My speaking before this society in some sort of answer to Dr. Brennemann's paper on "The Menace of Psychiatry"1 was decided on with full realization that about all that I could say was "Amen." Also, there is in the audience the chairman of a committee on the relationship of psychiatry and psychology to the practice of pediatrics.2 Moreover my title "The Promise of Psychiatry," was taken much more with an eye to some literary setting off of Dr Brennemann's article than with the slightest notion that there is any such promise—or, if there is one, that psychiatry can meet its note before being engulfed in bankruptcy.
While I can attest that these manifold misgivings were communicated to your secretary, they admittedly were not displayed until after the acceptance of your courteous invitation had been irrevocably nailed down. If what I have to say is but half the masterpiece