Page:Advice to Medical Students (1857) William Henry Fuller.djvu/25

25 would urge you to select as the companions of your leisure the standard works on the subject you engage in. Books are so numerous in the present day, and the time at your disposal is so short, that you are bound to devote yourselves entirely to works which bear the impress of genius and sterling worth. Even when you have recourse to the lighter productions of the day, you should still act upon the same principle. For whatever is trashy enervates the mind; whatever is immoral debases it; whatever is good and wholesome strengthens, expands, and elevates it. Believe me, your character may be known by your books almost as certainly as by your companions; and it should be your endeavour so to select both the one and the other, as to prove yourselves worthy citizens of the republic of letters, and fitting associates of well-educated, intelligent Christian gentlemen.

One word of caution may, perhaps, be added relative to the pursuits you engage in for the purpose of recreation. Always keep them subservient to the one object you have in view. It is not prudent to devote yourselves too exclusively even to anatomy, physiology, or chemistry, for, as already stated, a man may be sadly wanting as a practitioner who is nevertheless a minute anatomist, a profound physiologist, and an expert chemist. And it would be still more unreasonable to occupy any large portion of your time by aiming at proficiency in other subjects which do not bear so directly on your profession. Your time for study is necessarily so short, that if you wish for success you must turn neither to the right nor to the left, but walk steadily along the path you have chosen. Many persons of great ability and unwearied assiduity have wasted their talents and made shipwreck of their professional reputation by adopting an opposite course and grasping at too much, and it behoves you to be extremely careful not to fall into the same fatal error. Follow your favorite research in your leisure hours; but do not let it lead you to neglect the