PERIOD II.

PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION.

IN October 1820, James Hope went to Edinburgh in order to commence his medical studies. In conformity to established usage, his first year was principally devoted to anatomy, and was to him one of disgust and unhappiness, from the extreme repugnance he felt to the pursuit.

In selecting a profession for a son, one often hears parents speak of the importance of discovering the tastes of the youth, and making the selection accordingly, under the impression that a compliance with these will promote his future success. Although there is some appearance of wisdom in such a course, it is questionable whether it be really judicious, and it can scarcely be doubted but that the open avowal of such a principle must have an injurious effect on the immature mind. How can a youth of sixteen or eighteen, balance the advantages of the army, the bar, the medical profession, or the counting-house, and form a valid judgment among them? He is sure to be influenced by some high-wrought fancy or prejudice, imbibed

from a personal predilection or aversion entertained towards some individual of one or other profession. When in later life he awakes from his dream, and finds that the duties of a soldier involve more than wearing a splendid uniform and marching to the sound of gay music; that the merchant does not always reckon golden stores in his coffers; that honour and distinction are not constant attendants on him who follows a learned profession; when, in short, he discovers that in every station man is born to labour, and has only brief moments of success to cheer him on an arduous road, will he not repent of his choice, and, perhaps, in obedience to the early instilled principle of following inclination, either abandon his profession, or, pursuing it with languor, ascribe his consequent want of success to the unhappy position in which he is placed, rather than to his own want of energy and self-government?

Instead of looking to the tastes of their children, parents would do well to instil into their minds those principles of self-denial and self-control, that steady resolution to overcome all obstacles and do their best in every station, which will qualify them to fill, with usefulness and distinction, any post which the judgment of their parents, or family interest, or any other guiding circumstance may assign to them.

Though Mr. Hope had always told his sons that they were to choose their own profession-a choice which he did not afterwards concede-he had not neglected to impress upon their minds the foregoing

principles, which took deep root in that of his son James, and did him good service at this trying period of his life. His aversion to his profession, and especially to anatomy, was so great that many would have called it insuperable. Such a word entered not into the vocabulary of young Hope. He never had been conquered, and it was his intention never to be so. He had no idea of foregoing all hopes of future distinction because his preliminary studies were distasteful. Instead, therefore, of inquiring within himself what was agreeable or disagreeable, he calmly regarded the medical profession as that to which his future destiny was linked, as the sphere in which all his bright and ambitious dreams were to be realised. He knew that habit is one of the most powerful agents on the mind of man, and he relied on it for overcoming his feelings of disgust. He compelled himself to the diligent and persevering study of anatomy, but he dissected in gloves and with forceps, so as never to touch the body; and so strongly rooted were his feelings, that it took two years to overcome them in any great degree, and they continued to affect him slightly even six or seven years after.

Dr. Baillie was then at the head of his profession in London, and he was the model which James Hope proposed for his own imitation. He soon discovered that this eminent physician owed much of his justly acquired celebrity to the knowledge which he derived from the study of morbid anatomy; and his own

judgment enabled him to perceive that no man can hope to make important discoveries in medicine, unless he is intimately acquainted with the structure and functions of the human body. The expression which he used many years after in regard to this subject was, "that a physician, in looking at his patient ought, in imagination, to turn him inside out." Regardless of his own antipathy, he at once determined to concentrate all his powers on the most essential though least agreeable part of his studies, and he already planned the production of a work on the morbid anatomy of the whole body, illustrated by drawings as, at that time, there was no such work in existence. It is a rare thing to see a man not merely giving an ordinary share of attention to that which inspires him with disgust, but voluntarily selecting it as the subject of his peculiar study. In so doing, Hope gave a striking proof of the strength of his moral character, and the result is an encouraging illustration of the fact, that a vigorous cultivation of the intellectual and moral powers, followed by a determined concentration of those powers on one object or class of objects, is almost invariably crowned with ultimate success.

Some observations which occur in a letter written during his residence at Paris, in 1826, shew that, in studying pathological anatomy, he did not fall into the error commonly imputed to the French, of following it as "mere morbid anatomy-the science of the dis

secting room." He studied post-mortem appearances in reference to the previous symptoms; and in this, as in all his other studies, he cultivated science merely as a foundation of practical knowledge, and in subserviency to it.

At the commencement of his second session, he was introduced to Dr. James Bardesley of Manchester, who had been one of the President's of the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh, the previous year. Dr. Bardesley induced him to become a member of this Society (the only one in Edinburgh which he ever entered), and encouraged him to aspire to be its President, by taking a regular part in the debates. To this two apparently insurmountable obstacles presented themselves. The first was his diffidence, which was such, that he thought it impossible for him ever to speak before a considerable number of persons. The second was, that the debates were confined to medical subjects, and he had never opened a book on the practice of physic!

His friends, however, encouraged him, and it was agreed that he should open the session with the first speech, which, at least, secured him an uninterrupted expression of his ideas. The subjects for discussion were papers read to the Society by the members in rotation; but these papers were allowed to be circulated for a fortnight beforehand, amongst those who wished to take part in the debates. Hope examined the paper which was to form the subject of