30 THE NEW PHYSIOLOGY. 



only be, physical and chemical facts as interpreted in 

 the light of current physics and chemistry, it must be 

 pointed out that they are referring not to bed-rock 

 reality, but to interpretations of that reality ; and, 

 moreover, to interpretations which physical science 

 itself is showing to be imperfect, not to mention objec- 

 tions which seem to me of an even more formidable 

 character from the philosophical side. 



In the interpretation of Nature we have to look, not 

 merelv at the immediate sense data, but at the accom- 

 panying phenomena. When a piece of metal burns, 

 the residue is heavier than the original metal. This 

 might be due to the loss from the metal of something 

 with a negative weight, phlogiston, or to gain by the 

 metal of something of a positive weight. It was only 

 by investigating the accompanying phenomena — the 

 disappearance of what we now call free oxygen in the 

 process — that Lavoisier showed the second hypothesis 

 to be better than the first. Now, in the interpretation 

 of the phenomena life we are equally bound to look 

 at the phenomena which accompany each phenomenon 

 which we are investigating ; and it is here, as it seems 

 to me, that the mechanistic biology has signally failed. 

 It takes individual physiological data, as interpreted 

 in the light of current physical and chemical theory, 

 and assumes them to represent bed-rock fact. It then 

 endeavours to piece these individual data together, so 

 as to represent an intelligible physico-chemical process ; 

 and the result has been failure, which with advancing 

 knowledge seems only to become more and more hope- 

 less. 



In investigating a living organism we have no right 



