22 MEMORIAL SKETCH. 



" tissues are not less the result of their material constitu- 

 " tion ; " and that " vital properties are not added to matter 

 " in the process of organization ; but those previously existing 

 " and hitherto inactive are called out and developed." He 

 ventured, therefore, on the speculation that "the vital and 

 " physical properties of matter may ultimately be shown to 

 " result from some higher, more general quality ; an advance 

 " in the path of philosophy, should it ever be proved, far 

 " beyond any which has been already attained, or which we 

 *' have in immediate prospect." 



The same thought is developed in an article published 

 in the British and Foreign Medical Review, in April, 1838, 

 entitled " Physiology an Inductive Science," criticizing the 

 portion of Dr. Whewell's'-'History of the Inductive Sciences," 

 which relates to that subject. A few passages from this 

 essay, which was much admired at the time, will be found 

 on a later page of this volume.* They strike the keynote 

 of much of his subsequent " Philosophy of Nature." 



Side by side with this article, in the same number of the 

 Revieiv, stood another from the same busy pen, more than 

 fifty pages in length, on " The Physiology of the Spinal 

 Marrow." It contained a full treatment of the doctrine of 

 reflex action, then recently propounded as new by Dr. 

 Marshall Plall; and it was generally accepted by competent 

 judges as a fair statement of the aspect which the question 

 presented at that date, though it did not give satisfaction 

 to Dr. Hall. The author was recognized as having placed 

 the discussion upon a broader basis, as regards both the 

 general doctrines of the Physiology of the nervous system 

 and their history, than that to which Dr. Hall had been 

 himself disposed to restrict it. 



Such were the preliminary labours by which the young 

 man of twenty-four prepared for the accomplishment of 



* See p. 155. 



