Hugh Lenox Hodge

“ Thus blessed in his domestic relations, in his social circle, and in the confidence of the public as a practitioner and teacher of medicine, the moderate expectations of Dr. James were abundantly gratified; he had all that this world could bestow to render life happy and useful. He, however, felt and acknowledged that more was requisite to satisfy the wants of man, and he early found that religion alone can give zest to temporal enjoyments, and dissipate the dread of a future state of existence so natural to the human soul. ”

“ Such was the character of our late president, modest, retiring, distrustful of his own abilities; willing at all times to avoid responsibility, seldom acting therefore boldly and decidedly; but, nevertheless, a man of superior talents, well cultivated with ardent feelings and social propensities, in love with literature and science, eminently prepared for the social circle, for literary and scientific society, and for the active, laborious, and exhausting duties of the medical profession. ”

“ James was unfeigned modesty and diffidence. His conversation, his intercourse with his friends, with professional brethren, and even with students of medicine, his whole deportment indicated, that he did not rest upon his own sentiments with that implicit confidence which would induce him to promulgate his opinions, or to insist on their correctness or importance. He paid great deference to the opinions of others, and would hence submit to the guidance of those of an opposite temperament, really believing they must be better informed than himself. ”

“ His manners were courteous, affable, to the high and the low, to the learned and the unlearned, to the experienced practitioner in medicine, who came to solicit his advice, and to the student who was anxious to imbibe his sentiments on all subjects. Every word and look intimated the delicacy and purity of the inner man, whose mind was stored with knowledge, and whose heart was overflowing with kind feelings. ”

“ It is as a medical practitioner, that Doctor James was best known to this community, and especially to the members of this college. In this character, who has not known and admired him? Who is not ready to present him, as regards his disposition, his virtues, his sentiments, his manners and deportment, as a model for the young physician? His whole conduct proved that he was governed by those high-elevated sentiments, which result from an enlightened and gifted mind,—sustained by all that virtue and religion impart, to purify and exalt the human character. ”

“ James ever devoted much attention to the exact sciences. He was in the proper meaning of the term a Philosopher, —a lover and a supporter of science;—but, irrespective of those branches which are involved in his profession, he left to others minuteness of detail, and contented himself with mastering the general principles, and lending his influence for the support of scientific men and institutions. ”

“ In this state of mind, looking forward to an eternity of increasing knowledge, holiness, and happiness, he died July 5th, 1835; leaving us, his surviving friends, and the medical profession, a bright example of the accomplished physician and the Christian gentleman, who always preferred the useful to the brilliant, and who, however others may have surpassed him in originality of thought and boldness of execution, was inferior to none in that pure morality, that unsophisticated integrity, that sound discriminating judgment, so essential for the practitioner of medicine ”

“ As a practitioner of obstetrics, Dr. James manifested the same kindness and benevolence of disposition, the same prudence, discretion and judgment for which he was distinguished as a physician, and which gave him an eminent station as an accoucheur. As an operator, he was also skilful and prudent: occasionally also bold and decisive when the circumstances of the case demanded his assistance. ”

“ James has published few opinions on professional subjects. This is to be regretted, for it seems hardly possible, that the experience of a long life, devoted to the observation of disease, to the details of a profession so varied, yet so imperfect, as that of medicine, should not have furnished abundant material for the improvement of his science as well as for the amelioration of human suffering, especially when elaborated by a mind so well constituted and liberally furnished. ”

“ James, however reluctant he might be to promulgate his sentiments, or even to express an opinion, possessed a mind too powerful and too well furnished not to form positive opinions on almost every subject to which it was directed, whether in literature or science. Those only who enjoyed his confidence; who were admitted into the favoured precincts of his private friendship, could discover how positive and correct were his sentiments; how discriminating his opinions, respecting men and things ”

“ The influence of the eminent men who practiced and taught obstetrics in our city, now began to be felt. This science was emerging from obscurity; the clouds which enshrouded it were dispersing; public attention was roused, and public sentiment demanded that more importance should be attached to this branch of medicine in the schools of our country.
In 1808 Dr. Shippen died, and Dr. Wistar was appointed his successor, as Professor of Anatomy and of Midwifery. Dr. Wistar immediately perceived that these two departments of medical science ought to constitute two distinct professorships. ”

“ The first course of lectures in the University was commenced by the new Professor in November, 1810, and although supported, not by any positive regulations on the part of the trustees, but merely by the indirect influence of the school, and by the personal character of the teachers, was attended by a large proportion of the medical students then assembled in Philadelphia. Succeeding years witnessed increased attention to obstetrics; the importance of the science and its great practical utility were more obvious, and its complete triumph over ignorance and prejudice was at hand. ”

“ As an obstetrician, he was chiefly known to the inhabitants of this city and of our country; and great are the obligations under which society is placed to him and a few of his cotemporaries who, by their talents, education, learning, manners and accomplishments elevated and adorned a department of the profession which had been unaccountably neglected, and was, in this country especially, in a degraded condition. ”

“ Our regrets are unavailing, but this negative example should induce all of us who are actively engaged in professional duties to make that record of our experience and observations, which when age or ill health prevent active exertion, may be promulgated as our mite to the cause of science and the interests of humanity.
The excellence of Dr. James's feelings, the exercise of his benevolence, and his Christian charity were not limited however by the duties of his profession. He was a promoter as well as a patron of many benevolent institutions. ”

“ In the early periods of his professional career he indulged a strong native taste and a sprightly imagination, not only in rapidly ranging over the products of kindred minds, but in becoming himself a writer, even of poetry, and, in the opinion of partial friends, with no ordinary success, but never so much to his own satisfaction as to allow his name to be publicly connected with any of his productions. ”

“ It would be interesting, if practicable, to trace the gradual development of such a character from infancy to old age, to discover, if possible, the circumstances which favoured its growth, and to draw philosophical deductions for the improvement of the present or succeeding generations. Such hopes are vain, or nearly so; man is born with his peculiarities, with specific and yet complex sensibilities, and however similar the circumstances of life and education of two or more individuals, entirely different characters result. ”

“ This triumph of truth and humanity over ignorance and prejudice may be considered as complete. Obstetrics was confessedly equal to the other practical branches of medical science; and its practitioners and teachers were authoritatively pronounced on a par with those of Surgery and the Practice of Medicine. ”

“ James who, we have seen, contributed so much to this happy issue, received now the reward so eminently due to modest worth, superior talents and attainments, united with persevering industry.
Large classes annually resorted to Philadelphia, and profited by the lectures and demonstrations of the various professors, which were continually rendered more pointed and instructive, by the reiterated experience in the difficult art of teaching, and by the adoption of all the real improvements promulgated here or elsewhere. ”

“ He commenced and prosecuted the study of medicine under the direction of that eminent practitioner, Dr. Adam Kuhn, a disciple of Linnæus, whose opinion always carried weight among his medical brethren, and who had the honour of educating some of the first physicians of our country. In 1787, at the age of twenty-one, he received the certificate of bachelor in medicine, from the University of Pennsylvania, of which his preceptor Dr. Kuhn, was a distinguished professor. ”

“ This alone was necessary; he gained confidence, so that in the course of a few years he ventured to teach, as well as to practice his profession, and, having about this period married Miss Hannah Morris, (a lady connected with one of the first families in Pennsylvania, eminently adapted by her mild, but decided character, her judicious, yet cheerful disposition to meet the peculiarities of Dr. James's character,) his success became certain, business rapidly increased, and his time became fully occupied with patients and pupils, all of whom admired and loved him. ”

“ When the extent of varied character of his practice is considered, when it is known that much of his time was occupied with obstetrics, and, of course, that his hours of rest and sleep, as well as those allotted to recreation or business, were thus encroached upon, it will be found no mean praise that none complained of his remissness or neglect. ”

“ This is experience, ancient and modern, in opposition to the theories of philosophers. Still, our interest for the early history of the great ones of this world is not diminished, and when little can be learnt, as in the present instance, the disappointment is felt. ”

“ He however decidedly avowed himself as agreeing with Kuhn and Wistar, to whom his predilections and attachments had formerly been fully accorded. Still so slightly was he tinctured with prejudice, that when Kuhn and Wistar were absent from the city, he solicited the assistance of Dr. Rush for a sick relative, as we learn from the above-mentioned letter to his mother.
The winter dissipated the epidemic, and of course the fears, although not the sorrows of the inhabitants of Philadelphia. Dr. James undertook the more regular business of his profession, but did not yet feel himself settled ”

“ James wa born in Philadelphia, Aug. 31st, 1766, and was the youngest son. He was well educated after the manner of Friends, especially at their school, under the superintendence of Robert Proud, the historian of Pennsylvania. No doubt can exist, that his love of literature and of books in general, must have been at this period manifested, as his proficiency was early evinced, and a superiority over his cotemporaries in this respect existed, which could not otherwise be explained. ”

“ James; hence he early lent his influence to the society (formed chiefly among Friends, and having for a long time the late excellent Wm. Rawle as its president,) for the abolition of slavery in Pennsylvania. In perfect consistency with these views he was among the first members, and for a considerable time the president of the Pennsylvania Colonization Society, believing that the true interests of the black would by this institution be most efficiently promoted. ”

“ This self-command was the result of high moral and Christian principles. As a young man, when his feelings and passions were ardent, he is believed to have been uniformly correct in his conduct and moral principles. ”

“ Suffice it to say, that receiving his early impressions from distinguished English teachers, his views were founded mainly on British obstetrics. He examined, however, the productions of the French and other continental schools, followed their writers into that scientific detail, and those minute instructions regarding the mechanism of labour and the treatment of parturition therewith necessarily connected, which has distinguished the French obstetrician, and so elevated the science of tokology. Profiting by all this accurate information, Dr. ”