The history of medicine confirms me in this recommendation of essays to the attention of the members. How much interesting and truly valuable knowledge has been thus communicated to the world. In our own country we may boast of much valuable literature of this kind. In London, the Medical Observations and Inquiries, Medical Communications, Medical Transactions, Memoirs of the Medical Society, and Medico-Chirurgical Transactions, bear ample testimony to the beneficial effects that may arise from the publication of well-selected essays. Since the foundation of the Medical School in the University of Edinburgh, that city has been the favoured seat of medical learning; and how much of the reputation for that learning in our northern brethren, may be attributed to the success of the publication of valuable essays, I leave others to determine: but thus much I may observe, that so long as a taste for Medical Literature shall continue, so long will the Edinburgh Medical Essays, the Essays Physical and Literary, Medical Commentaries, and Annals of Medicine, be read with interest and attention. These publications require, indeed, no commendation from me, as their character and merit are well known, and their utility has long been decided by the general suffrage of the profession. I may, however, be here permitted to observe, (and I make the observation solely with the view of encouraging the exertions of the members of this association,) that many valuable papers, both in the London and Edinburgh Transactions, have proceeded from the pen of provincial physicians
