AIMS OF MODERN PEDIATRICS 479 



contact with internal medicine and the diseases of later childhood 

 closely related to the same were preferably studied. 



Even though the creation of independent chairs of pediatrics in the 

 German universities was improperly delayed by this relation, it had 

 the advantage that the establishment of the rapidly growing natural 

 sciences which was taking place at this period under the influence of 

 German internists came immediately and quickly to the service of 

 the clinic of children's diseases. The clearer knowledge of the disease 

 processes made possible thereby emphasized more and more the 

 identity of most of the diseases occurring in children and in adults, 

 and led them to seek the explanation of their differences in the pecu- 

 liar characteristics of the youthful organism. Of special importance 

 from this standpoint is the study of artificial feeding carried on with 

 such great energy by German authors (Biedert) ; this demonstrated 

 in the most convincing manner the unfinished condition of the in- 

 fantile digestive organs and the consequences arising therefrom. On 

 this basis the modern German school developed, which, by means of 

 the methods developed especially in internal medicine, saw the aim 

 of modern pediatrics in the investigation of those physiologic pecu- 

 liarities of the childish organism, which cause the differences between 

 its reaction under physiologic and pathologic conditions, and that 

 observed in adults. Recently the term pathologic physiology of 

 childhood has been used for this science. A similar road is being 

 traversed by the rising school of American pediatry; under the 

 leadership of Jacobi it has attached itself closely to the doctrines of 

 the German school. 



Thus we see the problems of pediatrics extended from an investi- 

 gation of diseased processes peculiar to childhood, as conceived by 

 the older pediatrists, to a general consideration of all pathologic 

 conditions occurring during this period of life. If I characterize this 

 as the current ruling at present and consider it the problem of the 

 immediate future for pediatrics, it must also be stated that the 

 solution of the part of this task belonging to physiology or general 

 pathology is not a problem for the pediatrist alone, but can only be 

 taken up successfully if assistance is had from workers in other lines. 

 It is recognized that pediatrics has at all times taken an active and 

 useful part in the building-up of general medicine and in the working- 

 out of questions of special clinical interest, which has been made 

 possible to a great degree by the peculiarity of its material. 



Of the greatest importance for the development of modern pedi- 

 atrics has been the introduction of exact methods of clinical dia- 

 gnosis, which developed in the middle of last century with the 

 great renaissance of the exact sciences. If this revolution was of 

 great aid in the study of diseases of adults, how much more for those 

 of early infancy, in which subjective statements and so many other 



