Moral Principles and Medical Practice | Page 7

is bound by His own wisdom to direct men to high purposes,
worthy of their exalted intellectual nature. But how shall He direct man?
He compels material things to move with order to the accomplishment
of their alloted tasks by the physical laws of matter. He directs brute
animals most admirably to run their appointed careers by the wonderful
laws of instinct, which none of them can resist at will. But man He has
made free; He must direct him to do worthy actions by means suitable
to a free being, that is, by the enacting of the moral law.
He makes known to us what is right and wrong. He informs every one
of us, by the voice of reason itself, that He requires us to do the right
and avoid the wrong. He has implanted in us the sense of duty to obey
that law. If we do so, we lead worthy lives, we please Him, and, in His
goodness, He has rewards in store.
But can He be pleased with us if we thwart His designs; if we, His
noblest works on earth, instead of adding to the universal harmony of
His creation, make monsters of ourselves, moral blots upon the
beautiful face of His world? It were idle for Him to give us the
knowledge of His will and then to stand by and let us disfigure His
fairest designs; to bid us do what is right, and then let us do wrong
without exacting redress or atonement. If He is wise, He must not only
lay down the law, but He must also enforce it; He must make it our
highest interest to keep His law, to do the right; so that ultimately those
men shall be happy who have done it, and those who have thwarted His
designs shall be compelled to rue it. He will not deprive us of liberty,
the fairest gift to an intelligent creature, but He will hold out rewards
and punishments to induce us to keep the law and to avoid its violation.
Once He has promised and threatened, His justice and His holiness

compel Him to fulfil His threats and promises. A man can commit no
rasher act than to ignore, defy, and violate that higher law of which we
are speaking, and which, if it must direct all men, especially requires
the respect and obedience of those into whose hands he has placed at
times the lives of their fellow-men, the greatest of earthly treasures.
I have insisted so much, gentlemen, on the existence of the higher law,
on its binding power and on the necessity of observing it, because it is
the foundation of my whole course of lectures. If there were no higher
law, then there would be no Medical Jurisprudence, in the true sense of
the word. For Jurisprudence studies the principles that underlie legal
enactments, and if there were no higher law, there would be no such
principles; then the knowledge of the human law would fill the whole
programme. This in fact is the contention of the defendant of
craniotomy to whom I have referred; and he boldly applies his
speculation to a matter in which the physician has the most frequent
opportunity to exhibit his fidelity to principle, or his subserviency to
the requirements of temporary expediency at the sacrifice of duty.
8. You will find, gentlemen, as we proceed in our course, that Doctors
have very many occasions in which to apply the lessons of
Jurisprudence in their medical practice. I even suspect that they need to
be more conscientious in regard to the dictates of the higher law than
any other class of men, the clergy alone, perhaps, excepted. They need
this not only for their own good, but also for the good of their patients
and of the community at large. The reasons are these:
A. The matters entrusted to their keeping are the most important of all
earthly possessions; for they are life itself, and, along with life, health,
the necessary condition of almost all temporal enjoyment. No other
class of men is entrusted with more weighty earthly interests. Hence the
physician's responsibility is very great; hence the common good
requires that he be eminently faithful and conscientious.
B. With no other class of men does the performance of duty depend
more on personal integrity, on conscientious regard for the higher law
of morality than with the Doctor. For the Doctor's conduct is less open
to observation than that of other professions. The lawyer may have

many temptations to act unjustly; but other lawyers are watching him,
and the courts of justice are at hand to check his evil practices. As to
the judge, he is to pronounce his decisions in public and give reasons
for his ruling. The