University of Maryland Baltimore Dental School - Mirror Yearbook (Baltimore, MD)

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Spend at least fourteen hours every week in professional reading and study. Don ' t be narrow. Know all the poets and authors of merit. Avoid trashy fiction. Belong to and attend the church. Join in every movement for the benefit and uplift of your community. Vote at every election, but avoid self-seeking politics. Exchange freely with your professional brother opinions and demonstrations. Try out your theories of practice before you exploit them. Never attempt to deceive or make false impressions in reports of cases. Belong to your State and local dental and medical societies. Build every day an addition to the knowledge you now possess, and you will be sought for out of many. Never dismiss a patient until you are satisfied you have done your best. Bring into your service the sunshine of a glad heart, and let a smiling face be its index. If this prescription be not shaken, but regularly taken, it will bring that genuine success to which Woodrow Wilson refers in the following paragraph : We do not live for material success. Not one of us has ever been satisfied for a single moment by material success. We live in order that our spirits may be serene. We live in order that days may come in which, when the work is over, we may look our fellow-men in the eyes with unfaltering gaze, and when we shall come to the brink of the grave and go down into its depths we may know that we, at least, have done our little parts to see that men are elevated to the uplands of vision and unselfish achieve- ment. Dr. B. Holly Smith. 17

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It is not all of success to resolve to be great. Greatness in character does not mean the evolution of some ponderous personality, which, like a massive piece of furniture, is out of all proportion to its setting, but a character which fully fills the niche it occupies, and from its station dispenses the bless- ings of high thinking and right doing. Greatness is the outgrowth of service to others. Not only is it impossible for one to resolve himself great, but though he lavish upon himself every effort of an earnest life, he will be as an inexperienced and untrained gawk, in comparison to him who has grown great in the service of his fellow. If every man who aspires to be great or resolves to be great should, without further ado, desert his habitual en- virons and flock to the door of place and power, he might knock till his knuckles were sore without gain- ing entrance, but what man who by toil and study has adequately prepared himself for useful service does not find himself already in the room of place and power? The diploma of the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery which the Class of 1912 acquires is no more than a form of introduction to professional life, the testimony of your Alma Mater that you are profes- sionally well-born and are of a family deserving station in any community which has regard for such dis- tinctions. Armed with this introduction you go forth to make or mar your own fortunes. There would be no failures in life if every loving mother ' s offspring might reap the fruition of her hopes. It rests with you to do her honor or to bring upon her household and name reproach. Every man should have a philosophy of life ; should resolve how it should be lived, and keep a watch- ful eye upon the execution of his purposes. The aimless and idle life is little less than criminal. In almost every corner of the world there is an opportunity for useful service. It waits the coming of the man capable of seizing it. Will you clutter up the way like useless hulks, or will you come with glad hearts and trained hands to do the world ' s work? Among other things, you have been trained in prescription writing. Let me write one which 1 believe if taken would make the Class of 1912 the greatest and most useful body of graduates of any college. r. Sleep outdoors, or with all the windows open. Go to the operating chair or laboratory bench early and quit while the sun shines. Spend at least fourteen hours every week in open daylight. 1G

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Oral Hygiene ENTAL HYGIENE is not the innovation that the present widely-reaching movement would seem to indicate. As far back as the first century, before the Christian era, we find Asclepiades advocating a sterile condition of the oral cavity, basing his curative processes upon hygienic care. Following him came Cornelius Celsus, the Roman, also born before Christ. He was even more explicit than his predecessor, advocating the removal of black stains and a thor- ough rinsing of the mouth every morning. Next in line were Pliny and Archigenes, both of whom men- tioned the application of medicines in the treatment of toothache. After these, little is known until Albucasis the Arabian came forward in the eleventh century with a full set of tartar-removing instruments, with directions for their proper use. Succeeding Albucasis, we find a long line of writers and prominent medical men, enthusiasts of Oral Hygiene. We have Guy de Chauliac, the greatest surgeon of the Middle Ages ; Grovanni of Arcobi ; Pari, Riviere and many others. But there is a vast difference between the present movement and the Oral Hygiene advocated by Ascle- piades and his successors. These were far-sighted men, who appreciated its value, but they reached only those who were educated sufficiently to grasp its meaning, and take advantage of their teachings. The scope of the presene Dental Hygiene movement has been immensely increased from those iso- lated efforts of our predecessors because of the economic problems involved. Where enormous sums have been spent for hospitals, sanitariums, and the like, it has been found more economical to prevent the spreading of these conditions, which require such places of recuperation, than to allow them to occur and do the repair work afterwards. The present campaign, then, is based upon the economic idea that the teeth are an essential factor in producing efficiency in the human body, and that the masses, being the economic factor in the develop- ment of the resources, wealth and power of the century, should be protected in every possible manner from those conditions which detract from their efficiency as a producing agent. A large number of persons at the present time have sufficient interest in their well-being to consult their dentist often enough to insure the retaining of these organs. But the masses which represent 75 18