556 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



urgent need of reform. The reform should take the direction 

 of teaching the subject practically and with direct reference to 

 its applications : as every branch of chemistry in turn must 

 necessarily be laid under contribution, chemists need have no 

 fear that their field of action will be thereby unduly limited. 

 The course followed at present has little disciplinary value — 

 there is much room for improvement in this direction at an 

 early date. It will be unwise, however, to make radical changes 

 until we are really clear what is desirable and what is 

 possible — a scheme must be worked out thoroughly and 

 carefully ; and when put in action must be administered 

 throughout a series of years without being subject to change 

 by order. There must be no cast-iron rigidity in the scheme. 

 As any system of control by external examinations would 

 inevitably bar the path of progress, the central institutions 

 should be free to administer their own affairs educational. 



But no really effective change will be possible in the 

 technical course of study until the schools have altered their 

 ways : until proper habits are acquired at school the path of 

 medical students at college must always be an uncertain one. 

 It, is needless to say more on so hackneyed a subject, except 

 to point out that medical men may help their successors most 

 materially if they will take every opportunity, each within his 

 own sphere of influence, to affect public opinion. 



Infinite possibilities are before us of ministering to the 

 alleviation and cure of disease, as our knowledge of normal and 

 pathological conditions increases. We are nowwasting invaluable 

 opportunities through our failure to institute systematic inquiry 

 and in consequence of the lack of trained scientific observers 

 among medical men. Every hospital affords abundant material 

 for study : therefore every hospital should have its chemical 

 laboratory devoted to scientific research work along physiological 

 lines. The men in charge of such laboratories would, in course 

 of time, become qualified to be teachers in the medical schools — 

 for we need to recognise that teachers as well as students 

 require training and full opportunity of gaining experience. 

 It is the duty of the public, in protection of their own interests, 

 to establish such laboratories. 



