CARL LUDWIG. 



rHE development of the science of life has more than 

 that of other knowledge gone forward in our days 

 under the guidance and direction of just a few transcendent 

 teachers. The scope and methods of modern physiology, 

 in so far as it claims to be an exact and truth-loving science, 

 lie confined within the limits which Johannes Muller and 

 Carl Ludwig have set. We must go back to the Athenian 

 days of Stoa and of Academy to find a personal influence as 

 great as that exercised by the last great teacher. Life is 

 for us the tritest, but at the same time the most marvellous, 

 and the most awe-inspiring reality. Strange therefore that 

 even in these days its fundamental doctrines should obtain 

 but few masters for its exposition. In this respect we may 

 perhaps detect a secret link between it and metaphysics, 

 from whose speculative views physiology -a science of facts 

 and substance — stands totally remote. 



In Germany no single branch of natural science can boast 

 a greater teacher than Carl Ludwig. Many are disposed to 

 rank the scholar, the investigator above the teacher. A 

 false conception ! Who can seriously so underrate the latter,, 

 for he also " must by hard fightino- have won conviction 

 for himself in regions where no other could come to his 

 aid, and must, in other words, have laboured on the con- 

 fines of human knowledge, and conquered new dominion 

 for it " ? 3 A great teacher in the true sense is even superior 

 to a great investigator ; to the latter the meed of acknow- 

 ledgment is accorded, if he has widened the limits at any 

 special point of the vast territory ; from the former how- 

 ever is demanded, that he be master of the whole, have 

 an eye for every detail, and in wise foresight prepare 

 for its fulfilment what the future has to ripen. The 

 possession of these latter qualities by Ludwig is most 

 conspicuous in his Le/irbuch der Physiologic, and through- 



1 Helmholtz, Uber die akad. Freiheit u. s. n. Vortrdge und Reden, ii., 

 p. 208. 



