22 GENERAL PHYSIOLOGY 



the surest support of physiology ; without it physiology is scarcely 

 conceivable." Miiller was incited by this idea, and the result was 

 the foundation of a wholly new science in his comparative physiology. 

 Throughout his whole life he defended the position expressed in 

 the words, " Physiology can be only comparative," and among the 

 very large number of his physiological works there are few in 

 which the comparative principle is not more or less clearly 

 expressed. 



He presented the results of his own investigations together with 

 practically all the physiological knowledge of his time in his 

 " Handbuch der Physiologic des Menschen" This work stands to- 

 day unsurpassed in the genuinely philosophical manner with which 

 the material, swollen to vast proportions by innumerable special 

 researches, was for the first time sifted and elaborated into a 

 unitary picture of the mechanism within the living organism. In 

 this respect the " Handbuch " is to-day not only unsurpassed, but 

 unequalled. Naturally many of its details are incorrect according 

 to present ideas ; later researches performed with a more perfect 

 technique have greatly extended and transformed some depart- 

 ments ; even many of Miiller 's general physiological ideas, such as 

 that of vital force, have been completely abandoned by the later 

 physiology ; nevertheless, it remains that of all the numerous hand- 

 books that have since appeared none has reached that of the great 

 master as regards the mode of dealing with the material. Most of 

 the later Hand-books, Text-books, Elements, etc., although intended 

 almost exclusively for the use of students, do not take the trouble 

 to point out even briefly the aims, the problem and the purpose of 

 physiological science, let alone giving to the matter as a whole 

 a philosophical treatment in Mtiller's sense. Such a lack must be 

 regarded as a serious detriment by thinking students who do not 

 learn simply by rote. Only a very few text-books form an 

 exception to this, as, e.g., Briicke's admirable " Vorlesungen uber 

 Physiologic." 



The tireless physiological activity of Mtiller, which won for him 

 the fame of being the greatest physiologist of all time, did not 

 prevent him from giving himself up in the later years of his life 

 with equal enthusiasm to morphology, especially zoology, com- 

 parative anatomy, and paleontology, and of acquiring the name 

 of the greatest morphologist of his time. So many-sided and 

 comprehensive was he that by his own fundamental labours he 

 mastered two large sciences, either one of which a single person is 

 at present hardly able to survey unaided. 



It is no wonder that so large a realm could not be held together 

 as a unit after the death of its ruler. Like Alexander's universal 

 empire, it became divided into many small territories, each one of 

 which controlled itself; and with the present boundary of science 

 it would be difficult to find a worthy successor to Miiller, even 



