12 NATIONAL TRENDS IN BIOLOGY 



tion; where neither the regulation of the stimulant nor 

 the nutrition accomplishes our purpose, we can rely upon 

 specific remedies. 



"The logical and inevitable conclusion is that, if we 

 thoroughly understood the exact function and the func- 

 tional relations of all the cells of the nervous system, we 

 could, beginning with the child, control in a large meas- 

 ure the development of his character, and in the adult, 

 modify existing attributes by stimulation of one class of 

 nerve cells and the repression of another to any extent 

 that we desire. Nothing can be more thoroughly practical 

 than the application of the proper remedial measures by 

 which the equilibrium of these centers is secured."^ 



It also should be said that while Dr. Smith discusses 

 here only the nervous system, every additional fact 

 learned about the individual cell brings us just that much 

 nearer accomplishing the desired results. And as the one- 

 celled organism must perform all the functions of life 

 that man performs with his highly specialized organs, 

 composed, in turn, of individual cells, there is no place 

 that one may hope for more biological light to be thrown 

 on all the activities, normal and abnormal, physical and 

 mental, of man, than through the knowledge gained by 

 experimental work on these lowly organisms. 



One of our leading scientific insurance investigators^ 

 of the ills of human kind, tells us that every conceivable 

 form of influence that can possibly shorten human life 

 is contained in the following eleven categories: 



