80 PHYSIOLOGY AND NATIONAL NEEDS 



The physiologist spends his life studying the 

 ways in which the activities of the various parts of 

 the body may be investigated, in determining what 

 is the normal action of each of these various parts, 

 how they interact on one another, and how they 

 are modified by various conditions ; and he is 

 thus trained to find out if any part is not working 

 rightly, and why it is not working rightly. 



So far as regards their relations to medicine, the 

 sciences of bacteriology and of pharmacology are 

 really extensions of physiology, since they involve 

 the study of the manner in which bacteria and 

 their products modify the normal working of the 

 organs, and of the ways in which various drugs 

 influence these vital processes. 



Without a training in medicine the physiologist 

 can approach the study of disease with some 

 prospect of success ; without a knowledge of 

 physiology the physician is merely groping in the 

 dark. 



But, you say, " every medical student has this 

 physiological training." I am afraid that too 

 frequently physiology is studied by the student 

 not as a preparation for the after-study of disease, 

 but as a means of passing a certain examination, 

 too frequently the teacher fails to keep before 

 himself and his students why they are studying 

 physiology, with the result that, when the student 

 comes to the bedside, he does not bring with him 



