The science of cure : an address delivered before the St. Andrews Medical Graduates' Association at the annual session held at the Freemasons' tavern on December 2, 1869 / by Benjamin W. Richardson.

  • Benjamin Ward Richardson
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The science of cure : an address delivered before the St. Andrews Medical Graduates' Association at the annual session held at the Freemasons' tavern on December 2, 1869 / by Benjamin W. Richardson. 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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    go on the new roads that lie open before us, shall proceed cau- tiously to explore, and as we explore, accurately to define. In- terpreting the position which through your favour I again hold by the ideal of object thus set forth, I have chosen for discourse dm-ing the present short hour a subject of general interest to aU classes of medical men : The Science of Cure. One word, nevertheless, must pass my lips before I come to this general topic; a word relative to our position at this time as a political and learned organization. We are I think forced to feel, and the sensation is pleasurable, that in carrying on the work for which we were originally bound together we have experienced an unvarying, and, I had almost been tempted to say, brilliant success. We have obtained a voice in parliamentary representation; we have set foot as rulers in the walls of our own University; we have made ourselves felt as a power in discussions affecting what may be called medical social science; in this vast city as our centre, where learned societies everywhere abound, we have taken our place amongst the rest, quietly, unostentatiously, but so securely, and with such freedom from jealous opposition, that other and older societies have willingly joined with us in the carrying out of objects intended for the welfare and happiness of mankind. Further, we have en- deavoured, and we are assured by those who are outside us that the endeavour here again has been rewarded with success, we have endeavoured to increase the usefulness of physic by studying it and cultivating it with a growing aversion to its dogmas and a growing appreciation of its connection with pure and simple natural science. We recall these truths with a sense of satisfaction, for that our exertions, however laborious they may have been, have been throughout profitable to ourselves in a degree far more than is com- mensurate with our exertions. Moreover we blend with this feeling the knowledge that ovir efforts have been useful to many, who, though allied to us by the tie of common fellowship as Graduates of the same University, have not felt themselves bound to unite with us in the plans we have laid out and executed for the welfare of the Medical Graduates as a whole. We are proudly conversant of the fact that the slights to which the possession of the St. Andrews degree was subjected some few short years ago, are heard no more; that the whips and scorns of time are felt no longer; that, in short, the world, always generous when by truthful and honest argument it is made conscious of its error or prejudice or in-
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