PHYSIOLOGY AND ITS RELATION TO MEDICINE 397 



now the standard for a good many problems in physics and chemistry. 

 Above all, in the studies of the energies of life we lack the controlling 

 factor of synthesis. If we can produce synthetically urea or sugars or 

 other dead constituents of a dead or living body, we cannot yet make 

 synthetically the smallest living organ of the smallest homunculus. 

 But what of it? Each science has its own degree of attainable exact- 

 ness. Physics and chemistry have one standard, and paleontology or 

 geology is bound to have another standard of exactness. There is no 

 one standard of exactness for all sciences. The scientific demand upon 

 work in any science is to strive for that degree of exactness which is 

 attainable in each specific field of investigation. 



I contend, further, that physiology ought not and cannot be pro- 

 perly developed upon the basis of a morphological unit. We might just 

 as well attempt to put up the mineral crystals as a basis for the study 

 of physics. 



I may say, further, that in my opinion the knowledge of vital ener- 

 gies would progress more rapidly if we were guided in our investiga- 

 tions by the view that the actual processes in the phenomena of life 

 are of a very complex nature. The desire to reduce the multiplicity of 

 phenomena to a few simple principles is a philosophical importation of 

 a psychological origin. Certainly premature attempts to offer simple 

 interpretations for complex phenomena have often been an obstacle 

 for a further development of our knowledge of the actual processes. 



Physiology, however, may take some useful hints from the other 

 sciences. It may learn from such exact sciences as physics and chem- 

 istry that the exactness and dignity of a science do not suffer by com- 

 ing into intimate contact with the necessities of daily life. On the 

 contrary, we find that those chapters of physics and chemistry whose 

 results found practical application are best developed. The contact 

 of a science with life and its actual necessities works, on the one hand, 

 as a stimulus to investigation, and, on the other hand, as a corrective 

 against an indulgence in mere hobbies. The experimental method 

 as such is no talisman against such scholastic degeneration. A study 

 of the literature of the last few decades will show that physiology, 

 too, could well stand such a corrective. 



Physiology could also learn from morphology that a special atten- 

 tion to the human being does not necessarily lead to a neglect of the 

 uniform study of the entire animal kingdom. The marvelous com- 

 plete studies of gross and minute human anatomy, which was of such 

 immense service to pathology and surgery, was in no way an obstacle 

 to the brilliant development of the broad science of zoology. 



There is, however, one difference between the studies of the energies 

 of inanimate phenomena and the studies of the vital energies, to which 

 I would like to call special attention. For physics there is only one 

 kind of energies; they are all normal. If the physicist meets with 



