THE MEDICAL PROFESSION.
LTO THE EDITOR OF THE SPEOTATOR."J
SIR,—The difficulty at Guy's Hospital is one of several recent events by which the position and influence of medical men have been made a distinct and conspicuous object of public attention, and appears to me to afford a suitable occasion for some con- siderations as to the extent and nature of that influence, which, if you will allow me, I would suggest to your readers. The physician is in our day fast assuming the place that at an earlier period was occupied by the priest. He is, as his rival was, a referee on that part of man's destiny which is considered most certain and most important, and naturally succeeds to that position of exceptional authority which belongs to a privileged order. The course of history affords us ample opportunity of appreciating the influence of such a position on the character of those who hold it. Has it been a happy influence ? I can hardly conceive of two answers to that question. Those who value the Church as a witness to eternal truth, and those who despise it as the monument of an obso- lete superstition, would be at one as to the dangers which encircle its ministers, so far as they regard themselves as a caste. The very name of "priest "—though applicable to many whom all might agree in regarding as the best of men — is a word of ill-omen in English ears. That this damnosa hereditas of privilege would pass unimpaired into the hands of any other set of men, I do not indeed believe. A physician cannot sink quite as far below the pattern that has been set before him as the clergyman can. But the temptations of average men raised on the platform of a revered order are much the same, whatever be the character of their elevation. I think there are very obvious signs that the Medical profession is becoming influenced by these tempta- tions, and I am sure that we, the indolent, unthinking public, are largely responsible for them. It has become almost an etiquette, in any discussion affecting the character of medical practitioners, to speak of them as a body of high-minded and dis- interested men ; and even those who have to complain of the conduct of individual doctors give in to the fashion. What is there to justify it? Unquestionably, the profession is one that numbers in its :ranks many high-minded and disinterested men. There is nothing to keep them out, and they exist in all classes. But to make any general statement about the character of the men who enter the Medical profession seems to me like making a general statement about the character of the men who cross Westminster Bridge. Whenever a par- ticular failing would prevent any one entering a particular profession, you may, indeed, vaguely ascribe the opposite merit to that profession. The British soldier, we may say, is generally brave. And, of course, whenever a profession tends to cultivate a virtue, you will find its votaries distinguished by that virtue. These truisms include all that may be said as to the character of any professional body of men whatever. The influence of the practice of medicine, like all other human practice, is surely a mixed one. It tends to develope some admirable qualities, and to repress others. The influence which a constant endeavour to save life and destroy suffering has in developing benevolence cannot, perhaps, be exaggerated ; but I think it has been con- sidered too exclusively. I recall, as I write, characters moulded by this influence,—physicians whose lives, in their unselfish devo- tion to the relief of obscure misery, their faithful ministrations to
those who could not reward them with money or fame, might seem to approach the ideal of human excellence. I suppose people mis- take the vividness of such an impression for its frequency. World- liness and selfishness, as they have no monopoly of any pro- fession, so they are not excluded from any ; and I should have thought their inlets to that which deals with the morbid side of human nature would be sufficiently obvious, had not all recent discussions betrayed a strange blindness in this direction. All professions and all things human have a side of moral dis- advantage, and it would seem strange, if we had not fallen into a phase of exaggerated eulogy towards this particular one, to insist that it forms no exception to the rule.
It is not only in justice to those with whom the Medical pro- fession comes into collision, that we should bear these con- siderations in mind. A true estimate of the temptations and disadvantages of any class of men is needed as a measure of justice to the members themselves. Ordinary men will cer- tainly disappoint us, if we expect to find them extraordinary men. We should all be judged harshly, if every fall were measured from the height of an imaginary elevation.—I am,
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