274 OWEN'S POSITION IN 



of the ground and rough-hewing of the foundation- 

 stones, the stately edifice of later builders could 

 not have been erected. 



In view of these considerations, it was not 

 altogether w T ith a light heart that I assented to 

 the proposal Sir Richard Owen's biographer did 

 me the honour to make, that I should furnish him 

 with a critical estimate of the extensive and varied 

 labours in the field of natural science carried on, 

 for some sixty years, with singular energy, by that 

 eminent man. For I have to reckon, more than 

 most, with those causes of imperfect or distorted 

 vision to which, as I have said, the eyes of con- 

 temporaries are obnoxious ; and, how 7 ever con- 

 fident of the will to correct their effects, I can 

 hardly hope to be entirely successful, without more 

 good fortune than I have a right to look for. 



It is an enhancement of the difficulties of the 

 task set me, that what I have to say must be 

 addressed not to experts, but to the general 

 public, to the great majority of whom anatomy 

 is as much a sealed book as the higher mathe- 

 matics. Even if some few have penetrated a little 

 way, their progress has probably been arrested by 

 the discovery that discussions about anatomical 

 topics are, as a rule, pre-eminently dry and tech- 

 nical. It must be admitted that there is some 

 justification for the popular distaste for anatomical 

 science. The associations of the subject are not 

 wholly pleasing ; and, undoubtedly, a long and 



