An address, delivered at the Birmingham School of Medicine and Surgery, on Monday, October 6, 1834, on the occasion of the passing of the appended laws and regulations / by John Johnstone.

  • Johnstone, John, 1768-1836.
Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An address, delivered at the Birmingham School of Medicine and Surgery, on Monday, October 6, 1834, on the occasion of the passing of the appended laws and regulations / by John Johnstone. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    ADDRESS. My Lords and Gentlemen, Although I have no anxiety lest the celebration of this day should pi'ove satisfactory to you^ and although I have so frequently experienced your kindness personally to myself, yet when I see so many venerable and learned persons around me—men ac- customed not only to give counsel in private affairs, hut even dele^ gates to the Supreme Authority—I cannot hut wish that you had assigned the part now entrusted to me to some more able hand. I am encouraged, however, to believe that my cause, if not my talents, will secure for me that benevolent attention which, in an audience like this, whatsoever tends to the public utility is sure to meet with —and therefore confidently do I address you on the opening of this, pennit me to call it. Temple of Science—not sprung, indeed, from the ashes of antiquity—not adorned by venerable recollections—not built on the remnants of columns which, in their pristine glory, supported an edifice dedicated to science, and worthy of its aijthor; but an establishment altogether new, altogether the work of our own compatriots, created by their own hands, furnished by their own industry, and to be perpetuated, I trust, by the continued munifi- cence of you, its noble patrons—and of you, its learned, its indus- trious, its vigilant, and its exemplary instructors and promoters. Well knew our ancestors that, where instruction was to he im- parted, there instruction should have a home and an abode: they well knew that the seed cast on the sand had little chance of root- ing. From the earliest beginnings of this institution, it was a ne- cessary part of the meditation of the founders to have regard to a domicilium—to a place of refuge, as it were, where those who taught might resort, and where those who wish to learn might at- tend. In the beginning of our Institution, narrow indeed were the