CHAPTER XII 

 APPLICATIONS AND POSSIBILITIES 



The knowledge that the shape and action of a man's body as 

 well as his mind depend on the internal secretions inspires the 

 hope of the emergence of a hitherto inconceivable controlling 

 power over human life in the future. For in the wake of chemical 

 discovery there has always come chemical control. The nature 

 of chemical research, the necessity for clear thinking, accurate 

 measurement, and experience in the actual handling of materials, 

 the fundamental tradition and technique of the science, have 

 made and will make the practical applications about which we 

 today may only speculate. What the study of the internal secre- 

 tions suffers from, at the beginning of the third decade of the 

 twentieth century, is insufficient appreciation of its meaning for 

 mankind. It is true that there are thousands of workers scat- 

 tered throughout the world contributing their mites to the general 

 store. They increase yearly, almost daily, and their achieve- 

 ments, in spite of an uncritical enthusiasm in some quarters and 

 a semi-charlatanism in others, have been and continue magnifi- 

 cent. But they are pecking at a mountain which requires 

 organized, massive, engineering organization for its blasting. 



The crying need is for an international institute, endowed and 

 equipped for investigation upon the proper scale, with all the 

 available appliances and methods already worked out and at 

 hand. Such an institution would possess the right chemical 

 laboratories for the making of blood analyses, metabolism ex- 

 aminations, and tests of endocrine functions. There would be 

 X-ray machines and experts to radiograph the pituitary, pineal 

 and thymus glands when possible. There would be psychologists 

 to carry out intelligence tests, determine emotional reactions, and 

 group mental aberrations, deficiencies and defectives. There 

 would be statisticians, trained in biometrics, to criticize and com- 

 pare data obtained. There would be anthropoligists to note and 

 measure variations in angles and curves, ratios and quotients of 

 the external conformation of the body. Internists would record 



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