Valedictory presidential address to the members of the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Edinburgh (delivered 2nd November 1887.) / by T. Grainger Stewart.

Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Valedictory presidential address to the members of the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Edinburgh (delivered 2nd November 1887.) / by T. Grainger Stewart. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

    5/18 (page 5)
    had he not possessed very ample means he would have acquired a much wider practice than he did. His unfailing courtesy, his extra- ordinary business capacity, and his faculty of lucid statement, to which I have already referred, combined to render him one of the most useful and esteemed members of this Society, as of the Eoyal College of Physicians, the General Medical Council, and the Uni- versity Court. There was one other member of the Society who died within the past two years, and who was better known to myself than to most of the members, and I crave your indulgence while I say a word of him which some of you may consider out of proportion to the services he was permitted to render the Society. ¥rom liis earliest student days I was intimately acquainted with Dr John Bishop. While still engaged in business in his native town of Shefi&eld he was a constant student of literature and philosophy. He corresponded upon philosophic questions with Dean Mansell, and was familiar with the writings of Sir William Hamilton.^ He worked also at chemistry and other departments of science, and whenever his circumstances made it possible he relinquished business in order to study medicine. Coming to Edinburgh, he became the devoted admirer of Goodsir and Turner, of Syme and Lister, and when he had graduated he became the private assistant of the author of the antiseptic system. Of the esteem in which he was held by his chief no better token could be given than the fact, that Sir Joseph volunteered to go from London to the Riviera, in the depth of winter, in order to try whether surgical operation might avert his impending death. The moral and intellectual qualities of Dr Bishop were of the highest order. His professional attainments and the zeal with which he discharged his duties deserve the utmost praise, and those of us who knew him best feel very deeply how much was lost to the profession by his early death. Like Mr Brown, of whom I spoke first, he was a man of deep religious earnestness, and exerted himself strenuously on behalf of medical missions and kindred institutions. We cannot but be saddened when we contemplate the long list of formidable losses which the Society has sustained, and to which I have thus briefly referred. On such an occasion as this it may be appropriate for us as members of this, the chief Medical Society of Edinburgh, and the Institution which most generally represents the brotherhood of the profession, to make a brief survey of the work that the profession is doing in the community, and consider in what respects and in what manner it might be better done. In a great medical centre such as Edinburgh the profession per- forms at least four functions, and I should like to draw your atten- tion briefly to each of them. Let us see what we are doing in our 1 His philosophic library is to form the nucletis of the library of reference of the University, naving been kindly presented to that Institution by his widow.