EXTRACT XXXVIII. c. 



ON STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION AS OBSERVED IN THE 

 HUMAN BODY PAR EXCELLENCE. 



IT may, we think, be accepted as axiomatic that every 

 structure and organ in the human body is constructed on 

 a definite plan, and for a definite purpose, which is 

 repeated with but slight variation, due mainly to environ- 

 ment, generation after generation, in the formative pro- 

 cesses of growth and evolution, and that, therefore, every 

 such structure and organ has a real and, so far, a vital, 

 function to perform within that body of which it forms a 

 part, of a co-operating, collective whole, and in which we 

 have to recognise it, in every instance, as an employee, or 

 worker, in the co-operative workshop, so to speak, and not, 

 as sometimes claimed, an inert or desiccated specimen in 

 a museum of " survivals." The prolonged process of 

 embryonic, foetal, and post-natal growth forms but an 

 organic evolutionary struggle, in which the final result is 

 the "survival of the fittest," in structure and function, in 

 virtue of complete or absolute adaptation to special ends 

 and requirements, and of freedom from the preceding 

 structural limitations, due to the meeting of only temporary 

 and passing formative wants and conditions. We may, 

 therefore, accept it as a proved, and almost self-evident truth, 

 that the completely developed example of the genus homo 

 possesses not an atom of superfluous or functionless 

 texture, and that every " part and parcel " of his organism 

 has a duty to perform in his body corporate, and a raison 

 d'etre for its continued existence in the commonwealth of 

 his textures and organs. In short, man may be held to 



