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MR. MORLEY ROBERTS ON THE FUNCTION OF 



what is pathological in one organism may be physiological in 

 another and that many diseases are reversions, that is, failure in 

 normal growth. Yet this greatly needed to be shown, and it 

 is not to be expected of a great pathologist and surgeon, and 

 perhaps the less the greater he is in his own branches of work, 

 that he should -attempt tasks from which many of the biologists 

 themselves seemed to shrink. Claude Bernard made similar 

 remarks as to pathology. It is to be regretted that a stumbling 

 block was placed in the path of progress by Darwin's hopeless 

 dictum as to the explanation of variation, just as another was by 

 Huxley when he declared consciousness an insoluble problem. 

 In every science great discoverers have too often delayed progress 

 as much by authoritative unsound opinion as they have advanced 

 it. Every Bible is first a book of revolution and then a refuge 

 for reaction. Yet no man can possibly know all he should know 

 for the purposes of his own work. This fact affords the only 

 justification for those, who cannot pretend to profound knowledge 

 in any special line, attempting to solve problems which by their 

 nature are beyond the specialist. They may have been able to 

 grasp in a measure the general conclusions of each science and 

 by a. happy, perhaps accidental, combination, show at least part 

 of the forest to those more particularly occupied with the trees 

 themselves or the flora of the undergrowth. 



It is remarkable that hitherto no one seems to have made the 

 observation that reaction to an actual, or threatened, breakdown 

 is one of the basal laws of all construction and organization. 

 Yet none can read engineering without observing that all 

 development has followed such lines. As new stresses are 

 introduced failure is threatened and steps are taken to obviate 

 disaster. What is a patch in one engine becomes organic in the 

 next. Since waste of energy can be looked on as pathological, 

 we observe the reaction in the engineer against such failures, as 

 the atmospheric engine is succeeded by improved forms ending 

 in the quadruple expansion engine. Many other instances could 

 be adduced in general or special engineering evolution, but 

 the best illustration of the facts which need elucidation can 

 perhaps be found in Gothic architecture. If such a demon- 

 stration of this general principle can be made it will go far to 

 obviate the objection, very likely to be made, that what occurs 

 in human construction has no relevance to the living organism, 

 especially if it can be suggested forcibly that human intelligence 

 is in itself a reaction, and that the law obtains in developments 

 of all kinds. That trial and error are at the base of evolution is 

 indeed implied in the current teaching as to variation, and its 

 extension to intellectual processes will surprise no worker who 

 has had to deal experimentally with the unknown. We may 

 expect, but never know where to look for, failure till we see it. 

 When it is seen we can do our best, as reacting agents, to remedy 

 it. Having said so much, and leaving aside the wider implica- 

 tions of such views, we may turn to such a problem of construction 



