MEMOIE OF MAGENDI. 95 



iology ii) France. Bichat combined with the expenmental method of Haller 

 bold and judicious views, drawn from a source where prejudice had been accus- 

 tomed to look only for style ; he threw into technical language the ideas of 

 Buffon;* invested them with the forms of the school, and supported them by 

 anatomical demonstrations. By the energetic cast of his genius Bicliat swayed 

 his cotemporaries to the study of a science for Avhich his own ardor extended 

 even to the sacrifice of his life. One of his school-fellows, Le Gallois, died also 

 in tbe same task ; but invested neither with the prestige of easy eloquence, nor 

 with the facilities of success afforded by comradeship, this modest precursor of 

 modern studies on the nervous system obtained from renown nothing but the 

 scantiest justice.t 



Le Gallois was still living when M. Magendie presented himself in the arena 

 as a champion of undoubted pretensions. In his own person a strange but favor- 

 able result of a training conducted on the principles of Jean Jacques, completed 

 by the severest teachings of our first republic, he had proceeded to frame for 

 himself a code of duties ; a code which did not save him from the eccentricity of 

 manifesting by turns the most inflexible selfishness and admirable disinterested- 

 ness ; a rigid probity in the statement of his own labors, a culpable injustice or 

 contempt for those of others; a hard and intolerant humor towards every one 

 who seemed to stand in his way ; a kindness and generosity without bounds for 

 the feeble or afflicted. 



It was by criticism that M. Magendie first made himself known.t In 1808 

 he reproached Bichat Avith having abandoned himself to hypotheses, and declares 

 that, for his own part, he shall admit no fiicts which do not find their confirma- 

 tion in experiments competent for himself to repeat. In 1809 he presented to 

 the Academy of Sciences a memoir on one of the most important phenomena of 

 the animal economy, that of ahsorptwn. If an active subi^tance, a poison or 

 virus, is introduced into any part of the body, that substance is immediately ab- 

 sorbed — that is to say, is carried from the more superficial parts to the deeper 

 and more essential. By what organs is this transfer effected? Is it by the 

 veins, or by the lymphatic vessels? Haller thought that it was by the former; 

 John Hunter, by the latter; other physiologists hesitated. By a bold experi- 

 ment, M. Magendie suppresses ihe lymphatic vessels ;§ he leaves only the veins; 



* See, as regards the obligations of Bichat to Buffon, my work, Dcla Vie, Sfc, part second, 

 p 17 ct scfj. 



t See the work of Gallois entitled Erperiences sur In Principe dc la Vie, notamment sur 

 Cclui dcs Moutemr.nts du CUcur ct sur tc Siege dc cc Principe. Paris, J812. It is from this 

 book, a conscieutious and profound labor, that dates, in France, the physiological study of 

 the nervous system. 



X See his nieaioir entitled Quelques Idies ncneralcs sur Ics Phgnomenes particuliers mix 

 Corps til-ants, (Bulletin dcs Sciences Medicates, 1809. p. 145 ) M. Bernard, the distinguished 

 disciple and friend of M. Magendie, has given a good simimary of his little tract, which is 

 essentially but a criticism of the vital properties of Bichat. "Why invent," asks M. Ma- 

 gendie, " on occasion of each phenomenon of living bodies, a particular and special vital 

 force? Might wo not content ourselves with a single force which we should call vital force 

 in a general manner, in admitting that it gives rise to different phenomena according to the 

 structure of the organs and tissues which operate under its influence ? But is not even this 

 single vital function too much ? Is there not here a simple hypothesis, since we cannot de- 

 tect it ? It woukl bo of greater advantage if physiology only commenced at the instant when 

 the phenomena of living bodies become appreciable by our senses." (Notice sur M. Mu>rcn- 



dic ; Lcqon d'Owccrturc du Coursde Medicine an College dc France, ISilG, p. 7. 

 ^ " jSI. Delille and I separated from tlie body the thigh of a dog previously c 



comatized with 



opium; we left untouched only the crural artej-y and vein, which preserved the communica- 

 tion between the thigh and the trunk. These tv/o vessels were dissected with the greatest 

 care ; their cellular tunic was removed, for fear that it m^ght contain some lymphatic ves- 

 sels. Two grains of a very subtle poison (upas ticutej were then injected into the paw; 

 the effects of this poison were as prompt and intense as if the thigh had not been separated 

 from the body. It might be objected that, in spite of all the precautions taken, the walls of 

 the crural artery and vein still contained lymphatics, and that these vessels sufdced to "-ivo 



