Gentlemen,—It is my pleasing duty in the first place to thank you, not
only for the kindness you have shown in electing me to the responsible
position of President of your Branch, but also for having given me the
honour of being the First President of the First Branch of the British
Dental Association.
I need scarcely say that the fact of our meeting here to-day as we are
now doing is a subject for congratulation, and the presence of so many,
and the distance some of you have come, proves the interest you take in
the great movement of the day, which has called into existence the
central Society of which we now form a branch.
Every new movement is sure to give rise to more or less excitement and
sometimes to great expectations, and I must, therefore, beg, first for
myself, your kind forbearance for my numerous shortcomings, of which I
am only too conscious; and secondly, for your society I must also ask
your kind consideration, if at the first it seems to you scarcely to
come up to the high standard of your anticipations, requesting you to
remember that it is still in its infancy, that it has commenced its
existence under difficulties, and I regret to say, not without some
opposition. It will, therefore, require care and energy, not only on the
part of the Executive body, but also in each individual member, to bring
it to that state of maturity we all are anxious to see it attain. I feel
certain from your presence here to-day that you have the interest of the
Society at heart, but I venture to remind you that the simply feeling an
interest in a thing is not sufficient in itself to command success.
_That_ is a result which requires, especially in these days, both energy
and labour, and we must never forget that our future position and
progress as a Society, will mainly depend on our own individual efforts,
since we are each of us an individual unit, the aggregate of which units
forms the Society itself.
It would be natural for you to expect in this, the first introductory
paper, a history of the origin and objects of the Society, but these
were so ably treated of by the worthy Secretary of the Society on his
visit to Manchester, and so many of you were present at the London
meetings, and so much has been already written on the subject, that it
would not only be superfluous but also presumptuous for me to attempt
what has already been done by others so much more competent than myself,
and I am therefore deprived of what would have been an interesting topic
for an address; but although the past and the present have thus been
taken from me, there still remains the future; and as I hope that in
that future our Midland branch will ultimately form a not unimportant
unit, I will therefore restrict what I have to say mainly to the subject
of the branch itself, and in doing so must crave your kind indulgence
for the many imperfections in my efforts, urging as my excuse the little
time that numerous professional and other engagements leave at my
disposal.
Here, I think, we may congratulate ourselves, that we exist as a branch
of the British Dental Association and not as an independent Society, for
I am sure we all feel that the scheme for the elevation of our
profession to its proper position, which that Society has been formed to
promote, has been most judiciously planned, and has thus far been most
efficiently carried out—a scheme, which whilst it in no way discourages
the attainment of the higher qualification of full membership of the
Royal College of Surgeons, in those who are anxious to distinguish
themselves, and possess the means and opportunity for so doing, provides
an efficient education in all those scientific and practical subjects
which it is necessary for a Dentist to know, and by means of the Dental
Diploma, affords the public a guarantee that the possessor of that
diploma has passed through a curriculum of such a standard as fully to
qualify him for the practice of the branch of surgery which he
professes. Nor must we allow to pass unnoticed the utter unselfishness
of its promoters, who laboured out of pure love for their profession,
knowing that they could never expect to see the good result of their
labours in their lifetime, unlike the man who is said to have remarked
that he never could see the good posterity had done for him that he need
trouble himself about posterity: and as was the case with many of those
grand memorials of the loving zeal and devotion of our ancestors, those
noble cathedrals with which so many parts of our country are adorned,
one generation was satisfied if they were able to lay the foundations
and were permitted to see some portion of the superstructure erected
during their lifetime, so in like manner, we must wait and not be
discouraged if we are unable to see the full development of the present
movement, but should consider it a privilege to be permitted to assist
in however humble a degree, in taking part in what we fondly and
reasonably hope will prove the formation of a grand future for our
branch of surgery.
To our Secretary and Treasurer are due, I believe, the credit of having
originated the branch, and I take this opportunity of saying that I am
unable in any way to claim a portion of that credit for myself, for I
gather from a letter in one of the journals, that I was not only
believed to have been one of the promoters, but that I was thought to
have been guilty of an act of discourtesy in what I had done, or rather
in what I had not done. I knew nothing of the project till I received a
printed circular inviting my co-operation, and it was not till after the
lapse of many weeks that I found myself able to join in the scheme. The
promoters worked hard in drafting the bye-laws and arranging the other
necessary preliminaries, but I am sure I may say for them that they feel
amply rewarded by seeing their pet child, over which they have laboured
so long, fully recognised as a legitimate offspring of the British
Dental Association.