The thoughtless slashing of the delicate and complicated structure of the body, of which untrained students are sometimes guilty, is indicative of a careless, unconscientious future physician. If carelessness similar to what is sometimes observed in the dissecting-room were carried on in the chemical laboratory, life or limb would soon be sacrificed. Yet a thorough grounding in the structure of every vital organ is more indispensable to us than chemistry, important as the study of chemistry is. Let me here note how the moral element on which I have so strongly insisted comes into play in this the first of our medical studies. Reverence for this physical structure of ours should always be shown in the use and arrangements of the anatomical rooms. Carelessness and irreverence in this department of study exercise a really deteriorating influence on students of medicine. Respect for the material used, care in its disposition, and a decent covering for each work-table in the intervals of work, may seem small observances, but they exercise a large influence over the moral training of the student when persistently carried out. It does not enter into my present purpose to enlarge upon the right method of studying each branch of medicine, for that would require a series of discourses. But I must give an emphatic warning against the strange neglect of _human_ physiology which I observe. This seems to proceed from the mistaken idea that necessary knowledge can be obtained from other organisms which bear a misleading resemblance to the human. What I would insist upon is, that we should endeavour to make ourselves thoroughly acquainted with the nature and variations of healthy human physiology before we are perplexed with the changes of pathology. Auscultation and percussion; observations of the healthy variations of the pulse, the tongue, the skin, and the various secretions, in as many healthy individuals, both adult and infant, as can be examined, compared, and recorded; the vital chemistry of the human tissues and secretions in health and disease; the modifying effects of temperament, heredity, idiosyncrasy, etc.--all this forms a department of human physiology, strangely neglected as a practical study, yet certainly of primary importance to the progress of medicine. But I must pass on to what is my immediate purpose--viz., the relation of women to medicine. Having dwelt on the moral and intellectual advantages of medical study, I must refer to another aspect of the subject--viz., the dangers which meet our earnest students.