120 REPORT — 1873. 



scopical study before this audience, I cannot but remember that in this country 

 more than in any other we have a number of learned gentlemen who, as amateurs, 

 eagerly pursue investigations in this department. I confess that 1 am always sorry 

 to'witness the enthusiastic perseverance with which they apply themselves to the 

 prolonged study of markings upon diatoms, important though these be in many 

 respects, seeing that they might direct their efforts to subjects which would repay 

 them for their labours far more gratefully. I would venture to suggest to such 

 workers that it is now more than ever necessary to abandon all aims at haphazard 

 discoveries, and to approach microscopy by the only legitimate method, of under- 

 going a thorough preliminary training in the various methods of microscopical 

 investigation by competent teachers, of whom there are now plenty throughout the 

 country. 



State of Physiology. 

 With regard to physiology, the present standpoint is not so high as in the case 

 of anatomy. Physiology, resting as it does upon a ti-ipod consisting of anatomy, 

 physics or mechanics, and chemistry, is many-sided. The most minute anatomy, 

 the most recondite physics, and the most complex chemistry have all to be taken 

 into account in the study of the physiology of living things ; so that it is not sur- 

 prising that it should, in its development, lag behind the comparatively elementary 

 subject anatomy. Until not so very long ago anatomy and physiology were,_ in 

 most of our medical schools, taught by the same professor, who, although professing 

 to teach both subjects, was generally more of an anatomist than a physiologist. 

 This arrangement gave to physiology a bias which was eminently^ anatomical; and 

 this bias continued in many quarters, notwithstanding the separation of the physio- 

 looical from the anatomical tuition, I am aware that there are still some distin- 

 guished anatomists who intermingle physiological with anatomical teaching. I am 

 not questioning the usefulness of the practice when carried to a moderate extent. 

 I wish merely to point out what appears to me to have been a result of the practice, 

 and I believe that the result was to give to physiologj^ an anatomical tendency. It 

 was natiu-al for the anatomist who dealt with visible structure to constantly refer 

 to this in explaining physiological action or function. Tlie physiologist with the 

 anatomical tendency always tried to explain a difference in the action or function 

 of a part by a difference in its evident structure ; and when his microscope failed to 

 show any structural difi'erence between the cells which form saliva and those which 

 produce pancreatic fluid, between the egg of a rabbit and that of a dog, he, baffled 

 on the side of anatomy, was too ready to adopt the conclusion that, inasmuch as the 

 microscope i-eveals 7io diffcrmice in the structure, there is really no structural differ- 

 ence between them, and that the only way in which the difference in action can be 

 explained is by having recourse to the old hypothesis, that the metamorphoses of 

 matter .and the actions offeree are in the living world regulated by a metaphysical 

 entity termed a vital principle, and that dissimilar actions by similarly constructed 



farts are only to be explained by referring them to the operations of this principle. 

 After alluding further to the "hypothesis of the vital principle and its supposed 

 actions, and after stating that he did not follow the teaching of those who still 

 adhere to this doctrine, the author said that, viewed from the physical side, there 

 appears to be no reason for supposing that two particles of protoplasm, which pos- 

 sess a similar microscopic structure, must act in the same way ; for the physicist 

 knows that molecular structure and action are beyond the ken of the microscopist, 

 and that within apparently homogeneous jelly-like particles of protoplasm there 

 may be differences of molecular composition and arrangement which determine 

 widely different properties.] 



A gi-eat change is now taking place in physiological tuition in this country— -a 

 superabundance of physiological anatomy and an almost entire absence of experi- 

 ment are no longer its characteristic features. Tlie study of physics, too much 

 neglected, is happily now being more and more regarded as important in the pre- 

 liminary training of the physiologist as the study of anatomy and of chemistry ; 

 and I trust that the day is not far distant when in our medical_ schools the thorough 

 education of our students in mathematics and physics will be insisted upon as abso- 

 lutely essential elements in their preliminary education. Until this is done phy- 



