If any one should be curious to see what are the modifying circumstances
in a physician's life which strongly tend to weaken or to reinforce
character, I recommend a delightful little address, quite too brief, by
Dr. Emerson, the son of the great essayist. It is unluckily out of print
and difficult to obtain. If you would see in real lives what sturdy
forms of personal distinctness the doctor may assume, there is no better
way than to glance over some half-dozen medical biographies. Read, for
instance, delightful John Brown's sketch of Sydenham and of his own
father, or George Wilson's life of John Reid, the physiologist, whom
community of suffering must have made dear to that gentle intelligence,
and whose days ended in tragic horror such as sensational fiction may
scarcely match; or, for an individuality as well defined and more
pleasing, read Pichot's life of Sir Charles Bell, or one of the most
remarkable of biographies, Mr. Morley's life of Jerome Cardan.

I am reminded as I write how rare are the really good medical
biographies. The autobiographies are better. Ambrose Paré's sketches of
his own life, which was both eventful and varied, are scattered through
his treatise on surgery, and he does not gain added interest in the
hands of Malgaigne. Our own Sims's book about himself is worth reading,
but is too realistic for the library table, yet what a strangely
valuable story it is of the struggle of genius up to eminent success.
But these are the heroes of a not unheroic profession, and I had almost
forgotten to set among them, as a study of character, the life of the
tranquil, high-minded Jenner, the country doctor who swept the scars of
smallpox from the faces of the world of men, and beside him John Hunter,
his friend, impulsive, quick of temper, enthusiastic, an intensely
practical man of science. These are illustrations of men of the most
varied types, whose works show their characteristics, and who would, in