Augtisi 4, 1881] 



NATURE 



325 



like 2500 medical men, 110 less than 1000 being from 

 abroad, and 500 from the provinces. Indeed, the at- 

 tendance is more than double that of any previous Con- 

 gress. Among the distinguished foreigners who attend 

 the Congress are the following ; — Dr. Fordyce Barker, 

 New York ; Dr. Billings, Washington ; Dr. Bigelow, 

 Boston ; Professors Brown-S(fquard, Paris ; Chauveau, 

 Lyons; Donders, Utrecht; Professors Holmgren, Upsala; 

 His, Leipsic ; Kolliker, Wurzburg ; Klebs, Prague ; 

 Loven, Stockholm ; Pasteur, Paris ; ffliiger, Bonn ; Pan- 

 teleoni, Rome ; Von Slawjansky, St. Petersburg ; Stokvis, 

 Amsterdam; V'irchow, Berlin. A very large concourse of 

 members thronged the rooms of the College on Tuesday, 

 and crowded St. James's Hall yesterday morning, when 

 Sir James Paget delivered the presidential address. The 

 sectional meetings are being held in the rooms of the 

 various scientific societies in the Burlington House region, 

 and there are fifteen of them altogether. Prof. V'irchow gave 

 an address last night on " The Value of Pathological E.xpe- 

 riments." To-day Prof. Maurice Raynaud gives a general 

 address on " Scepticism in Medicine " ; to-morrow Dr. 

 Billings of Washington gives an address on "Our Medi- 

 cal Literature " ; and to-morrow night the Lord Mayor and 

 Corporation receive the members in the Guildhall at a 

 conversazione. On Saturday there will be several excur- 

 sions, and Sir Joseph Hooker will hold a reception at Kew 

 in the afternoon. On Monday at a general meeting Prof. 

 Volkmann of Halle will lecture on '' Modern Surgery"; 

 and on Tuesday Prof. Huxley will lecture on " The 

 Connection of the Biological Sciences with Medicine." 

 We this week give the opening address of Sir James 

 Paget : — 



As I look round this hall my admiration is moved not only 

 by the number and total power of the minds which are here, 

 but by their diversity, a diveraily iu which I believe they 

 fairly represent the whole of tho^e who are engaged iu 

 the cultivation of our science. Yar here are minds represent- 

 ing the distinctive characters of all the must gifted and most 

 educated nations ; characters still distinctly iiauonal, in spite 

 of the constantly increasing intercourse of the nations. 

 And from many of these nations we have both elder and 

 younger men ; tlioughtful men and practical ; men of fact and 

 men of imagination ; some conlideut, some sceptic ; various, 

 also, in education, in purpose and mode of study, in disposition, 

 and in power. And scarcely less various are the places and all 

 the circumstances in which those who are here have collected 

 and have been using their knowledge. For I think that our 

 calling is pre-eminent iu its range of opportunities for scientific 

 study. It is not only that the pure science of human life 

 may match with the largest of the natural sciences in the 

 complexity of its subject-matter ; not only that the living 

 human body is, iu both its material and its indwelling 

 forces, the most complex thing yet known, but that in our 

 practical duties this most complex thing is presented to 

 us in an almost infinite multiformity. For in practice we are 

 occupied, not with a type and pattern of the human nature, but 

 with all its varieties in all classes of men, of every age and every 

 occupation, and all climates and all social states ; we have to 

 study men singly and in multitudes, in poverty and iu wealth, in 

 wise and unwise living, in health and all the varieties of disease ; 

 and we have to learn, or at least try to learn, the results of all 

 these conditions of life while, iu successive generations and in 

 the mingling of families, they are heaped together, confused, 

 and always changing. In every one of all these conditions man, 

 iu mind and body, must be studied by us ; and every one of 

 theih ofters some different problems for inquiry and solution. 

 Wherever our duty or our scientific curiosity, or, in happy com- 

 bination, both, may lead us, there are the materials and there 

 the opportunities for separate original research. 



Now, from these various opportunities of study, men are here 

 iu Congress. Surely, whatever a multitude and diversity of 

 minds can in a few days do for the promotion of knowledge, 

 may be done here. 



But it is not projjosed to leave the work of the Congress to 

 what would seem like chances and disorder, good as the result 

 might be ; nor yet to the personal influences by which we may 

 all be made fitter for work, though tliese may be very potent. 



In the stir and controversy of meetings such as we ohall have, 

 there cannot fail to be useful emulation ; by the examples that 

 will appear of success in research, many will be moved to more 

 enthusiasm, many to more keen study of the truth ; our range 

 of work will be made wider, and we shall gain that greater in- 

 terest in each other's view-s and that clearer a| prehension of 

 them which are ah\ays attained by personal acquaintance and by 

 memories of association in pleasure as well as iu work. But as 

 it will not be left to chance, so neither will sentiment have to 

 fulfil the chief duties of the Congress. 



Following the good example of our predecessors, certain sub- 

 jects have been selected which will be chiefly, though not exclu- 

 sively, discussed, and the di-cussions are to be in the sectious 

 into which we shall soon divide. 



Of these subjects it would not be for me to speak even if I 

 were competent to do so ; unless I may say that they are so 

 numerous and complete that — together with the opening ad- 

 dresses of the Presidents of Sections — they leave me nothing but 

 such generalities as may seem commonjiiace. They have beeu 

 selected, after the custom of former meetings, from the most 

 stirring and practical questions of the day ; tliey are thi se w hich 

 must occupy men's minds, and on which there is at this time 

 most reason to expect progress, or even a just decision, from 

 very wide discus^ion. They will be discussed by those most 

 learned in them, and in many instances by tho»e who have spent 

 months or years in studying them, and who now offer their work 

 for criticism and judgment. 



I will only observe that the subjects selected in every section 

 involve questions in the solution of w hich all the varieties of 

 mind and knowledge of which I have spoken may find their 

 use. For there are questions, not only on many subjects, but 

 iu all stages of progress towards settlement. Jn some the chief 

 need seems to be the collection of facts well observed by many 

 persons. I say by many, not only because many facts are 

 wanted, but because in all difficult research it is we 1 that each 

 apparent fact should be observed by many ; for things are not 

 what they appear to each one mind. In that which each man 

 beUeves that he observes, there is something of himself ; and 

 for certainty, even on matters of fact, we often need the agree- 

 ment of many minds, that the personal element of each may be 

 counteracted. And much more is this necessary in the consi- 

 deration of the many questions which are to be decided by dis- 

 cussing the several values of admitted facts and of probabilities, 

 and of the conclusions drawn from them. For, on questions 

 such as these minds of all kinds may be well employed. Here 

 there wdl be occasion even for those which are not uncondi- 

 tionally praiseworthy, such as those that habitually doubt, and 

 those to whom the invention of arguments is more pleasing than 

 the mere search for truth. Nay, we may be able to observe the 

 utility even of error. We may not indeed wish for a prevalence 

 of errors ; they are not more desirable than are the crime and 

 misery which evoke charity. And yet in a congress we may 

 palliate them, for we may see how, as we may often read in 

 history, errors, like doubts and contrary pleadings, serve to 

 bring out the truth, to make it express itself in clearest term.s and 

 show its w hole strength and value. Adversity is an _excellent 

 school for truth as well as for virtue. 



But that which I would chiefly note, in relation to ithe great 

 variety of minds which are here, is that it is characteristic of that 

 mental pliancy and readiness for variation which is essential to 

 all scientific progress, and which a great international congress 

 may illustrate and promote. In all the subjects for discussion 

 we look for the attainment of some novelty and change in 

 knowledge or belief ; and after every such change there must 

 ensue a change in some of the conditions of thinking and of 

 working. Now, for all these changes minds need to be pliant 

 and quick to adjust themselves. For all progressive science 

 there mu-t be minds that are young whatever may be their age. 



Just as the discovery of auscultation brought to us the neces- 

 sity for a refined cultivation of the sense of hearing, which was 

 before of oidy the same use iu medicine as in the common busi- 

 ness of life ; or, as the employment of the numerical method in 

 estimating the value of facts required that minds should be able 

 to record and think in ways previously unused ; or, as the ac- 

 ceptance of the doctrine of evolution has changed the course of 

 thinking in whole departments of science : so is it, in less mea- 

 sure, in every less advance of knowledge. All such advances 

 change the circumstances of the mental life, and minds that 

 cannot or will not adjust themselves become less useful, or must 

 at least modify their manner of utility. They may continue to 



