The physician in his intercourse with his patients has so much of the free familiarity of home, that he can see these sparks of contention, as they kindle up here and there, more quickly than others can. Thought and feeling are often revealed to him unconsciously, and the very fountains from which they rise are almost open and naked to his view, and, I may add, to his influence also. If he then be a man of peace, he can do much from day to day in repressing those thoughts and feelings, almost in their nascent state, which, if encouraged, would distract and divide family circles, neighborhoods, and perhaps communities. If, on the other hand, he is not a peace-maker, but has an ear ever open to the tongue of scandal, and is himself a tattler—if he is ready to secure his own aggrandizement by injuring his competitors, and is therefore disposed to rejoice in the misfortunes of others, he scatters the seeds of contention wherever he goes, and the peculiar relation which he sustains to a large portion of the community enables him so to scatter them, that they will be sure to take root, and grow, and produce an abundance of fruit. This leads me to say that it is especially true of the physician, that the most of his influence lies in the little hourly acts, and in the familiarly, perhaps carelessly, dropped words, which make up the chief part of his life, and not so much in the opinions which are formally expressed, or in the acts which obviously follow deliberate consideration. This is true to a great extent of every man who mingles in society with the ordinary degree of freedom. They indeed, who move about among their fellow-men with as little familiarity or sympathy as a recluse, have but little influence, and that only when they utter their formal opinions. But the occupation of a physician necessarily puts him at the very antipodes with the recluse. Even if he be disposed to shut up his heart against his fellow men, and to make his intercourse with them of a strictly scientific character, his bosom will very soon be unlocked, or he must give up his profession. The fountains of sympathy and feeling will be unsealed by the potent influence of daily intercourse with human suffering and joy. He cannot from day to day administer to the relief of distress without sympathy, and that sympathy cannot always be suppressed. It will gush forth, and the frigid man of science will become the kind and familiar friend. Mingling then, as the physician necessarily does, so freely and intimately with the world around him, it must be eminently true of him, that it is the spirit of the man, as it breathes forth in his common every day words and acts, even in his very manner, that really gives the character to his influence. So that if he be not forward to speak out his sentiments, or to give his advice, the sentiments which he has, and the advice which he would give, are as well known, as if he uttered them. It is in truth this