342 THE BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES AND MEDICINE. [LECT. 



to the best advantage, increasing the growth of the 

 whole, supplying any losses, keeping up a due succes- 

 sion, etc." (I.e. p. 133). 



If we follow Hunter's conceptions to their logical 

 issue, the life of one of the higher animals is essentially 

 the sum of the lives of all the vessels, each of which 

 is a sort of physiological unit, answering to a polype ; 

 and, as health is the result of the normal " action of 

 the vessels," so is disease an effect of their abnormal 

 action. Hunter thus stands in thought, as in time, 

 midway between Borelli on the one hand, and Bichat 

 on the other. 



The acute founder of general anatomy, in fact, 

 outdoes Hunter in his desire to exclude physical 

 reasonings from the realm of life. Except in the 

 interpretation of the action of the sense organs, he 

 will not allow physics to have anything to do with 

 physiology. 



" To apply the physical sciences to physiology is 

 to explain the phenomena of living bodies by the laws 

 of inert bodies. Now this is a false principle, hence 

 all its consequences are marked with the same stamp. 

 Let us leave to chemistry its affinity ; to physics, its 

 elasticity and its gravity. Let us invoke for physiology 

 only sensibility and contractility." 1 



Of all the unfortunate dicta of men of eminent 

 ability this seems one of the most unhappy, when we 

 think of what the application of the methods and 

 the data of physics and chemistry has done towards 

 bringing physiology into its present state. It is not 



1 " Anatomie generate," i. p. liv. 



