EE VIEWS. 
89 
€mplo 3 nnent, instead of the opaque varieties. The account of the mode of 
photographing objects is a lucid one ; and the tuial chapter, relating to the use 
of very high magnifying powers and the nature of cell-life, will be found 
to contain all that the most recent discoveries have taught. No pains have 
been spared to make the book a valuable companion for the microscopist, and 
in addition to its other matter there are appended lists embracing the names 
of all microscope makers, English and foreign, preparers of objects, artists, 
wood engravers, printers, and lithographers, stone preparers, manufacturers of 
apparatus, and the titles of British and foreign treatises on the microscope, 
and English periodicals relating to the science of histology. The opening 
plate exhibits a series of well executed photographs of microscopic objects, 
which can be examined with the little biconvex lens with which each copy is 
provided. In all there are over fifty-six beautiful plates, and we can honestly 
affirm of Dr. Beale’s treatise, that there is nothing relating to the microscope 
which is not discussed in its pages, and that it is a volume to be purchased 
by every working and amateur histologist. 
HE voliune on this subject which Dr. Anstie has produced is one of 
remarkable interest to the general as well as to the professional reader. 
Ignoring the doctrine of a vital force and maintaining Coleridge’s idea of life, 
that it is a tendency in a body to individuation, as the only peculiar and 
unvarying condition by which it can be described, he points out the nervous 
system to be the necessary requisite of individuation, as a mechanism by 
which a relation, most intimate and constant, between, the parts united in the 
individual whole is upheld. “ The standard of life,” he goes on, “ is a certain 
exact balance of various forces, developed with a certain constant relation to 
material tissue arranged in a definite manner ; to say that we increase such 
life or ‘ vitality ’ in one part of the organism by destroying this balance, is 
a contradiction in terms. And the standard of function in an organ is the 
accurate discharge of such an amount and kind of work as may help to main- 
tain this healthy adjustment of power and of matter in the organism ; to 
say, then, that an organ exhibits an increased activity merely because it is 
seen to be under the influence of extraordinary powers, and to present a new 
arrangement of matter, is incorrect.” To assume, then, according to the com- 
mon doctrine, that all mental excitement, increased sensibility, pain, comail- 
sive muscular action, considerable increase of secretion, and increase of the 
heart’s action are caused by, and proofs of, a stimulant action upon the 
organism is erroneous. The cause of such effects must be a devitahzing 
action. And hence those agents which produce any of these effects, so far 
from possessing claims to be stimulants as they are usually considered, are 
rather devitalizing agents, or causes of loss of nervous power. Such agents 
must be described as narcotics. A stimulant being an agent ha^dng the 
power of exciting the action of the nervous system is determined by its effects 
“ Stimulants and Narcotics, their Mutual Eelations.” By Francis E. 
Anstie, M.D., M.E.C.P., &c. London ; Macmillan & Co. 1864. 
STIMULANTS AND NAECOTICS.* 
