Address delivered at the opening of the twenty-eighth session of the Leeds School of Medicine / by the president, John Deakin Heaton.

  • Heaton, John Deakin, 1817-1880.
Date:
1858
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Address delivered at the opening of the twenty-eighth session of the Leeds School of Medicine / by the president, John Deakin Heaton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    are not inferior, and that for the large proportion of you who will ultimately practice out of London, your examination fees are smaller on that account. Besides this double examination on professional subjects, the Court of Examiners of the Apothecaries’ Society propose to insti- tute a preliminary or matriculation examination in general learn- ing ; and the College of Surgeons intimate their intention of adopt- ing the same plan. This examination, as at present announced, includes classics and the elements of mathematics. Should the experiment succeed, it is probable, and 1 think very desirable, that this examination will be made to include some of the modern European languages, and other branches of polite learning. The member of any learned profession should possess that amount of general education which is proper to a gentleman, and the want of which discredits both himself and the profession to which he be- longs. And it seems right that the societies, to whom is confided the trust of guarding the portals to our profession, should enforce the acquirement of such general learning, and ascertain that it is really possessed by those who are admitted within its precincts. It is not to be expected that the majority of medical men should be accomplished classics, or profound mathematicians ; I do not think that such Scholars would be likely to make the best practitioners ; and I am sure that the amount of time necessary for such large acquirements could be ill spared from that required for their pro- fessional studies by young men who, for the most part, are very much dependent on their own exertions after reaching manhood ; but it is most desirable that all members of our profession should possess such an acquaintance with grammar, history, geography, languages, and the powers of numbers, as shall render him a polite and well-bred gentleman. In such preliminary learning as ortho- graphy, and the other rules of English grammar, sometimes pupils in this school have displayed a deficiency much to be regretted; and it is remarkable how prevalent such deficiency is, not alone amongst medical students, but amongst young men of varied pursuits, whose position and prospects would have suggested a different result. The recent middle-class examinations by the University of Oxford have brought out this fact very strikingly. Of the eleven hundred and fifty candidates, about five-eighths were rejected ; and of this very
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