424 Observations on Organic Chemistry 



chargeable with the error) refuse to adopt the methods of physics and 

 chemistry — methods which have been pursued with such signal success 

 in these sciences — so long as they are unable to discriminate between 

 useful and useless experiments, and rest satisfied with the weighing of 

 smoke, it is impossible that they should make any real progress. 



Why do these physiologists and pathologists reject our science? By 

 abandoning the Aristotlean method, that of the phlogiston theorists, 

 namely, converting effects into causes, Chemistry has, during the last 

 fifty years, progressed with gigantic strides towards comprehending all 

 the natural phenomena within its domain. This science is at present 

 in a rapid course of development, especially in its organic department; 

 it is endeavouring to advance from the simple facts already ascertained 

 — its known data — to the investigation and apprehension of the more 

 complex and more intricate phenomena which still remain mysteries to 

 us. It has already made us familiar with the effects and actions of forces 

 upon all the inorganic matters in nature, and it is now employed in seek- 

 ing to ascertain and define the exact share which those forces take in the 

 vital processes, the limit of their sway in the living organism, and thus 

 to distinguish and separate the chemical actions from the operations 

 of the ultimate cause of vital phenomena — from the effects of life itself. 



Chemistry, in its bearings upon, and application to medicine and 

 physiology, may be considered as a microscope, adapted to facilitate 

 observations and investigations into the mysteries of nature, and to 

 render the phenomena observed more intelligible to the intellectual eye, 

 and more susceptible of useful applications. 



To comprehend the living organism entirely and satisfactorily we 

 must be acquainted with everything occurring within it. But how can 

 we read and understand a book if we are acquainted with only half the 

 letters of the language in which it is written, and but few of the rules 

 by which the construction of the language is governed. The letters 

 and the rules necessary to be known for the comprehension of this 

 volume of nature have been the object of the most laborious resear- 

 ches of the most sagacious and best experienced men for a thousand 

 years. These researches have proved unavailing, the end is not yet at- 

 tained, because a wrong road was taken, and the means employed were 

 not adapted to the object in view. A right direction, correct means, ju- 

 dicious and well considered methods, were formerly altogether wanting. 



Medicine and physiology are, like other sciences, in a continual state 

 of progress ; enormous labours, the expenditure of incalculable ener- 

 gies, have elevated these sciences to that high degree of development 

 which they have attained, to the exalted ground they now occupy. 



