Page:Transactions of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia (ser 03 vol 05).djvu/60

l It was not enough for the purposes of Dr. Wood, as a teacher of medicine, that the mind should he stored with knowledge. There were also required a ready command of that knowledge, and an aptitude for communicating it to others. Dulness, ruggedness, and prolixity must be avoided, and interest excited; or, whatever in other respects the merits of the writer and speaker, they will fail to secure attention and make due impression. This Dr. Wood strove to do, and signally accomplished. Nothing was overlooked, or disregarded, that might contribute to the general result. His chirography, if not beautiful, had the greater merit of being plain and legible; his lectures—rich in matter and illustration—were at once pleasing and instructive; his elocution natural, easy, forcible, and—when the subject permitted—frequently eloquent; while his style of composition—almost faultless—was smooth, chaste, graceful, and vigorous. He has no meretricious or redundant ornament, and sense is nowhere sacrificed to sound. He aims throughout to express his meaning simply and perspicuously, and thus to avoid all possible misunderstanding.

As it was said of Goldsmith—nullum quod tetigit non ornavit—so it may be with nearly equal truth be averred of Dr. Wood. His writings are almost classical in their character; he elevated the standard, and gave a right direction to medical education, rendering subsequent advance easy and certain; and left an impress on the chairs he successively filled, which will not soon be effaced or forgotten. As a teacher of medicine, at the bedside in the Hospital, or from the rostrum of the University, he was unrivalled in his own country and unsurpassed in any other. His treatises on the materia medica and on the theory and practice of physic have been invaluable gifts to the profession; and, in a word, it may