TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 101 



concerning the effects of agents so called Physiological and Therapeutical, are 

 becoming of less value, and new ones of more. Most of us, who have passed the 

 prime of life, must be content to learn from the more favoured in years. They 

 who are young must be willing to be patient and laborious, if they would add any 

 thing of permanent value to physiological knowledge. The day in which hundreds 

 of organic compounds are synthetically produced, and the microscope offers for 

 mechanical analysis a clearly defining magnifying power of 5000 linear, is not one 

 when rough work of hand, or conjecture unsupported by proof as to the chemical 

 changes which go on within organic structures, will stand. What Life is will long, 

 perhaps always evade our human ken ; what is done during Life, what can be done 

 consistently with Life, and what produces death among living things, every year 

 makes more sure and more plain ; every year makes the search more exciting, the 

 reward more great, the reasons for admiration of the order of things on the whole 

 more conclusive, and the admiration and awe more profound. 



At the outset it was said that only very qualified assent coidd be given to the 

 remark of a philosophical writer, that it is a prime necessity for Biology that it 

 should be separated from Medicine. It has been my endeavour to show the 

 amount of truth which belongs respectively to the remark and to the dissent. 



Physiology, to sum up, is become a science, precise, of enormous extent, bringing 

 to its support mathematics, advanced physics, difficult chemistry, accurate and com- 

 prehensive anatomy. Part of the basis of the science or art, which averts or lessens 

 suffering and disease, and postpones or makes easy death, depends in great mea- 

 sure upon its progress. But the applied and observational part can only be learned 

 by the bed-side of the sick. Therefore pure Biological Science and pure Clinical 

 Art must each have their votaries, but it must be the aim of each to learn from the 

 other what is necessary for himself. May the State be wise enough (and it is 

 becoming so in every civilized country) to appreciate these principles and their 

 application ! There never was an age — it is not ungratefid to the giants of old to 

 say this — there never was an age when there were so many students, in the best 

 sense, of Biology and of Medicine, actuated by a simple love of truth ; and never 

 a time when, as a class, they were so free from prejudice, so candid, and so patient. 



On Life. By Dr. Lionel S. Beale, F.E.S. 



On the Formation of Pus, in reference to the doctrine of Cell Pathology. By 

 J. Hughes Bennett, M.D., Professor of the Institutes of Medicine, Sfc. in the 

 University of Edinburgh. 



Dr. Bennett stated that a cell pathology had naturally sprung from the cell theory 

 as originally framed by its founders, Schleiden and Schwann, which had greatly 

 extended the boundaries of science. The cell pathology of Virchow, however, was 

 ba^ed upon a law he sought to establish, viz., that every cell sprung from a pre- 

 existing cell, and that we must not transfer the seat of real action to any point be- 

 yond the cell. This supposed law, the author maintained, was opposed by so many 

 histological facts as to be altogether untenable. He begged especially to draw at- 

 tention to the origin of pus-cells, which Yirchow and some of his followers had re- 

 presented as originating in the interior of connective-tissue corpuscles. Dr. Bennett 

 and his pupils had frequently sought, by passing setons through the skin and 

 muscles of animals, to observe in the inflamed tissues the appearances which had 

 been figured in support of Virchow's views, but had never succeeded in seeing pus- 

 cells within preexisting cells. Henle had pointed out that the error had originated 

 in mistaking the triangular spaces observable on a transverse section between the 

 bundles of various fibrous tissues for cells, as in these unquestionably pus was very 

 likely to collect. Dr. Bennett further believed that the tendency of many cells to 

 enlarge as the result of irritation, and to multiply themselves endogenously, as 

 shown by himself, Lebert, Goodsir, Redfern, and other pathologists, was another 

 source of mistake among the younger histologists. The granides and included cells 

 so formed were mistaken by them for those of pus, though easily separated from 

 them. He called attention to a series of preparations (which were exhibited) 

 showing suppuration in inflamed eyeballs and in pneumonic lungs, in which pus- 



