and firm amidst all the drifting 
tides of adversity and disappointment, and unmoved 
by all the rude storms of fate. It is my desire to show 
that Medical Study and Practice meet the highest pur- 
pose of earthly existence. 
How can I live a true and noble life ? What is 
that design ? These are questions that every thought- 
ful mind asks itself. The final end of man’s exist- 
ence is the glory of God. “ But,” as observed by 
Sir William Hamilton in his argument for the study 
of mental philosophy, “ it is manifest, indeed, that 
man, in so far as he is a mean for the glory of God,* 
* The German philosopher Jacobi, gives expression to the same 
thought as to the purpose of man’s existence: 
“The wise man is known by the choice of the ends which he pro- 
poses to himself; the prudent man is known by the choice of the 
means by which he attains his ends, whether they be wise or unwise. The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
11 
must be an end unto himself, for it is only in the 
accomplishment of his own perfections, that, as a crea- 
ture, he can manifest the glory of his Creator. Though, 
therefore, man, by relation to God, be but a mean for 
that very reason, in relation to all else he is an end. 
Wherefore, now speaking of him exclusively in his 
natural capacity and in his temporal relations, I say it is 
manifest that man is, by nature, necessarily an end unto 
himself—that his perfection and happiness constitute the 
goal of his activity, to which he tends and ought to 
tend when not diverted from this his general and native 
destination, by peculiar and accidental circumstances.” 
From this the distinguished philosopher goes on to 
show how the vast majority of men are so diverted by 
the necessities of procuring a livelihood—man convert- 
ing himself into an instrument, working for others so 
that with the remuneration given him he can procure 
the means of living : “ Thus, in the actualities of social 
life, each man, intended of being solely an end unto 
himself—instead of being able to make everything sub- 
ordinate to that full and harmonious development of 
his individual faculties, in which his full perfection and 
his true happiness consist—is, in general, compelled to 
degrade himself into the mean or instrument toward 
the accomplishment of some end external to himself, 
and for the benefit of others.” Now the studies which 
a man engages in have either absolute or relative utility, 
But how are the ends themselves to he known ? Is the choice of the 
wisest to decide? Then we can not say, as we have just said, that 
the wise man is known hy his ends. Semper idem atque idem nolle. 
But what is this one and the same which is to he always willed? 
It is the glory of God.” 12 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
the one referring to man’s perfection as an end, the 
other as an instrument. Barely do these utilities coin- 
cide ; nay, they are often antagonistic. But such union 
does occur to a remarkable degree in Medicine; that is, 
he who faithfully studies it in all its varied range of 
knowledge, is thoroughly imbued with its spirit, labors 
to promote its progress, is promoting the harmonious 
development of all his powers, the symmetrical evolu- 
tion of his character, and is thus increasing his happi- 
ness and perfection, thereby realizing an j absolute 
utility ; at the same time he becomes a capable instru- 
ment for earning a livelihood—he is a bread-winner— 
and thus attains a relative utility, and this utility is of 
the greatest value to his fellow men. 
Lest any one may hesitate to accept fully, as the 
true theory of life, the views presented, let me rein- 
force it by a passage from Lord Bacon, and we will see 
how he concludes the glory of God, and the good of 
man’s estate the end of human learning: 
“ But the greatest error of all the rest, is the mistak- 
ing or misplacing of the last or furthest end of knowl- 
edge ; for men have entered into a desire of learning 
and knowledge—sometimes upon a natural curiosity 
and inquisitive appetite, sometimes to entertain their 
minds with vanity and delight, sometimes for orna- 
ment and reputation, sometimes to enable them to 
victory of art and contradiction, and most times for 
lucre and profession, and seldom sincerely to give a 
true account of their gift of reason to the benefit and 
use of man; as if there were sought in knowledge a The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
13 
couch whereupon to rest a searching and restless spirit, 
and a terrace for a wandering and variable mind to 
walk up and down with a fair prospect, or a tower of 
state for a proud mind to raise itself upon, or a fort or 
commanding ground for strife and contention, or a 
shop for profit and sale, and not a rich store house for 
the glory of the Creator, and for the relief of man’s 
estate.” Those final words of the Lord Chancellor: 
“ for the glory of God, and for the relief of man's estate,” 
how grandly they ring out! They ought to be written 
in the heart of every physician, and emblazoned on 
his life! 
Having now clearly before us the great purpose of 
man’s existence, let us next inquire what are the ele- 
ments of this immaterial nature, in regard of which 
alone he was wont to have been originally created in 
God’s image, and by the development of which he 
manifests God’s glory. 
“ Man is a being, intellectual, or thinking and know- 
ing ; moral, or willing and active; and (Esthetic, or 
feeling and enjoying.” To these three cardinal ele- 
ments of his nature correspond the true, the good, and 
the beautiful: knowledge, virtue, and enjoyment in the 
contemplation of the beautiful, make up the trinity of 
the soul’s needs. hTor can one be cultivated to the 
utter exclusion of the others, without marring the 
soul’s symmetrical and harmonious development, 
“ For Beauty, Good, and Knowledge are three sisters, 
That doat upon each other, friends to man, 
Living together under the same roof, 
And never can be sundered without tears.” 14 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
Considering the cardinal elements of man’s physical 
nature in the order in which they have been enu- 
merated, we have first to examine the influence which 
the Study and Practice of Medicine exert upon the 
intellectual culture of the individual, then upon his 
moral, and finally upon his aesthetic culture. 
Metaphysicians variously classify what are termed 
our mental powers, very much as hydrographers map 
the ocean—arbitrary lines drawn here and there. The 
mind is a unit, and what are called its various powers 
or faculties are simply modes of manifestation of that 
unit. However, accepting the ordinary division, it 
would be impossible to select a single faculty or power 
which the study of medicine cultivates to the exclu- 
sion of others. Observation, perception, comparison, 
memory, imagination, reflection, reason, judgment, 
etc., all are called into daily requisition. Medicine is 
a mental gymnasium in which the mind can be exer- 
cised in every direction and posture. This truth must 
be so obvious to a reflective mind, that we scarce need 
attempt its demonstration, nor even its illustration. 
There is one power, however, to which brief reference 
may be made, for if the assertion just made would be 
disputed on any ground, it would be on this: the 
value of imagination in the progress of our science, 
and in the duties of our art. That man of wonderful 
philosophic attainments and general knowledge, the 
late Mr. Buckle, in a lecture delivered in 1858, upon 
the Influence of Women in the Progress of Knowledge, 
asserts what every intelligent person must confirm, The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
15 
that women naturally prefer the deductive method of 
reasoning, while men, on the other hand, arrive at 
results by the slow process of induction. There are 
several reasons why women prefer the deductive or 
ideal method. And among these are: “they are more 
emotional, more enthusiastic, and more imaginative 
than men, they therefore live more in an ideal world, 
while men, with their colder, harder, and austerer 
organization, are more practical, and more under the 
dominion of facts, to which they consequently ascribe 
a higher importance.” 
Upon the basis of this very difference of methods 
of reasoning, as so ably presented by Mr. Buckle, an 
argument has been founded in a recent foreign jour- 
nal, against the admission of women to the medical 
profession, medicine—so we are daily taught—being 
purely an inductive science, while woman is a deductive 
reasoner. But it is foreign to our purpose to weigh 
this argument, only let us say that reasoning deduct- 
ively is not utterly forbidden in the progress of medi- 
cine, as it becomes more and more a science, and the 
imagination in its highest manifestations can be 
brought into play. In more than one of the sciences 
closely connected with ours, some of the most impor- 
tant laws have been discovered by deduction. Thus, 
in the very lecture just quoted, the author refers to the 
fact that the highest morphological generalization we 
possess concerning plants, was made by one of the 
greatest of poets, Goethe; and he made it not in spite 
of being a poet, but because he was a poet; his bril- 16 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
liant imagination, his passion for beauty, and his 
exquisite conception of form, supplied him with ideas, 
from which, reasoning deductively, he arrived at con- 
do sions by descent, not by ascent. 
But, without dwelling upon this point, we may 
assert that imagination is of daily use to the physician 
and to the surgeon. The scientific anatomist from a 
single bone constructs the skeleton, and “ bodies forth 
the form” of a thing unknown to others before; the 
painter from a single face harmoniously groups, in all 
the details of expression, coloring, etc., others about 
it; the poet from a single incident evolves a consistent 
life story; the physician must represent to his mind 
from certain ascertained facts, others which are only 
half seen or altogether concealed, all uniting in a pic- 
ture that shall be harmonious; the surgeon, every time 
his knife dissects the living tissues, reproduces from a 
few landmarks the very representations that he has 
studied in the dissecting room, modified by the pecu- 
liar conformation of the individual subject, and meet- 
ing the emergencies of the special case in hand. 
It is possible wre might go a step further, asserting 
that he who is incapable of great imaginative power, 
who is simply a cold and frigid intellect, forever grov- 
eling Gradgrind-like among dead facts, is not capable 
of taking the highest professional rank. 
There is another aspect in which we propose to con- 
sider the relations of medicine to intellectual culture. 
Its study, whether in books, at the bedside, or on the 
cadaver, is a study of truth. Now truth is food for The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
17 
the intellect ;* the mind was made to know, as the eye 
to see or the ear to hear, and by knowledge it grows 
and is invigorated. Not only so, but remembering the 
indissoluble bonds which bind our intellectual and 
moral natures in the unity of the human soul, truth 
and virtue are intimately connected—right thinking 
and right doing, correct knowledge and correct action; 
while, on the other hand, an intellect befogged with 
ignorance, beclouded with sophistries, inevitably mis- 
guides and corrupts the moral nature. The medical 
student has offered him a rich body of truths for the 
nutriment of his mind; the physician, in his daily 
practical investigations of disease, is a truth-seeker— 
error, falsehood, will satisfy neither his mind nor his 
conscience, nor, lowest of all, his interest. 
But again. It is not the acquisition of other men’s 
knowledge, but the grasping of the unknown, which 
imparts the highest pleasures and most develops the 
mind. New worlds for the ambitious warrior to con- 
quer ; new lands for the adventurous mariner to dis- 
cover ; new truths for the philosopher to unfold. The 
fleet-footed racer, as he speeds to the goal—the swift- 
winged bird, as he sweeps over us or soars to the clouds 
—have pleasure in the exercise of God-given power; 
and so man, in the exercise of his power in the con- 
quest of new fields of knowledge, and in the gathering 
of truths hitherto unknown. fDid the Almighty, 
* Rev. Dr. Thornwell’s Discourses on Truth. 
t This passage we find a different rendering of in “ The Prose 
Writers of Germany." In that given above we have followed Sir 
Wm. Hamilton, op. ext. 18 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
said Lessing, holding in one hand Truth, and in the 
other Search after Truth, deign to tender me the one I 
might prefer, in all humility, but without hesitation, 
I s’ould request Search after Truth. “The sciences 
always studied with the keenest interest are those in a 
state of progress and uncertainty; absolute certainty 
and absolute completion would be the paralysis of any 
study.” Now it is in just this condition of progress and 
uncertainty that medicine is found at present; it is, in 
many respects, uncertain, and we labor for increase of 
positive knowledge; it is essentially progressive—“the 
goal of to-day is the starting point of to-morrow.” In 
this progress it is the privilege and duty of all the 
members of the profession to participate, for there is 
no period in a physician’s history when he can cease to 
study; the medical student becomes a practitioner, but 
he is still a student. Jeremy Taylor has drawn a 
beautiful and striking picture of sympathy, which may 
be adapted to the mutual contributions of medical men 
to the increase of medical knowledge: “ Two torches 
do not divide but increase the flame; and though my 
tears are the sooner dried up when they run upon my 
friend’s cheeks in the furrows of compassion, yet when 
my flame hath kindled his lamp, we unite the glories, 
and make them radiant like the golden candlesticks 
that burn before the throne of God, because they shine 
by numbers, by union, and confederations of light and 
joy.” 
Let it not be imagined that if the practitioner living 
remote from our great cities does read, think, observe, The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
19 
reflect, study, he can accomplish nothing for the pro- 
fession at large. Even were this true, the exercise of 
his own powers, the development and growth of his 
own mind would be reward enough ; but, beside, the 
influence which such an one exercises upon the pro- 
fessional tone, and upon the professional status with 
the people, is invaluable. Undoubtedly those who live 
in our large cities have great advantages for the increase 
of their knowledge—large libraries and instruments 
available, hospital opportunities for studying disease, 
therapeutics and pathological changes; but at the same 
time, let us remember it is not the place and oppor- 
tunities that make the man, but his own heroic resolu- 
tion and indefatigable industry—the hare, conscious of 
her superior speed, sleeps on the way, while the tortoise 
slowly, patiently, persistently, and successfully, toils to 
the goal. “Only a country doctor” has sometimes 
been sneeringly said of one who was fitted to stand 
the peer in all that makes the truly noble physician of 
those whose location and circumstances have been 
much more favorable to professional culture. It was 
a *country doctor, who, in his rides through the pleasant 
lanes of Gloucester, thinking as he went, grasped that 
truth, and subsequently demonstrated it, which has 
been the greatest benefit medicine ever conferred upon 
humanity. Through all the world and through all the 
ages, the praise of Jenner shall not cease. 
We next inquire into the legitimate influence of 
medicine upon the individual’s moral culture. The 
* Lancet, 1861. 20 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
promotion of virtue—virtue in the heart and in the life 
—may be accepted as the evidence and the end of such 
culture. Virtue, virtus, the pith and essence of man- 
hood, we take to include the wise regulation of all the 
emotions, instincts, appetites, desires, feelings, pur- 
poses, et cetera, and the general just conduct of the 
individual life in all its relations to others, to society, 
and to God. Of course, we do not propose any 
elaborate ethical investigation, for time would not 
permit it; but chiefly by illustration to give a hurried 
sketch, or rather glimpses, of a great truth which 
should vitalize every medical life. We speak of. 
different manifestations of virtue as virtues, personal, 
social, Christian, et cetera. So, too, we specify, among 
others, temperance, chastity, charity, benevolence, phi- 
lanthropy, as virtues. Of course, as moralists assert, 
there is nothing virtuous or vicious in any appetite, 
desire, instinct, or emotion, or in certain physical acts, 
in themselves considered; it is the object which evokes 
them, the purpose in kind, or in degree, which invests 
them with moral qualities. 
Man has been endowed with a physical nature 
which is subject to certain laws, obedience to which 
secures in the main the healthful performance of all 
its functions, while violation of those laws brings its 
harvest of suffering, pain, discomfort, disease, organic 
changes, death—one or all. Nor does the body alone 
suffer, for our immaterial nature, whose instrument the 
body is of right, but whose lawless governor or cruel 
jailor it sometimes becomes, is affected by physical The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
21 
changes; physical disorder is often the expressive of 
obvious somatic changes, and we look for the mens 
Sana only in the corpore sano. Now, the physician 
studies these laws unto which our bodies have been 
made subject, and knows better than any one else the 
penalties which attend their transgression. In illus- 
tration, let us take the too familiar example of the use 
of alcoholic liquors. Such use has no moral quality in 
itself; on the one hand it may destroy, on the other, 
save life. But the physician has studied alcohol in its 
composition, its chemical characters, its combinations, 
its physiologic effects, its pathological results, and its 
therapeutic uses. We know that in some instances 
alcohol holds “such a swift enmity with the blood of 
man,” that fat globules take the place of normal ele- 
ments; that it singles out for its special action that 
which is the highest in the organization, the brain; 
that it may smite a man to death within an hour by 
meningeal hemorrhage, or by pulmonary apoplexy, 
or that it may make a man utterly insane as the 
fiercest inmate of Bedlam. Still more, the physician 
has studied not only acute, but chronic alcoholism,* in 
its lesions of motility—the trembling hand, the chorea, 
the epilepsy of drunkards, paresis, tonic spasms; in its 
lesions of sensibility, various disorders of general sensa- 
tion, hypersesthesia of special senses, or else the blunted 
taste or smell, the disordered eye or ear; the general 
depravation of organic life, with power so weakened 
that it soon succumbs to severe acute disorders; the 
*See Nouveau Dictionnaire, tome iii, p. 635. 22 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
disturbance and perversion of intelligence, the blunting 
of moral sensibility, hallucinations, delirium, mania; 
sleep no longer shedding its sweet influence upon the 
widely-staring and bloodshot eye, the darkness is 
bright with surrounding flames, and the night is thick 
with furious fiends, and murder and suicide may be 
the possible final acts of the horrid history. The 
physician, scalpel in hand, has searched out upon these 
sad and loathsome wrecks of humanity the patho- 
logical changes which alcohol has produced—in the 
stomach, inflammation, ulceration, local hypertro- 
phies, and contractions; in the liver, congestion, irri- 
tations, fatty degeneration, et cetera; in the kidney, 
various forms of what has been known as Bright’s dis- 
ease—lesions of which, according to Dr. Christison, 
three-fourths or four-fifths are found in drunkards; in 
the organs of respiration and of circulation, too, as 
well as in some other parts of the body, the evidences 
of this terrible poison may be found. He goes a step 
further. Studying the laws of hereditary transmission, 
he finds that the accursed thirst for intoxicating liquors 
may be the inheritance of the offspring of drunkards; 
or that such offspring will exhibit the evidences of a 
feeble vitality, and that they are liable to absolute 
mental or physical defects. 
How, can the medical man, in view of such a repre- 
sentation—and the picture falls immeasurably below 
the dread reality, not a tenth part of the terrible 
details have been presented—ever, in view of his pro- 
fessional studies and observations, be a drunkard? Hay, The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
will he not, both by example and precept, bear earnest 
witness against a vice which every year sweeps its 
thousands of victims into dishonored graves? 
So, too, in reference to sensualism, the living death of 
whatever is purest and noblest in human nature, the 
prolific source of physical sufferings, not in the individ- 
ual alone, but in others; in successive generations, too, 
illustrating the terrible law of retributive justice which 
visits the iniquities of the fathers upon the children, 
who better knows its legitimate character and conse- 
quences than the physician, and who will guard more 
sedulously against it than he? He, who in the 
daily exercise of his professional duties, needs a clear 
eye, a steady hand, an unclouded mind and a calm 
judgment can not, consistently with his high obliga- 
tions, suffer himself to be mastered by any instinct, 
appetite or passion. 
* Familiar with the degradations and imperfections of 
human nature, he is likewise familiar with its nobili- 
ties—lives sinking in the degradation and darkness, 
lives struggling up to the infinite light, lives hard, self- 
ish and unsympathetic, lives glowing with generous 
self-sacrifice and noble devotion—and thus his own 
soul, with this food for pity, and food for love and 
admiration, daily is purified and grows more catholic. 
The responsibilities which are imposed upon him, beget 
a corresponding degree of moral strength. Health, 
the greatest blessing of life, without which reputation, 
place, wealth and power are but mockeries, and honor 
and life itself are reposed with implicit faith in his 24 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
hands. Life—who can tell its value, cheaply as men 
sometimes estimate it? “Ah!” says De Quincey, 
“ what a vulgar thing does courage seem, when we see 
nations buying it and selling it for a shilling a day; 
ah ! what a sublime thing does courage seem when 
some fearful summons on the great deeps of life carries 
a man, as if running before a hurricane, up to the 
giddy crest of some tumultuous crisis, from which lie 
two courses, and a voice says to him audibly, ‘ One 
way lies hope, take the other and mourn forever.’ 
How grand a triumph, if even then, amidst the raving 
of all around him, and the frenzy of the danger, the 
man is able to confront his situation—is able to retire 
for a moment into solitude with God and to seek his 
counsel from Him!” Ah! what a cheap thing is 
human life when we see great waves—hundreds, thou- 
sands and ten3 of thousands of our fellow beings— 
sweeping on to the fiery edge of battle and falling 
before it as the grass before the scythe, or the forest 
before the hurricane. Ah! what a precious thing is 
human life when we consider its origin, its duties, its 
destiny. Tell me the worth of the life of father or 
mother to helpless, friendless offspring; of the phil- 
anthropic citizen to society; of husband to wife, or 
wife to husband? What plummet will sound the 
depths of human sorrow at losses like these ? What 
calculus compute its measure and weight? Or, take 
the more familiar case, where an idolized child is smit- 
ten with disease, and trembles on the verge of death, is 
it in human language to tell the anxiety, the tender- The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
25 
ness and the power of a mother’s love bom in the 
mighty passion of motherhood and nurtured by a thou- 
sand cares and assiduities, by dangers already passed 
and by responsive affection. She would freely give her 
life to save that of her offspring, her own God-given 
child, for, as one of the most gifted of female poets— 
and a woman only could have written these lines—has 
said : 
“ He gives what He gives. I appeal 
To all who bear babes ! In the hour 
When the vail of the body we feel 
Rent round us, while torments reveal 
The motherhood’s advent in power. 
And the babe cries—have all of us known, 
By apocalypse (God being there, 
Full in nature!) the child is our own— 
Life of life, love of love, moan of moan, 
Through all changes, all times, everywhere.” 
And how grand a triumph it is for the physician 
called to these scenes of human suffering and human 
perils when, amid the raving of all around him and the 
frenzy of the danger, he can calmly confront his situa- 
tion, wisely and promptly invoke those means which 
shall result in the restoration to health of one so loved 
and precious; for worship as devoutly as we may at 
the shrine of Nature, loyally as we may recognize her 
autocracy in the recovery from various diseases, every 
physician will meet with many instances where, but for 
professional intervention, death is inevitable. And the 
gratitude of those thus rescued, or of their friends and 26 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
kindred, is neither myth nor bauble. I know it is the 
fashion on the part of some to depreciate this kind of 
currency, and to complain of the conduct of society 
towards us, and it may be true that many might say, 
in honest confessiou, 
“ God and the doctor we alike adore, 
But only when in danger, not before; 
The danger o’er both are alike requited, 
God’s forgotten and the doctor slighted.” 
If society does treat the medical man harshly and 
unkindly, is it any worse than medical men treat each 
other? Many of the worst things ever said of a phy- 
sician originally came from another physician’s tongue; 
society is often merely the whispering gallery which 
echoes back these utterances. Were we more charit- 
able towards each other, we would silence half the 
reproaches which are brought upon the profession. 
But be this as it may, I firmly believe that the majority 
of patients are not wanting in gratitude when the phy- 
sician has proved himself not only skillful but likewise 
kind and sympathetic; and how that gratitude, 
whether it be expressed in a simple gift, in words or 
tears, makes glad our hearts ! 
In the exercise of a true philanthropy, and in the 
consciousness of relieving human suffering, some of the 
best elements of our moral nature are developed. So, 
too, in the very sorrows, temptations and trials we are 
called to endure, if we bravely and patiently meet 
them, our virtue grows steadier, as the tree most The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
27 
exposed to the rude winds gets a tougher fiber and a 
stronger grasp upon the nurturing earth. 
In the study of man himself, we are taught the 
highest virtue. *One of our own profession has said : 
“For the world, I count it not an inn, but an hospital; 
and a place not to live, but to die in. The world that 
I regard is myself; it is the microcosm of my own 
frame that I cast mine eye on; for the other, I use it 
but like my globe, and turn it round sometimes for my 
recreation. Men that look upon my outside, perceiv- 
ing only my condition and fortunes, do err in my alti- 
tude; for I am above Atlas his shoulders. The earth 
is a point not only in respect of the heavens above us, 
but of that heavenly and celestial point within us. 
The mass of flesh that circumscribes me, limits not my 
mind. The surface that tells the heavens it hath an 
end, can not persuade me that I have any. I take my 
circle to be above three hundred and sixty. Though 
the number of the ark do measure my body, it com- 
prehendeth not my mind. While I study to find how 
I am a microcosm, or little wrorld, I find myself some- 
thing more than the great. There is surely a piece of 
divinity within us ; something that was before the ele- 
ments, and owes no homage unto the sun. Nature 
tells me I am the image of God, as well as Scripture. He 
that understands thus much hath not his introduction, 
or first lesson, and is yet to begin the alphabet of man.” 
Upon the title page of a work on astronomy, these 
words were found: “in undevout astronomer is mad.” 
*Sir Thomas Browne, Religio Medici. 28 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
And if that mysterious music of the spheres which the 
noble old Greek philosopher, centuries ago, heard, now 
finds such expression from Christian philosophy, look- 
ing up to the mighty worlds that mass the sky with 
miracles of light, 
“Forever singing as they shine, 
The hand that made us is divine I” 
how much more reason will we find in our study of 
man—his body which, “in its dumb dissection, was 
eloquent to moralists of other days in teaching man’s 
nobility as a living soul,” and God’s intelligence as a 
creator; his physical nature with all its various powers 
and capabilities, and that personal intelligence which 
“spurns the conditions and boundaries” of this present 
transitory life, to write down in the volumes we study, 
instead of the unjust reproach of a past age: “ Tres 
medici duo athei,” these other words: “ An undevout 
physician is madP 
Some writers on mental philosophy have alleged 
that an exclusive devotion to the study of physical 
phenomena diverts the mind from a proper appre- 
ciation of its own powers and capacities and relations, 
and leads inevitably to a materialistic philosophy. 
But the physician is exposed to no such perils, 
for he must examine, in addition to his other inves- 
tigations, the phenomena of mind. A knowledge 
of the laws which govern the human understanding is 
needful in his daily studies of disease. Let him 
attempt, for example, to describe, or even to appre- 
ciate, the phenomena of hysteria, excluding all refer- The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
29 
ence to the will, to emotion, and to ideation, and how 
utterly incomplete and imperfect the picture. Such 
knowledge, too, is valuable in therapeutics in enabling 
us to communicate our thoughts to others by first 
securing clearness of conception to ourselves ; and still 
more, permits us to ascend as on a ladder whose foot 
rests upon the earth, but whose top reaches the empy- 
rean—thus, as said by a *French author, our science is 
spiritualized. 
Disease itself, with which the physician is daily 
brought face to face, has important lessons to the 
thoughtful mind in reference to man’s moral rela- 
tions. Why this blot upon Nature’s fair face? Why 
these pale faces pleading for strength and life ? Why 
these plaintive cries from sick beds, these groanings 
and agonies ? Why these Misereres making discordant 
creation’s harmonies ?. Is disease the mysterious pur- 
pose of the Divine Father of us all, or is it a disturbing 
element permitted, not commanded ? Or, finally, is it 
a discipline for the higher training and development of 
man ? But no matter whither a reverent speculation 
may lead us, as physicians we are permitted to rejoice 
in the fact abundantly proved, that the power of dis- 
ease is every year weakened, or rather that there is an 
increased duration of life, “such increase being mainly 
due to the various important and valuable improve- 
ments in medicine and surgery.” f “ It has been 
established that the term of human life has not only 
* Philosophic de la Medicine, per le Docteur T. C. E. Edouard Auber. 
tStudies in Physiology and Medicine, by Dr. Graves, p. 125. 30 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
increased since the time of the Romans, but that it has 
received a considerable addition even within the last 
hundred years. So great has been the increase in the 
mean duration of life, that in the tables which were 
made sixty or seventy years ago, and which served as 
the basis of calculations for insurance companies, the 
duration of life has been found considerably under- 
rated.” A lessening of the ravages of disease, a longer 
and a healthier life for the individual, thus rendering 
possible a higher culture and larger usefulness for each 
generation—these are among the blessings which Medi- 
cine brings. 
Having thus shown, or at least endeavored to show, 
some of the relations which Medicine, properly pur- 
sued in study and practice, bears to our intellectual and 
moral culture, it remains to speak of its influence upon 
our aesthetic nature. Truth and Virtue do not exclude 
Beauty from a just scheme of medical education and 
life. Time will permit but a few words upon this third 
topic. A law of the Thebans required her artists to 
represent the beautiful, and forbade the imitation of 
the ugly and deformed. How much better the office 
of the physician who seeks to restore the beauty which 
the ravages of disease may have destroyed, or of the 
surgeon whose skill is so often invoked for similar 
restoration from mechanical or other injuries! No 
one need fear that the skill of the artist, or even the 
genius of the poet, will not find congenial work in 
Medicine. The study of the human form has itself 
important lessons in beauty; and when we bring its The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
31 
tissues under the field of the microscope, or when we 
explore the w’onderful perfections of its various organs 
and the harmonies of their associated actions, if we 
may not, Galen-like, esteem ourselves to be composing 
a hymn to the Deity, at least we will be obtaining 
revelations of the beautiful. So, too, in our daily 
intercourse with our fellow-beings, we will often be 
witnesses of scenes that not only thrill the soul, but 
gentle as the calm light of early dawn, or of sunsetting, 
open up to our vision some of the most beautiful mani- 
festations of human character or conduct. The true 
physician, working faithfully in his profession, finds 
himself, day by day, not only growing-in intellect and 
strength of moral nature, but also in purity of affection 
and in refinement of sensibilities; womanhood, and 
childhood especially, give us daily lessons in the culti- 
vation of kind and gentle manners, which are the out- 
growth of true and active sympathy, in sincerity, and 
in that “charity” which doth not behave unseemly, 
and which so beautifully adorns any life. The physi- 
cian, above all men, is and ought to be a gentle-man; 
and when, as sometimes happens, Calibans come into 
our profession with coarse speech and rude behavior, 
which would be offensive in an ox-driver or a scaven- 
ger, it is a sad thing for that profession, but a sadder 
for those sufferers who seek their aid. 
Medicine invokes the largest culture of all our 
powers—the symmetrical development of the entire 
character. I wish to see, said Dr. Latham, physicians 
still instituted in the same discipline, and still reared 32 
The Subjective Utility of Medicine. 
in fellowship and communion with the wisest and best 
of men, and that not for the sake of what is ornamental 
merely, and becoming in their character, but because I 
am persuaded that discipline wdiich renders the mind 
most capacious of wisdom and most capable of virtue, 
can hold the torch and light the path to the sublimest 
discoveries in every science. It was the same discipline 
which contributed to form, the minds of Newton and of 
Locke, of Harvey and, of Sydenham. 
Young Gentlemen: The duty assigned me for this 
hour has been discharged. Imperfectly, but sincerely 
and earnestly, I have endeavored to impress some of 
the great purposes with which you should engage in 
medicine, and the highest reward which awaits you if 
you are faithful in duty. “ To create life is the 
attribute of God; to preserve life is the noblest gift 
man has received from his Creator.” O, be worthy 
this great gift. 
Coleridge once said: “The memory of my mother is 
a religion to me.” May not each one of you say : My 
profession is a religion to me, binding me as if with 
chains of adamant t© the True, the Good, and the 
Beautiful, so that all these shall blend together in my 
nature, and mine shall be a higher reach of intellect, 
holier views of duty, a more loving gentleness, and an 
ampler charity in feeling, thought, word, and deed—a 
life growing day by day more noble and generous, and 
more truly consecrated to *“ Christ’s work.” 
*Dr. Stokes’ Address before the British Medical Association, 
August, 1868.