108 PATHOLOGY 



lead to coordination of knowledge and broad and still broader gen- 

 eralizations as to causes, nature, and processes of disease. At pre- 

 sent we may be said to be gathering materials for this broader com- 

 parative pathological biology of the future in the same way as the 

 older naturalists gathered materials for the biologist of the present 

 day. 



Pathology and Research 



At least in certain fields the student of the pure science of disease 

 is primarily interested in the knowledge of disease for its own sake 

 without much thought or immediate care as to any prompt practical 

 use to which such contributions as he may make to this knowledge may 

 be put. It is true here as it is in general that most things are done 

 only on account of the results expected from them in the future, but 

 immediate technical utility is not always the sole guiding principle 

 of the investigator in pathologic domains. The history of pathology 

 shows him that in this science as well as in its synthetic sciences all 

 actual increase in knowledge eventually helps to relieve suffering. 

 Everywhere the most intimate relations may be seen between the 

 progress of medical knowledge and the progress of medical art. Like 

 other sciences pathology furnishes many examples of the rather 

 unexpected importance and the even profound influence of the new 

 observation, the new methods of study, the new point of view that 

 at first seemed to have but limited significance. Indeed some of the 

 fundamental ideas of scientific medicine have arisen in this way. 

 It has been well said that no knowledge of substance or force or life 

 is so remote or minute, but that to-morrow it may become an indis- 

 pensable need (van Hise). We in America have therefore much 

 reason to rejoice because of the strong movement that is starting in 

 the interest of scholarship and of research in pathology, a movement 

 that of course does not limit its influence merely to the advancement 

 of knowledge, but exercises as well a powerful influence upon the 

 diffusion of knowledge. The man who is so full of enthusiasm for 

 pathology that he will "burn his lamp for its advancement" is 

 likely also to be an inspiring teacher illuminating the older know- 

 ledge with the discovery of to-day and placing the new facts in their 

 proper relations to what is already known and to what will be known. 

 Medicine in this country has been so preoccupied with building-up 

 medical education for the training of physicians that comparatively 

 little energy has been available for the upbuilding of medical science 

 itself. Thus pathology in the universities has not been taught until 

 very recently in such a way that graduate students might take it up 

 as a branch to be followed through long stretches of labor. This is 

 regrettable, but in some of our universities pathology is now placed 

 on equal footing with other natural sciences and fully recognized as 



