October 25, 1894] 



NATURE 



631 



as a remedy in dyspepsia, digestive ferments .have been largely 

 employed to assist the stomach and intestine ii> the performance 

 of their functions, but very little has been done until lately in 

 the way of modifying tissue changes in the body by the intro- 

 duction of ferments derived from solid organs. For ages back 

 savages have eaten the raw hearts and other organs of the 

 animals which they have killed, or the enemies they have con- 

 quered, under the belief that they would thereby obtain increased 

 vigour or courage ; but the first definite attempt to cure a disease 

 by supplying a ferment from a solid non-glandular organ of the 

 body was, I believe, made in Harvey's own hospital by the use 

 of raw meat in diabetes.^ It was not, however, until Brown- 

 ^(jquarJ recommended the use of testicular e.ttract, that the 

 ittention of the profession became attracted to the use of extracts 

 I solid organs. Since then extract of thyroid, extract of kidney, 

 vtract of supra renal capsule have been employed; but even yet 

 ..ley are only upon their trial, and the limits of their utility have 

 not yet been definitely ascertained. 



But yet another therapeutic method has been recently intro- 

 duced which bids fair to be of the utmost importance, the treat- 

 ment of disease by antitoxins. The discovery by Pasleur of the 

 dependence of many diseases upon the presence of minute or- 

 ganisms may be ranked with that of Harvey, both in regard to 

 the far-reaching benefits which it has conferred upon mankind, 

 and for the simplicity of its origin The germ of all his 

 discoveries was the attempt to answer the apparently useless 

 question: "Why does a crystal of tartaric acid sometimes 

 crystallise in one form and sometimes in another?" From 

 this germ sprung his discovery of the nature of yeast and of 

 those microbes which originate fermentation, putrefaction, and 

 disease. These minute organisms, far removed from man as 

 they are in their structure and place in nature, appear in some 

 respects to resemble him in the processes of their growth and 

 nutrition. They seem, indeed, to have the power of splitting 

 up inactive bodies into substances having a great physiological 

 or chemical activity. From grape sugar, which is comparatively 

 inert, they produce carbonic acid and alcohol, both of which 

 I have a powerful physiological action. From inert albumen they 

 j produce albumoses having a most powerful toxic action, and to 

 the poisonous properties of these substances attention was for a 

 while alone directed. But it would appear that at the same time 

 they produce poisons they also form antidotes, and when 

 cultivated without the body, and introduced into the living 

 organism, they give rise to the production of these antidotes in 

 still greater quantity. 



The plan of protection from infective diseases, which was first 

 employed by Jenner in small-pox, is now being extended to many 

 other diseases, and the protective substances which are formed 

 in the body, and their mode of action, are being carefully investi- 

 :;ated. The introduction either of pathogenic microbes or 

 iif toxic products appears to excite in the body a process of 

 tissue change by which antitoxins are produced, and these may 

 be empioved either for the purpose of protection or cure. 

 By the use of antitoxins tetanus and diphtheria appear to 

 be deprived of much of their terrible power. l!ut it seems 

 probable that a similar result may be obtained by the introduc- 

 tion of certain tissue juices into the general circulation. It 

 was shown by Wooldridge that thyroid juice has a power of 

 destroying anthrax poison, and it seems probable that increase 

 of the circulation of certain organs will increase their tissue 

 activity, will throw their juices or. the ])roducts of their 

 functional activity into the general circulation, and thus 

 influence the invasion or progress of disease. As I 

 have already mentioned, we are able to influence the circu- 

 lation in muscles both by voluntary exertion and by passive 

 massage, and we should expect that both of these mca-ures 

 would inlluence the constituents of the blood generally ; and 

 such, indeed, appears to be the case, lor J. K. Mitchell - has 

 found that afler massage the number of blood corpuscles in the 

 circulation is very considerably incre.ased. 



Had time allowed it, I had intended to discuss the modifica- 

 tions of the heart and vessels by the introduction of remedies 

 into the circulation, the power of drugs to slow or strengthen, 

 to quicken or weaken the power of the heart, to contract or 

 relax the arterioles, to raise or lower the blood pressure, to 

 relieve pain or to remove dropsy ; but to do this wauld require 

 time far exceeding that of a single lecture. Moreover, the 

 methods and results were admirably expounded to the College 



* /)>-/.'. Mcti. Janrn.t February ai, 1874. p. 221 ctseg. 

 - American Journal of Medical Science^ May 18^(4. 



by Dr. Leech in his Croonian lecture, and I have therefore 

 thought I should be better fulfilling the wish of Harvey that the 

 orator of the year should exhort the Fellows and Members of 

 the College to search out the secrets of nature by way of experi- 

 ment by directing their attention to fields of research which 

 have received at present little attention, but promise results of 

 great practical value. Lastly, I have to exhort you to continue 

 in mutual love and affection among yourselves ; and it seems to 

 me that the best way of doing this is to direct your attention to 

 the examples of Harvey and of our late President, whose death 

 we deplore to-day. They were beloved by their fellows while 

 they lived, their loss was lamented when they died, and they 

 have left behind them an example not only of goodness, but of 

 courage. Harvey, seated speechless in his chair, distributing 

 rings and parting gifts to his friends while awaiiing the approach 

 of death ; or Andrew Clark, steadfastly determining to continue 

 at work and die in harness, in spite of the haemoptysis which 

 seemed to threaten a speedy death, affjtd us noble examples 

 which ought to encourage us to follow the directions of the 

 venerable Longfellow, who, taking the organ Harvey studied 

 to symbolise such courage as Harvey and Clark showed, says — 



" Let us then be up and doing 

 With a heart for any fate. 

 Still achieving, still pursuing, 

 Leam to labour and Co wait." 



SCIENTIFIC METHOD IN BOARD SCHOOLS} 



\ T the request of my friend and former pupil, Mr. W. M. 

 ■^^- Heller, I have undertaken to say a few words by way of 

 introduction to the course which he is about to give here to 

 assist a number of you who are teachers in schools in the Tower 

 Hamlets and Hackney district under the School Board for 

 London — a course of lessons expressly intended to direct your 

 attention to the educational value of instruction given solely 

 with the object of inculcating scieutijic habits of mind and 

 uuntific ways of working ; and expressly and primarily in- 

 tended to assist you in giving such teaching in your schools. 



Nothing could afford me greater pleasure, as I regard the 

 introduction of such teaching into schools generally — not Board 

 Schools merely, but all schools — as of the utmost importance ; 

 indeed, I may say, as of national importance : and I now con- 

 fidently look forward to the time, at no distant date, when this 

 will be everywhere acknowledged and acted on Personally I 

 regard the work that I have been able to do in this direction as 

 of far greater value than any purely scientific work that I have 

 accomplished. At the very outset of my career as a teacher, I 

 was led to see how illogical, unsatisfactory and artificial were 

 the prevailing methods of teaching, and became interested in 

 their improvement. My appointment as one of the first pro- 

 lessors at the Finsbury Technical College forced me to pay 

 particular attention to the subject and gave me abundant 

 opportunity of practically working out a scheme of my own. 

 I was the more anxious to do this, as I soon became convinced 

 that if any real progress were to be made in our system of 

 technical education, it was essential in the first place to intro- 

 duce improved methods of teaching into schools generally, so 

 that students of technical subjects might commence their studies 

 properly prepared ; and subsequent experience has only con- 

 firmed this view. Indeed it is beyond question, in the opinion 

 of many, that what we at present most want in this country are 

 proper systems of primary and secondary education : the latter 

 especially. Now, most students at our technical colleges, in 

 consequence of their defective school training, not only w.aste 

 much of their time in learning elementary principles with which 

 they should have been made familiar at school, and much of our 

 time by obliging us to give elementary lessons, but what is far 

 worse, they have acquired bad habits and convictions which 

 aie very diflicult to eradicate ; and their mental attitude towards 

 their studies is usually a false one. 



The first fruits of my experience were made public in 18S4, 

 at one of the Educational Conferences held at the Health 

 Exhibition. On that occasion, and again at the British Asso- 

 ciation meeting at Aberdeen in 1885, in the course of my 

 address as president of the Chemical Section, after somewhat 

 sharply criticising the methods of teaching in vogue, I pointed 

 out what I conceived to be the directions in which improvements 

 should be effected. Others meanwhile were working in the 



1 A rjivised address delivered at ihc Bcrncrs Street BoarJ SchiK)!, Com- 

 mercial Koad, London, E., on October .;, 1=94, by Prof. H. E. .\rm»trong, 

 F.R.S. 



NO. 1304, VOL. 50] 



