PHENOMENA OF MUSCLE AND NERVE. 327 



theory was not abandoned, but every inconvenient case of absence 

 of current was, on various pretexts, explained away. The mole- 

 cular theory next introduced untold confusion into the subject of 

 action-currents, where it literally turned things upside down ; errors 

 of fact had to be first removed, and then new facts discovered be- 

 fore this confusion could be got rid of, and before this department 

 of the subject could be so cleared up that its law, like that of the 

 current of rest, could be expressed simply. 



The molecular theory was especially unhappy in its application 

 to electrotonus. It was incapable of explaining either the galvanic 

 or the excitatory phenomena, although it pretended to explain the 

 former and held out the prospect of explaining the latter, together 

 with the function both of nerve and of muscle in its entirety, in the 

 future. Now it has come to this, that on the one hand the theory 

 claims to have discovered a fact basis for the supposed intrapolar 

 arrangement of molecules (of course, only by disregarding obvious 

 explanations), while on the other it abandons its explanation of 

 extrapolar currents, notwithstanding that this intrapolar rotation 

 was invented (it need scarcely be said without any basis of fact, 

 or discussible theory) for the very purpose of explaining the extra- 

 polar currents. 



The theory was equally unfortunate in its application to the currents 

 of the skin and secreting organs ; here it has favoured the setting 

 up of an almost inverted law of secretion-currents, founded on a 

 false conception of action-currents in nerve and muscle, and so has 

 led to results which are wrong in fact. Finally, it has shown 

 itself an utterly incapable guide in the study of electrical fish, the 

 best that it could do being to bring into existence an easily demo- 

 lished fabric of rash speculations. I will not refer to the 

 currents of plants and parenchyma which, as they are in the highest 

 degree inconvenient to the molecular theory, are wilfully neglected, 

 or of which the facts are misrepresented. 



I challenge the mention of a single statement contained in this 

 indictment against the molecular theory which I am not able to 

 substantiate and confirm by quotations. I maintain, however, that 

 this theory which was sufficiently dangerous to lead its author (the 

 creator of this rich field, the discoverer of its methods, the man who 

 has helped to teach his contemporaries in medicine to think in 

 accordance with physics) from error to error, that this theory must 

 now at length be given up. It must be given up completely ; all 

 toying with it in handbooks must cease, even at the cost of losing a 



