When I was a medical student at Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons, a framed quotation used to hang outside of the office of the Department of Medicine. It was this memoir of Hector Berlioz:
My father, Louis Berlioz was a doctor. It is not for me to estimate his abilities, but I may say that he inspired great confidence both in our town and in the neighboring ones. He was keenly sensitive to the responsibilities of his profession, and believed that in the practice of so dangerous and difficult an art as medicine, it behooved him to devote every spare moment to mastering it, since the life of his fellow-creatures was dependent on his skill.
To the best of my recollection, this was the only intimation ever offered that there might be an intellectual hereafter following departure from the university center. Indeed, other exposures seemed to conspire in such