The claims of forensic medicine : being the introductory lecture delivered in the University of London, on Monday, May 11, 1829. / By John Gordon Smith.

  • Smith, John Gordon, 1792-1833.
Date:
1829
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The claims of forensic medicine : being the introductory lecture delivered in the University of London, on Monday, May 11, 1829. / By John Gordon Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    must prove worse than a failure, if the parts of this well connected science are disjointed in this manner, their rela- tions must be lost sight of; and it has been well remarked, that there is no science which admits of a more natural method of arrangement. Who, for instance, among the teachers of other branches, is to go out of his proper path in order to study the nature and application of medical evidence—under which title alone a course of lectures might be given with great utility ? It is enough for every teacher to mind his proper province, and devote himself to his professed busi- ness. We have had too much of that universal sort of pro- fessorship in London; and in my opinion (by no means a singular one), the injunction might with great propriety be given,' Divide, ct cloce.'—I have listened, with equal surprise and disgust, to the lessons of a great surgeon in this metro- polis upon the treatment, and even the detection of poisons, and I have traced the despicable consequences of these les- sons afterwards into courts of justice. Depend upon it, this is a distinct application of the medical sciences, mistakes about which are almost certain to take possession of the minds of those who neglect it, or who do not pay even considerable attention to it; and it is not because a man is successful as a physician or surgeon that he must be a Me- dical jurist. Another suggestion I beg to advance while upon this sub- ject. All that is necessary to be known cannot be acquired from books. They are excellent for recalling ideas and re- freshing the memory; but Forensic Medicine requires nume- rous practical illustrations that books cannot exhibit. There are objects for every sense, as well as for the judgement, and a necessity for acquiring no small share of manual dex- terity, as well as acuteness of observation and accuracy of inference. I am now about to make a very startling assertion, and I certainly would not make it if I were not able to prove it— as my friends of the law would say.—I do not believe there is a medical man educated in England who can open a dead