Sir William, therefore, in exciting Abernethy's enthusiasm at this time, was probably of great service. He was thus impelled to pursue the study of anatomy, which perhaps might otherwise have failed to interest him sufficiently, whilst his attention was by no means diverted from the real purposes of that study. On the contrary, he always saw anatomy, as it were, through a physiological medium. This threw a pleasure into his anatomical pursuits, and was _one_ of the means by which, in his own lectures, he contrived to impart an interest to the driest parts of our studies. Many years afterwards, he was fond of illustrating the true relations of anatomy and physiology, and at the same time contrasting the attractions of the one with the comparatively repulsive requisitions of the other, by saying, with Dr. Barclay, of Edinburgh, that "he never would have wedded himself to so ugly a witch (anatomy), but for the dower she brought him (physiology)." The impressions which he derived from Sir William Blizard were deep and durable. More than thirty years after, when he himself was at the zenith of his career, we find his grateful feeling towards Sir William still glowing warm as ever. He seems to have considered the expression of it as the most appropriate opening to the first of the beautiful lectures which he delivered at the College of Surgeons in 1814. It must have been a moment of no small gratification to Sir William, who was present, now venerable with age, to have found that the honourable course of his own younger days, and the purity and excellence of his precepts, had all been garnered up in the heart of his grateful and most distinguished pupil. Nor could the evidence of it be well made more striking than when heralded forth before an audience composed of the most venerable and experienced, as well as of the most rising members of the profession; and, to crown the whole, with an eloquence at once modest and emotional, impressive of the depth and sincerity with which the eulogium was delivered.