William Osler's philosophy / by Ludwig Edelstein.

  • Ludwig Edelstein
Date:
1946
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: William Osler's philosophy / by Ludwig Edelstein. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    6/30 page 272
    than in His scripture. Osier thus was encouraged to acquire thorough knowledge of natural phenomena, and it was mainly Lyell and Dana who interpreted the world of nature for both teacher and pupil.3 After Osier had entered college, and after he had decided to study medicine, natural studies, of course, predominated; and though the broader issues were not lost sight of, merely religious schooling or controversy apparently became less attractive to him. To the Reverend Professor Bevan who was entrusted with the privilege of “ directing the minds of the thinking youths at the Provincial University into proper philosophical channels . . . the hungry sheep looked up and were not fed.” Like certain others, Osier preferred to reason with Bovell, the Professor of Natural Theology and Lecturer in Medicine, on “ Providence, Foreknowl¬ edge, Will and Fate, Fixed Fate, Freewill, Foreknowledge absolute.” 4 In these debates the theological and scientific arguments attracted him. Of philosophy the student learned little from his teacher. Bovell did not succeed in making him read Locke or Berkeley, Kant or Hegel, Spinoza or Descartes, or any of the moderns. Pie was only able to kindle through his lectures some interest in Cousin, JoufTroy and others of the French school.5 While Osier was in college, Darwin’s theories were in the ascendancy. The Origin of Species had appeared ten years after he was born; the Origin of Man came out in the year of his graduation. Bovell, caught in the storm “ which shook the scientific world with the publication of the Origin of Species,” had “ sought a harbour of refuge in writing a work on Natural Theology; ” he was one of the “ really devout students.” In his house Osier heard long debates in which the attempt was made “ to reconcile Genesis and Geology.” 6 There is no evidence that Osier became an adherent of the new gospel. He does not seem to have made a decision either way. Once, when his thoughts were engrossed with his examinations and with his future, he picked up a volume of Carlyle and found on the page he opened the familiar sentence: “ Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.” 7 This “ common place sentiment ” took hold of his imagination. It started him, as he says 3 Ibid., 34 ff.; especially 37. For Johnson, cf. An Alabama Student etc., 1908, 248. 4 Cushing, I, 69. 5 Ibid., 62 f. 6 Ibid., 68, 62. 7 Student Life, 80; cf. Cushing, I, 81; II, 354. The quotation is from the beginning of Carlyle’s essay “Signs of the Times” and reads somewhat differently: “Our grand business undoubtedly is, not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.”
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