Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 1.djvu/82

 advocating a tedious minuteness in the specification of symptoms, I would consider it expedient that the condition of every important function of the frame should be clearly and distinctly stated; in short, that all should be told into which the observer himself deems it necessary to enquire, or which has any influence in directing his own judgment. Every practitioner of experience must know that circumstances apparently trivial enter largely into his considerations, whether of the diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment of disease; and whatever is thus influential, however slightly in degree, it is of importance to record. I ought, perhaps, to notice specially the morbid appearances of the tongue and of the countenance, so various, and so expressive of much which the functions more generally examined may fail to indicate. The importance of the indications which they furnish, and the assistance which they render in the attainment of an accurate diagnosis, is admirably illustrated by Dr. Marshall Hall, in his “ Commentaries on some of the more important diseases of females.”

The task which I assigned myself is now performed. It sprung from the sense which I entertain of the duty incumbent on every member of the newly formed association, of contributing with his best powers to the ends designed. If the suggestions offered in the preceding pages merit but slight estimation, they will, at least, occupy but little space in the forthcoming volume. Should they, on the contrary, be deemed not wholly unimportant, the subject cannot fail to interest others, so as to ensure its being more worthily and more ably treated.