A letter to the provost of Oriel, on a scheme for making Oxford more accessible to medical students generally / from C.H. Pearson.

  • Pearson, Charles H. (Charles Henry), 1830-1894.
Date:
1858
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A letter to the provost of Oriel, on a scheme for making Oxford more accessible to medical students generally / from C.H. Pearson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    Of course, I can only say generally in regard to these things. There are some, who, without reading for honours, acquire at Oxford and Cambridge such knowledge, or such mental skill, as is of great avail in the medical life; hut, speaking generally, and putting my opinion in another form, if I am asked whether a lad of seventeen or eighteen, destined for our profession, should go to Oxford or Cambridge, without any intention of taking the best honours he could attain, or should go for the same number of years to a good practitioner, or hospital surgeon, in the provinces; I should recommend the latter. Of course, if I would do this in the present state of the Univer- sity regulations, I would do it the more, if the University degree \vas attainable with even less effort and less knowledge than it now requires. It is not for me to say what part in the improvement of medical education Oxford and Cambridge should take; but I may express my belief that they can render the best service, not by lowering their standard for degrees and entering into competition with in- ferior institutions, that can do small or common things as well as they can, but rather, by raising their standard for degrees, and by guiding as far as possible the courses of study in the public and private schools. The general principles of the plan for school examinations, promoted by Mr. Acland, seemed to me capable of very valuable application for the preliminary education of medical students; and if this plan could be well carried out by the univer- sities, it would, I believe, very largely increase their utility and influence. And this it would do without at all interfering with that from which Oxford and Cambridge have justly derived their power and reputation in our profession,—the education, namely, of a certain number of physicians who, by their thorough mental training and large classical or scientific acquirements, have commanded success and influence. If the influence of the uni- versities in our profession is, as I believe, decreasing, it is not because the number of their medical graduates is diminished, but because so small a proportion of them engage in the higher studies and severe discipline of the universities. I shall regard it, therefore, as a calamity to our profession if the degrees of Oxford and Cambridge were made more easy of attainment (easy, I mean, in respect of mental effort); their value, I believe, is and always will be in direct proportion to the difficulty of obtain- ing them; and I cannot see any real or singular advantage which