From The Month. THE ANCIENT FACULTY OF PARIS. Ar the corner of the Rue de la Bûcherie and the old Rue des Rats, now known by the more dignified appellation of the Rue de l'Hôtel Colbert, may still be seen, unless the unsparing hand of "modern improve ment" has very recently swept it away along with so many other memorials of the past, a dirty, dilapidated building topped by a round tower, which you might take for some old pigeon-house. The half-obliterated inscription upon an escutcheon on one of the facades of the edifice indicates, however, some heretofore high and venerable destination-Urbi et orbi salus. If curiosity lead you to penetrate into the interior of this dismal edifice, you find yourself, after mounting a damp staircase, in a great circular hall, divided into four irregular compartments. Above some empty niches hollowed in the thickness of the wall runs a wide cornice, the now-defaced sculptures of which represent alternately the cock-Esculapius's bird and emblem of vigilance-and the pelican nourishing its young, the type of self-sacrifice-watchfulness and unsel fish charity, the two great duties incumbent on the professor of the healing art. You stand, in fact, in the midst of the ancient amphitheatre of the Faculty of Medicine. There studied, and there, in their turn, taught, the great anatomists of the seventeenth contury, Bartholin, Riolan, Pecquet, Littre, Winslow. This building was an old adjunct to a large and handsome hotel belonging to the medical body, containing their chapel, library, laboratory, a vast hall for solemn disputations, with minor saloons for the daily lectures, etc., with the addition of a large court and botanical garden. It was abandoned long before the Revolution, and not a trace of all i corporate glory of the medical fa now remains. The quarter of P. in which it stood, known former. the Latin quarter, long preserve! peculiar stamp and physiom Here were the colleges of St. M of Normandy and Picardy, of Ly Presles, Beauvais, Cornouailles, as that long succession of churches, es vents, colleges, and high topple houses, filled with a studious yo which formerly crowded the Bue Jacques and the Rue de la Harpe. A these and many other sanctuaries t religion and of science, so intimate connected in the middle ages, clus ed around the faculty. Here, in fas was the centre of the university Paris, whose origin is lost in the ob scurity investing the early media period. The methodical classificat.. under the head of faculties of the de ferent studies pursued at that celebrs ed institution dates, however, from d close of the twelfth century. The faculties formed independent compar ies, attached to their common moti". the university, like branches to th parent stem. Disregarding all apocryphal prett sions to antiquity, we cannot assign st earlier date for the formation of the medical body into an independent co poration than the year 1267. Abet that time we find the faculty in posession of its statutes, keeping registes and affixing to documents its massive silver seal. The term Faculty of Medicine, it must be observed, is mudern. The title Physicorum Facultas. or Facultas in Physica, was long pre served. Whatever we may think of the empirical practice and dogmatic character of the medical art in those times, we cannot but see in this an in then the recognized basis of medicine. We have here, if not a principle clearly understood and habitually followed, at least an intuition and a kind of programme of the future. A memorial of the old designation survives in our own country in the title of physician, while in the land where it originated it has been discontinued. Born in the cloister, medicine long retained an ecclesiastical character. Most of the doctors in early times were canons; and those who were neither priests nor even clerks were still bound to celibacy; a regulation which remained in force long after councils had decreed the incompatibility of the exercise of the medical profession with the ecclesiastical state. In dication that natural science was even its earliest beginnings. It loved to describe itself as veteris disciplinæ retentissima. In those days men gloried in their respect for antiquity. common with all the different bodies which composed the university of Paris, the medical corporation possessed great privileges-exemption from all taxation, direct or indirect, from all public burdens, from all onerous services or obligations. When we sum up all the advantages enjoyed by this and other favored bodies and classes in the middle ages, the reflection naturally suggests itselfwhat must have been the condition of the poor, who possessed no privileges and bore all the financial burdens? In the days, however, when standing armies in the pay of government had no existence, when the king himself was a rich proprietor with large personal domains, when national debt and its interest were things unheard of, the ordinary imposts, as distinguished from all arbitrary and accidental exactions, were, of course, very much lighter than those of modern times. Liberty in those days assumed the form of privilege; and its spirit was nursed and kept alive within the bosom of these self-ruling corporations, and in none more remarkably than in that of medicine. The esprit de corps naturally existed with peculiar strength in a body not merely organized for purposes of instruction, but exercising a liberal profession, of which it had the monopoly.* Hence a minute internal legislation imposed upon all its members, and willingly accepted in view of the interests of the body. Its alumni were aspirants to a life-long membership; whereas with us the medical man's dependence upon the faculty virtually ceases the day he takes his doctor's degree. He has nothing more to ask or to receive from it; his affair is now with the public; The general assemblies of the faculty were held sometimes round the font of Notre Dame, sometimes at St. Geneviève des Ardents, sometimes at the Priory of St. Eloi; while, for the ordinary purposes of instruction, it shared fraternally with the faculty of theology the alternate use of some common room with a shake-down of straw in the Quartier St. Jacques. But by-and-bye riches began to pour in, chiefly through the means of the legacies of members of the medical corps or other well-wishers; and, thanks to the liberality of Jacques Desparts, physician to Charles VII., the corporation of doctors was finally installed in the abode we have just described. To the general worth and respectability of the body in the fifteenth century we have the testimony of Cardinal d'Estoutteville, who, in 1452, was deputed by the Pope to reorganize the university of Paris, and who found less to reform in the faculty of medicine than in any other department. Indeed, no change of much importance was introduced, with the exception of the revocation of the law of celibacy, which the cardinal pronounced to be both "impious and unreasonable." Independence of spirit and great reverence for its own traditions were characteristic of the medical body from VOL. II. 32 It is probably this peculiarity which caused the medical to be considered as pre-eminently the faculty. Its practice brought it into intimate contact with the world at large; and this has also doubtless led to the exclusive retention, in this instance, of a designation common in its origin to other departments of learning. and the sense of brotherhood with his colleagues in the profession is lost, it is to be feared, not unfrequently in a feeling of rivalry. But it was otherwise in the olden time. The day which now sends forth the full-fledged doctor to his independent career drew the tie closer which bound him to his order, in which then only he began to take his solemn place. The honor and the interest of each member thus became common property, and unworthy conduct was punished by summary exclusion from the body. Unfortunately this esprit de corps had its bad as well as its good results. It produced a certain narrowness of mind, a love of routine, and no slight attachment to professional jargon. It is not that the faculty was actually the enemy of all progress, but progress must come from itself. As no association of men, however, can enjoy a monopoly of genius, useful and brilliant discoveries emanating from other quarters had to encounter the hostility of the chartered body. This spirit was exemplified in its animosity toward surgery, long a separate profession, in its prejudice against the doctrine of the circulation of the blood, because an English discovery; against antimony, because it originated with the rival Montpelier school; against quinine, because it came from America. To these subjects we may hereafter recur; in the meantime we note them as instances of medical bigotry, which exposed the profession to just ridicule, but which has drawn down upon it censure and disesteem of perhaps a somewhat too sweeping character. It would be unfair to judge the ancient faculty solely from its exhibitions of foolish pedantry and blind prejudice; and it is our object on the present occasion to give a slight sketch of its constitution and internal government, such as may enable the reader to form a juster and more impartial view both of its faults and of its substantial merits. Indeed, without some solid titles to general esteem, it would seem improbable that the faculty should have attained to the high position which we find it occupying in the seventeenth century. One accidental cause, no doubt. the importance of the doctors de the whole period which we are o sidering was their small relativer. ber. From a computation made modern member of the medical g fession in France,* to whom we are. debted for our facts, the average ber of doctors in the capital from year 1640 to the year 1670 dê: exceed 110. Compared with the po ulation of Paris, which is reckonela 540,000 souls, this gives one do for every 4,900 of the inhabitan The medical corps is now 1,8.0 stra while the population has risen only 1,740,000. Great as is this incres of population, greater, we see, prope tionally, has been that of the med practitioners, who are at present as to 940. If sickness was as prevalen the seventeenth century as it is no and recourse to physic and physick, as frequent, we can imagine that the faculty must have necessarily occupied a distinguished position. Many offices now undertaken by public instution or by government devolved, also. that time on the faculty, which to tầ best of its ability supplied the want sanitary regulations, and exercisei kind of medical police, including ! supervision of articles of diet. this must have helped to swell t importance. A large proportion the doctors received during this sel ed period of thirty years were Parians; and nothing is more com than the perpetuity of the profess in certain families. This circumste must have combined with the corpo reverence for their traditions to in sify their attachment to a recer system, and to strengthen that spiri union which is a source of power. respect which the lower bench paid the upper, and the young to the ancie -and by "young" we mean young in their degree, not in years-must have contributed toward the same result. It required ten years of doctorate to qualify a man to take his place amongst this venerable class; and the statutes are prolix on the subject of the respect due to the ancients from their juniors on the bench; a respect which was to be marked by every external act of deference. But the first and great tie which bound all the members together was religion. To profess the Catholic faith was long an essential condition of admission to the examinations. The facalty gave an energetic proof in 1637 of the importance it attached to this fundameatal rule, when it withstood the pressing solicitations of the king's brother, the Duke of Orleans, in favor of a certain Brunier, the son of his own physician and a Protestant, although the prince endescended to address a flattering letter to the dean of the faculty, signing himself Votre bon ami, Gaston," and although his request was backed by a royal injunction. The sovereign must nels bow to the authority of the statdes, respectfully but firmly urged in contravention of his regal pleasure. Yet this would seem to have been a closing effort, for in 1648 we find four Protestant doctors on the lists. Every year there was a solemn mass on St. Lake's day, at which all the members were bound to be present, and which even at the commencement of the seventeenth century was still sung by the doctors of the faculty. After mass the statutes were publicly read. There was a like obligation, with a penalty for its neglect, to attend an annual mass for deceased doctors, and another for benefactors, as also to accompany the bodis of their brethren to the grave. The head of the corporation was the dean. His powers were extensive, and the honor paid to him unbounded. He was the" guardian of the discipline and statutes" of the faculty, vindex discipline et custos legum; he was at once its foremost champion and its highest dignitary. He was also its historian, entering in its great registers all facts interesting to the corporation which occurred during the course of his administration. The account of each diaconate is headed thus: "In Nomine Omnipotentis Dei, Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sincti. Incipit commentarius rerum in decanatu gestarum." Amongst other topics judged worthy of registration is a necrologic notice of members deceased during the period. Take as a specimen, which marks at the same time the high estimation in which the diaconate was held, the account given of Merlet's death in 1663. He was the "ancient of the company," and had been remarkable for the zeal he exercised in its behalf. The then dean, the illustrious Antoine Morand, pays the venerable doctor a visit just before he expires; and the dying man breaks out in a kind of Nunc dimittis -"Now I can die conterted, since it has been given me to behold once more the dean of the faculty." Valot, the king's physician, who had come to see the patient, expresses in language of much reverence his hope that Merlet may still live to illustrate the supreme dignity in which he stands amongst them. The "patriarch" with his last breath energetically refuses such excessive honors. He confesses that he holds a high rank as ancient of the school, but not the highest. the dean alone," he says, "belongs supreme honor." "Sublime words," observes Morand in his funeral notice: "veritable song of the dying swan, proceeding from a man truly wise and endowed with all perfection! May he rest in the peace of the Lord." Of course, it is a dean who is speaking. The charge was indeed a weighty one, both externally and internally; for in spite of general respect, the medical corporation, like most privileged bodies, had active enemies. Every two years a fresh election took place on the first Saturday after All Saints'. The dean deposed the insignia of his dignity and gave a report of the state of affairs to "To the assembled doctors, who, as usual on all solemn occasions, had previously attended mass. All their names were then placed in two urns; one containing those of the ancients, the other those of the juniors. The dean shook the urns, and drawing three names from the first and two from the second, proclaimed them aloud. The five doctors thus chosen by lot as electors, and, as such, themselves ineligible, swore to nominate the worthiest, and retired to the chapel to implore the divine aid. They then elected by a majority of their number three doctors, two ancients and one junior. Amidst solemn silence, the dean once more drew the lot, and the name which came forth was proclaimed dean for the next two years. The professors, who for long years were but two in number, were also chosen biennially, and by a similar combination of lot and election. Some good must have arisen from the liability under which every practitioner of the medical art lay of being called on to teach it. Another not unwise regulation was that which, reversing the order observed in the case of the dean, placed in the professional urn two junior names against one ancient. Long practice of teaching is apt to wear out the powers of the most able. Considering the times, the elements of instruction were abundantly supplied. The bachelors were not permitted to do more than comment upon and expound the ancients, and their programme was furnished to them. The professors took the higher and more original branches; they alone could dogmatize from the great pulpit of the amphithe atre (ex superiore cathedra). The teaching embraced, according to the quaint phraseology of the day: 1. nattural things, viz., anatomy and physiol ogy; 2. non-natural things-hygiene and dietetics; 3. things contrary to nature-pathology and therapeutics. In the year 1634 a course of lectures on surgery, delivered in Latin, and exclusively for the medical students, was added a practical course of surgery in French already existed for the bar ber apprentices; and the faculty began to perceive that if they would keep their supremacy over the barber-surgeons, it would be as well to know as much as their disciples. The oath taken by the professors is remarkable, especially the exordium "We swear and solemnly promise give our lessons in long gowns w wide sleeves, having the square cap o our heads, and the scarlet scarf on or shoulders." This we see was the first duty. Their second engageme was to give their lessons uninterrup edly, and never by deputy, save in case of urgent necessity; each lecture !> last an hour at least, and to be deliver ed daily, except in vacation time, whic extended from the vigil of St. Peter and St. Paul, the 28th of June, to th of the exaltation of the cross, the 1 of September, and on festival days which were pretty numerous, includi also certain other solemnities, as wel as the vigils of the greater feasts, whe the schools were closed, causa confer sionis, as the statutes have it. Practical instruction was much more meagre than the oral, but this is hardly to be imputed as a fault. Anatomy cannot be learned except by dissection and no bodies but those of criminal were procurable. The faculty had look to crime to help on its progres in this study. When an executis took place, the dean received forr. notice, and convoked the doctors at: students on the occasion " to make a anatomy," as it was called. Wh the faculty was at peace with the surgeons, the latter were favored with an invitation. By a strange prejude theory and practice, as we have notie were kept distinct. The learned pr fessor would have demeaned him? by becoming an operator, while the acting surgeon was condemned to be a mere intelligent machine, and was formally interdicted from being initiated in the higher mysteries of the profe sion. It was a barber who generally filled this inferior office, and he not unfrequently would display more know ledge than his masters; for which of |