The reciprocal obligations of professors and pupils : an introductory lecture / delivered by Thos. D. Mitchell ... November 3d, 1845.

  • Thomas Duché Mitchell
Date:
1845
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The reciprocal obligations of professors and pupils : an introductory lecture / delivered by Thos. D. Mitchell ... November 3d, 1845. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    I am aware, that some are of the opinion, that the previous education and discipline of every young man who enters a medical school should be such, as to preclude the necessity of spending a moment in efforts to inculcate lessons touching the morality of medicine, in such a place as this. Be this as it may. The landmarks of virtue and integrity? however broad and deep they may have been laid in earjy youth, arc too often obscured by the mists and fogs of erroneous, not to say vicious habits, to be constantly in the mind's eye, as beacons to warn against, danger, or to indicate the path of rectitude. We are all, gentlemen, whether young or old, too prone to forget our duty. We sec the right, and yet the wrong pursue. Favor me, therefore, for a few moments, with your patient and candid attention, while I attempt to trace put, somewhat in detail, a few of the more important points to which I have just referred, in a brief and con^ cise survey of the reciprocal obligations of Professors and Pupils, An incorporated medical school is, in a certain and very important sense, public property. Its very existence, and, above all, its success is dependent on public approbation and regard; not on the whims and caprices of the selfish, the conceited, and the arrogant, who are inconu potent to judge of the merits of any public institution, but on the good sense of the well informed, the well meaning, and the judicious portion of society. It is a sort of temporary substitution of public discipline and control, for that which has long been exercised under the paternal roof, or in the office of the well informed private preceptor. And, however obvious it may be, that the game general rules which have been enforced by the principal, should be rigorously yet prudently exercised by the substitute, there are now, and there always have been those, who regard the period allotted to a course of medical lectures, as a sort of moral chasm, a season of infinity, a time when men may live as they list, cast oil* the restraints of virtue, and let loose every vicious propen^ sity, And it is wit!) the deepest regret I am constrained to admit the charge of delinquency on the p:iri of teachers in these respects; and to say, that while some have exhibited, in most felicitous relief, the moral character appropriate to our profession, there have been those whoso habitual course had no other tendency than to confirm the ardent, way* ward and inexperienced youth, in the demoralizing practices in which ha had ihoughtlessly embarked. In the family compact, there are mutual obligations and responsibil- ities, equally binding on the parties. It would be preposterous to calculate on the spontaneous flow of filial affection, where parental