THE MEDICAL SCHOOL OF THE MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY.
By James Edward Neild, M.D.
Lecturer on Forensic Medicine.
Mr. Vice-Chancellor, Ladies and Gentlemen,—
The Medical School of the University is now entering upon the twenty-sixth year of its existence, and the Faculty of Medicine have thought it well that the occasion of beginning the session for this year, should be marked by the delivery of an Address, and they have clone me the honour to request me to undertake that duty. While conscious of the distinction thus accorded me, it would be only affectation if I did not believe that the Faculty, in making the request to me, knew that from my long connexion with the School, I possessed a good deal of personal knowledge, both of the University generally, and of the School as the most important section of it; and that, therefore, I was not ill qualified to note, and briefly comment, upon the progress which has so happily marked its career.
Looking back upon the long procession of events that have happened since the project of a Medical School took definite shape, I cannot but regard with a perplexed interest, but nevertheless, with a large measure of satisfaction, many of the occurrences which have served to indicate its movement. As a, long chapter in the social and educational history of this new country, the past quarter of a century just closed is curiously engrossing.
The scheme of the University itself, as everybody knows, owed its inception to the late Sir Redmond Barry, who, with eyes farseeing beyond those of his contemporaries, perceived, even in the early era of this country, the desirability of an educational institution to which all others should look up as their head, and their authority; and although he was counselled to dismiss from his mind such a project as premature, if not visionary, he persisted in regarding it as not only possible, but imperative, and he lived long enough to see much of the fruition of his hopes, and a great deal more than even he, with all his sanguine belief in the truth of his predictions, ever dreamed would come to pass.
