PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OF A PHYSICIAN.




CHAPTER I.


We all admit that every one who attempts to act as a physician, should
strive to qualify himself, or herself, for the work by obtaining the best
education which our medical schools afford; for to physicians are
intrusted, not simply the property or money, but the very lives of their
fellow-citizens. As the responsibility is great, so the duty of preparing
one's self before commencing practice, and of keeping fully abreast of all
new and valuable discoveries in the art of healing, is equally great. A
physician should not be led blindly by his teachers and prominent medical
writers, and so strongly confirm himself in the theories and views which
they proclaim that he cannot, without prejudice, examine new views and
theories with due care. It has been said that when Harvey discovered the
true course of the circulation of the blood, there was not a single
professor in the medical colleges of England over fifty years of age, who
ever believed "the heresy," as his discovery was called. However this may
have been, it is certain that professors and prominent medical writers are
not always the first to see and recognize the truth, even when it is
clearly presented to their notice.

A native of western Massachusetts, I studied medicine with an intelligent
and worthy physician in my native town, and attended two and one-half
courses of medical lectures at the Berkshire Medical College, at
Pittsfield, Mass., and graduated in 1841; and during the following winter I