Or is there in the professional man something still deeper than the characteristics just mentioned, something of which these are but the outgrowth? The professional man enjoys his work and would rather do it than not. Many of us, perhaps most, are driven to work by the need to live. We will do that work faithfully and not disappoint those who depend on us. But we often think of work as toil, do as little of it as possible, and find our enjoyment quite outside it. Days of freedom from that toil are eagerly anticipated. How different is the professional spirit! It took up its work originally not as a task but as a chance to gratify a personal interest. To following that interest through all its windings its heart has been given. Throughout there has been a passion for perfection, never realized, never abandoned. Each day carries accomplishment forward and discloses wider ranges into which skill might extend. Hardship, lack of gain, failure to be recognized are matters of slender consequence. The work itself is its own rich reward. Such is professional responsibility at its best. It is responsibility to no individual, not even so much to the general public as to the profession chosen. Perhaps we catch the spirit most readily among artists and scholars, who proverbially show little regard for financial results. But even where regard for money is patent and necessary, this professional spirit is often also present. I am ill and call a physician. He comes to my bedside day by day, studies my case with elaborate care, gives up large amounts of precious time to my whims, and never allows his moods to intrude, so that on my recovery I cannot help saying: “What a sympathetic person you are! I do not see how you can hold an interest in so many people and feel their afflictions as if they were your own.” Such a remark would be as inadequate as if I had said: “You have thoroughly earned your fee.” Both would be true, and both would point to motives which might rightly influence him. But into that complex motive would go a third factor more influential still, if he was a worthy physician. He cares for the healing art. Of course he is unwilling that I, this individual person, should suffer. But it is not the “me” element nor the money element which made him take his trouble. He would have done the same for a stranger. And this impartial attitude is, on the whole, best. Personal sympathy is often disturbing. Let him coolly survey me as a case of typhus fever, and I shall get his best service. Through me he relieves suffering, obtains for himself a due income, gains larger knowledge of disease and skill in combating it; in short, meets the responsibilities of an arduous and interesting profession.