Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 1.djvu/72

 of superior merit only; let that meed be awarded by those who can best appreciate the merits and whose delight it would be so to distinguish it, namely, the profession itself; the highest places would then be filled by those best fitted to adorn them, and an incitement be given to the whole body, which would soon remove every shadow of such reproach as the reviewer has cast on them.

This notice of the trade of physic is rather a digression, and somewhat out of place. It was wholly unpremeditated; association with other thoughts brought the subject unbidden to my mind, whence it flowed reluctantly to my pen. Having no application to those whom I now address, it might be expunged, and should be so, were it not that it presents some truths which appear to me to merit grave attention. The imputation, too, so broadly cast on the profession, seemed to call for some disclaimer, and, feeble as mine is, I could not withhold it, as evidence that the profession is not so degraded as the reviewer represents; that it is not wholly absorbed by considerations of mere trade; and to shew that its aspirations are extended somewhat beyond the sphere of vulgar practice, I might appropriately refer to the almost simultaneous and widely pervading zeal which has, on the call of a single voice, so promptly formed the Association which gives occasion for this essay. The instance suffices to prove, that zeal for the higher objects of medical research is not deficient, and that, amid all the anxious cares of life, medical men are ever ready with their best efforts to promote all the higher and more dignified objects connected with their profession. As an art, guided in its exercise by the