Page:The Harveian oration (electronic resource) - Royal College of Physicians, 1881 (IA b20411911).pdf/24

 of the College can be preserved, nor yet particular men receive that benefit, by their admission into the College which they might expect, ever remembering that 'concordiâ res parvæ crescunt, discordiâ magnæ dilabuntur.'"

First let us note the evidence which this document contains of his great love for this venerable institution. I think that no one of us can read his life, study his works, or review his character, without feeling for the moment stimulated to follow his own example. He regarded the College of Physicians as a grand foundation. He looked to it in the future as the great centre from which the light of medical science and skill was to shed its lustre over England; he hoped that the College was to be the teacher of her people, the adviser of her rulers, and the training-school of her medical men. He sought to help in this development; and while he made the old physicians' hall his school of medical philosophy, where he for so many years taught his new doctrine, he sought also to bind in the bonds of friendship those who met in solemn conclave to determine the great questions of the day.

It must be confessed that until recently his hopeful anticipations have not been realised. A narrow and exclusive jealousy grew up in place of the large-hearted sympathy which he had hoped would guide the steps of the Fellows of the