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PHYSIOLOGY : ITS PLACE IN EDUCATION. 
ledge and judgment to be of universal application : and 
hence they are accepted as guides in matters on which they 
have as little correct information as those whom they 
mislead. The error lies in the system of education which 
has been generally followed in our universities and schools 
— a system far behind the requirements of the time. There 
is, however, a dawn of improvement in this direction, as we 
shall presently more plainly point out. The study of 
physiology would be important to the clergy if it only 
restrained them from doing mischief — if its influence on 
their actions were merely negative. But this knowledge 
would also be productive of positive good ; for it would 
enable them to point out where infringements of natural 
laws were being committed, and how they might be ob- 
viated. 
Members of the legal profession, especially in the higher 
grades, are often called on to decide questions involving a 
knowledge of the phenomena of life. It is true, that they 
ordinarily call medical evidence to their aid ; but of the real 
value of this, they have little or no idea ; and, if it be con- 
flicting, they are liable to be utterly confounded. It cannot, 
then, be a matter for wonder, that they should sometimes 
adopt decisions entirely at variance with physiological facts. 
We say here little of those most abtruse phenomena, the 
mental functions; although these may, for all practical 
purposes, be included in our remarks. But, in regard to 
more obvious and tangible facts, how can a judge decide 
rightly, in cases where questions involving the several points 
arise, who does not know, for instance, the phenomena of the 
absorption of a poison, the circulation of the blood, the 
nature of the air which we breathe, or the mode in which 
the process of respiration is carried on ? His decision, if 
correct, must be a piece of good luck; or it must be the 
result of the laborious exercise of common sense, operating 
in the midst of confusion, where a little instruction in 
common physiological principles would have made all clear. 
To the conductors of schools a knowledge of physiology 
would be useful, in preventing them from committing many 
of the absurdities which are practised. In these institutions, 
especially, we believe, in girls’ schools, there is too often a 
gross neglect of rational principles. As a rule, there is too 
much restraint of the natural lively impulses of children, 
while a rigid discipline of “ Papa, potatoes, poultry, prunes, 
and prism,’’ is enforced. This system is absurd and wrong 
enough in itself; but there are some institutions where the 
defiance of nature is carried to a far greater extent. For 
