544 



NATURE 



[October 13, 1923 



tion is at least as necessary to it as induction. There- 

 fore I do not agree with the party of the Bears when 

 they depreciate subsidised investigations carried out 

 by full-time workers under managing committees. 

 The present state of medical science requires con- 

 stant physiological, pathological, therapeutic, and bio- 

 chemical researches, often involving delicate measure- 

 ments which cannot be made by medical practitioners 

 outside laboratories, or even by teachers in the medical 

 schools in their spare time. Spend therefore as much 

 money as you can raise for tliis purpose ; let every 

 budding Pasteur have his chance ; and pray for a 

 Rockefeller. But at the same time considerable waste 

 must be expected and allowed for. One docs not envy 

 committees of management. As Sir Ernest Rutherford 

 recently said in his address to the British Association : 

 " Those who have the responsibility of administering 

 the grants in aid of research for both pure and 

 applied science will need all their wisdom and ex- 

 perience to make a wise allocation of funds to secure 

 the maximum of results for the minimum of ex- 

 penditure. It is fatally easy to spend much money 

 in a direct frontal attack on some technical problem 

 of importance when the solution may depend on 

 some addition to knowledge which can be gained in 

 some other field of scientific inquiry, possibly at a 

 trifling cost." 



I can adduce many other difficulties. Workers are 

 apt to be called away to other posts before their task 

 is complete. Then who can know when an old vein is 

 exhausted, or whether a proposed new line is really 

 promising, unless he himself has worked at the job ? — 

 and few committees can consist of specialists in all 

 possible lines. In my own subject I have known men 

 employed who had never read the literature, who dug 

 up again old disused workings, or who chased the wild 

 goose with a pinch of salt for years — all costing money. 

 But the greatest waste is caused by the large number 

 of incomplete articles, constantly being published, 

 which, though they may be good so far as they go, are 

 lost in the mass of literature — so that when the man 

 who clears up the question finally arrives he is obliged 

 to rediscover all the matter for himself. But in spite 

 of these difficulties I agree with the Bulls. The world 

 must continue spending money in this way ; and it will 

 improve the system with practice. 



Now for the other side — the obverse of the medal. 

 One of our most distinguished physicians told me a 

 few months ago that some one had accused him of not 

 really being a man of science because he did not work 

 in a laboratory ! Yet he has made more valuable 

 additions to medical knowledge and practice than has 

 fallen to the lot of most laboratories. Consider this 

 point carefully. The work of the laboratory has 

 almost always been the collection of facts and measure- 

 ments, the elaboration of detail, the testing of theories ; 

 but the other side of science, the great inductions which 

 have solved problems or have applied facts directly 

 to the cure or prevention of disease have been made 

 mostly by that humble individual, the " private 

 enthusiast " — generally either a teacher or a " mere 

 doctor." William Harvey was a mere doctor ; Edward 

 Jenner, a mere country doctor ! What laboratory did 

 jenner require ? He did not even use a microscope, 

 and yet he gave to humanity t"he greatest single boon 



NO. 2815, VOL. 112] 



which it has ever received, and also initiated <i\;r 

 present knowledge of immunity. G. F. E. Kudu n- 

 meister, who first proved alternations of generatiot-, 

 in parasites, was a practising doctor, Pasteur \\.i 

 a professor of chemistry. Lister was a practisi: j 

 surgeon in Glasgow. Robert Koch was also a ni< ;. 

 practising country doctor when he discovered tin 

 bacilli of anthrax and of surgical sepsis, the stainin. 

 of bacteria, and plate-cultivation, thus making practi .il 

 bacteriology. Man.son was a doctor in China. Laveran, 

 Bruce, Reed, and Leishman were or are army doctor^ 

 Need I mention any more names ? — I should have \<> 

 hurl almost the whole history of medicine at yoi; : 

 Where were the laboratories of these men ? — in tin ir 

 own hospitals and consulting-rooms. Where were th( 

 laboratories of Kepler and Newton? — in their own 

 brains. Who are making the innumerable advan< rs 

 which we see to-day in connexion with medical, surgii A, 

 and sanitary practice regarding almost all diseasi^ 'i 

 Very largely our professors, our teachers, our lalx)ratory 



workers, it is true ; but also, and not If ■' lini(ian> 



and our hygienists. 



We see then that there is much to dc said for the 

 Bears as well as for the Bulls. It is an historical fact 

 that most of the greatest advances have been made 

 by men who were not subsidised for their researches. 

 I think, therefore, that the whole field of public support 

 for science should be broadened so as to include such 

 men. At present the public gives considerable sums 

 for institutional investigations with the test-tube, the 

 scalpel, and the microscope, but little or nothing for 

 workers outside. That is, it supports, and rightly 

 supports, observational science, which is largely 

 ancillary, but scarcely helps those great intellectual 

 investigations which mostly obtain the final or useful 

 results. It would have subsidised Tycho Brahe's 

 observatory at Uraniborg ; but it would probably have 

 refused a penny to Kepler, or to Newton, or to Jenner. 

 It pays for digging the foundations of the Temple of 

 Medical Science, but leaves the building of the walls 

 and towers to the practitioner and the enthusiast — 

 often at their own cost. It pours out money for the 

 expectation of discoveries to come, but refuses to give 

 anything for discoveries already completed by private 

 individuals ! 



It seems to me that all this is ver\' " bad business. ' 

 We should pay not only for expectations but also for 

 results. I should like to see the whole medical pro- 

 fession brought into the research fold — not in labora- 

 tories, but in their practice, their consulting-rooms, 

 and their own brains. Some one will say that the 

 private enthusiast will continue to work whether we 

 help him or not — surely the meanest argument ever 

 used ! — but will he ? Then some one else will exclaim 

 that there is nothing to hinder any and even.' medical 

 man from investigation. I am not so sure. True, 

 hundreds or thousands of them arfe now actually thus 

 engaged, and, in fact, are obtaining the important 

 results just mentioned ; but large numbers of medical 

 men cannot always afford such a luxur\-, because they 

 have to maintain their practices. The reason for this 

 is that while clinical researches which improve medical 

 and surgical treatment often enhance practice — and 

 ver}' deservedly so — other scientific work, such as 

 physiological and pathological studies, which are off 



