The principles and practice of dentistry : including anatomy, physiology, pathology, therapeutics, dental surgery and mechanism / by Chapin A. Harris.

  • Harris, Chapin A. (Chapin Aaron), 1806-1860.
Date:
1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The principles and practice of dentistry : including anatomy, physiology, pathology, therapeutics, dental surgery and mechanism / by Chapin A. Harris. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    partial, it necessarily fails to accomplisli tliat wMcli it promises. Such training may make dental laborers, tradesmen, or artisans: but never dental artists, or scientific mechanicians: nor can the dentistry which they practise be, in any respect, identified with that which we have defined as a branch of the art of med- icine. A preparation begun in pure science may end in correct practice, and the early habits of student-life may follow the professional man throughout his career; but a preparation, be- gun in practice, will end there. The routine of professional duties often tempt the scholar to sink into the mere practitioner; it is rare indeed that one reverses the order of nature and sets aside the claims and emoluments of practice, to acquire slowly those habits of study so easily learned in youth. It requires the broadest literary and classical education of boyhood to counteract the necessarily narrowing influence of the profes^ sional studies of manhood; and it demands the largest possible infusion of purely scientific teaching, during professional pupil- age, to correct the matter-of-fact influence of practice. In this lies the great error of American practical systems of education. They teach boyhood to take a utilitarian view of every lesson learned, and encourage young men to neglect studies in which they cannot see some prospective pecuniary value. It is the application to science and art, of that philosophy of life, which subordinates mind and body to the one idea of making a living; that spirit of trade, which regards classical study a waste of the years, in which plastic youth can best be moulded into the mer- cantile idea of Profit and Loss. Limitation, first in.the amount of mental culture, secondly in its direction, is thus made to combine with the inevitable influence of all exclusive pursuit, whether of science or business; the result is a rapid increase, in all professions, of men whose vision is limited by the narrow horizon of their special occupation, and who possess none of that large-minded liberality, which is the outgrowth of a gen- erous education. It is by such early restriction of thought and action within the narrow grooves of life's future pursuits that a merchant so often loses all power to enjoy the fruit of his toil, a physician is unknown beyond the sick-room, a surgeon contributes nothing to the cause of science, and a dentist holds no social position. This inevitable tendency of purely practical