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as he calls it, has no natural alliance with the practice of physic; because to no secular profession does the Christian religion afford more aid, than to medicine. The business of physicians leads them daily into the abodes of pain and affliction. It obliges them frequently to witness the fears with which their patients. leave the world, and the anguish of their surviving relatives. Here the resources of their art fail them, but the comfortable views of the Divine government, and of a future state unfolded in the Gospel, come in and more than supply their place. A pious observation, dropped from the lips of a physician in such circumstances of his patients, often does more good, than a long and, perhaps, ingenious discourse from another person, inasmuch as it falls upon the heart at the moment of its deepest depression from grief. *

Aside, therefore, from the temptation to neglect a suitable observance of Sunday, arising from the impossibility of suspending their professional labors entirely on that day, the influence of the study and practice of medicine does not seem to be unfavorable to sound religious feeling and sentiment. In truth, the history of medicine makes it manifest, that in every case of infidelity, it is the fault of the individual, and not the tendency of the profession. Many of the first physicians in ancient and modern times have been pious men. Hippocrates did homage to the gods of his country, and Galen vanquished atheism, for a time, in Rome, by proving the existence of a Creator from the curious structure of the human body. Cheselden, the celebrated English anatomist, always implored, in the presence of his pupils, the aid and blessing of Heaven upon his hand, whenever he took hold of an instrument to perform a surgical operation. Sydenham, the great luminary and reformer of medicine, was a religious Boerhaave spent an hour, every morning, in his closet, in reading the Scriptures, before he entered upon the duties of his profession. Dr. Haller has left behind him an eloquent defence of Christianity, in a series of letters to his daughter. Dr. Fothergill's long life was filled up with acts of good-will to men, and of gratitude and piety to God. Dr. Hartley, whose works

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will perish only with time itself, was a pious Christian. Of these celebrated physicians, Dr. Rush remarks, that "the weight of their names alone, in favor of revelation, is sufficient to turn the scale against all the infidelity that has ever dishonored the science of medicine."*

It often becomes the painful duty of the physician to satisfy himself on reasonable grounds, whether he ought to withhold, or make his patient acquainted with, his opinion of the probable issue of a malady manifesting mortal symptoms. "I own," says Sir Henry Halford, "I think it my first duty to protract his life by all practicable means, and to interpose myself between him and every thing which may possibly aggravate his danger. And, unless I shall have found him averse from doing what was necessary in aid of my remedies, from a want of a proper sense of his perilous situation, I forbear to step out of the bounds of my province, in order to offer any advice which is not necessary to promote his cure. At the same time, I think it indispensable to let his friends know the danger of his case, the instant I discover it. An arrangement of his worldly affairs, in which the comfort or unhappiness of those who are to come after him is involved, may be necessary; and a suggestion of his danger, by which the accomplishment of this object is to be obtained, naturally induces a contemplation of his more important spiritual concerns, a careful review of his past life, and such sincere sorrow and contrition for what he has done amiss, as justifies our humble hope of his pardon and acceptance hereafter. If friends can do their good offices at a proper time, and under the suggestions of the physician, it is far better that they should undertake them than the medical adviser. They do so," continues he, "without destroying his hopes, for the patient will still believe, that he has an appeal to his physican beyond their fears; whereas, if the physician lay open his danger to him, however delicately he may do this, he runs a risk of appearing to pronounce a sentence of condemnation to death, against which there is no appeal, no hope; and, on that account, what is most awful to think of, perhaps, the sick man's repentance may be less available. But friends may be absent,

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and no one near the patient in his extremity, of sufficient influence or pretension to inform him of his dangerous condition.

"And surely," he further says, "it is lamentable to think, that any human being should leave the world unprepared to meet his Creator and Judge, with all his crimes unrepented of. Rather than so, I have departed from my strict professional duty, done that which I would have done by myself, and apprized my patient of the great change he was about to undergo. Of the great number to whom it has been my painful professional duty to have administered in the last hours of their lives, I have sometimes felt surprised, that so few have appeared reluctant to go to the undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns.' I have seen those who have arrived at a fearless contemplation of the future, from faith in the doctrine which our religion teaches. Such men were not only calm and supported, but even cheerful in the hour of death; and I never quitted such a sick chamber without a wish that my last end might be like theirs." *

The relation in which a physician stands to his patient, and to the families into which he is called, is highly confidential in many respects, and an obligation of the most sacred nature rests upon him, not to abuse this confidence. He is looked upon as a confidential adviser and friend, and, as such, is admitted at all hours into the bosom of the families he attends, and to their most private apartments. He often becomes acquainted with the personal infirmities and disabilities of his patients, which are of the most humiliating kind. In respect to the ladies of a family, he is often placed in a situation of the utmost delicacy. Domestic secrets and occurrences of great delicacy and importance may sometimes come to his knowledge, in the unreserved and confidential intercourse which must and ought to subsist between the physician and his patients. He is morally unfit for his profession, if he is not keenly alive to the obligations of secrecy imposed on him by his being made the depositary of the confidence of the families into which he is admitted; and he grossly and inexcusably betrays his trust by the smallest disclosure of any thing of a delicate or private nature which comes to his knowledge in the way of his profession.

Essays, &c., read at the Royal College of Physicians, 1832; p. 79.

Every profession and every employment is, and ought to be, exposed to full and free competition. Competition is the spring of every kind of excellence; but there are some circumstances in the actual practice of medicine which tend to render rivalship among physicians more keen and bitter, than between the members of almost any other liberal profession or branch of business. The competition between lawyers for success is almost entirely in open court; public opinion permits it, nay requires it to be keen, strenuous, and energetic; but all mean and unworthy artifices, subjected as they must be to public observation, do not fail, whenever practised, to recoil on the head of him who ventures to resort to them. Not so, however, with physicians. They go continually from house to house, they spend much of their time in private intercourse with their patients and the families to which they pay their daily visits; the chief scene of their labors is in private; they are little exposed to public observation; and therefore, the preventive and corrective power of public opinion cannot be brought to bear often or much upon them. They are constantly exposed to the temptation of sacrificing moral principle to the motive and prospect of obtaining wealth and honor by the sacrifice. Hence, as might be expected in a large body of men, the moral principles of too many physicians, so far as respects their treatment of their brethren, do not prove strong enough to withstand the temptation. This is one of the very cases noticed and condemned by Cicero, where the moral delinquency seems not to be very flagrant, and the prospect of advantage is very great. *

To undermine a successful competitor in the same city or neighbourhood, by evil surmises or secret misrepresentations, by publishing or artfully aggravating his mistakes, by depreciating the estimation in which he is held, or by ridiculing his person, character, and habits; to endeavour to retain exclusive possession of the district in which one is employed, by crushing young physicians, who, at their outset in life, may attempt to establish themselves within its limits; to harbour feelings of jealousy, envy, and hatred towards a fortunate competitor when he is called in by one's former patients, or towards one's former patients them* De Officiis, Lib. III. c. 20.

selves, in consequence of their exercising their unquestionable right of calling in another physician; to triumph insultingly over other physicians to whom one is himself preferred; to refuse, by reason of private pique, previous misunderstanding, or other personal motives, to meet in consultation with any physician for whose advice the patient or his friends may be anxious; to oppose the admission of other physicians to a joint share with one's self in the superintendence of hospitals and other like institutions; to censure unnecessarily the proceedings, and expose the defects, of one's brethren, when summoned to take charge of a case which has previously been in other hands; to attempt to introduce to public confidence physicians of small qualifications, because they happen to be one's relatives or countrymen, or to have been educated at the same school or college with one's self; to entertain absurd prejudices against any of one's brethren, in consequence of having an unfavorable opinion of the university from which they received their degrees, or because they have not been fortunate enough to receive a degree from any institution, when they give proof of actually possessing those attainments, of which an academical education is considered as the basis, and a degree as presumptive evidence; all these practices, and many more, are alleged to be extensively known among physicians, contrary to their mutual duty to each other, reproachful to their profession, and unworthy of the superior education and standing in society which they enjoy.

In one respect, the physician is invested with a weight of moral influence almost unknown to any other profession, which enables him to be useful to society. The effect of all vice, of whatever kind, is to impair health, destroy character, undermine life, and cause premature death. This is known and acknowledged by all in general terms. But on this subject, the opinion of physicians has peculiar weight. They impart the lessons of actual experience, and, in illustration of them, they can generally refer to facts within their own knowledge. And it must be acknowledged to their praise, that they have seldom, if ever, been wanting in the discharge of the high moral duty to society, which their superior knowledge and experience in this respect so well qualifies them to perform. When, for instance, in the

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